Kapok

Where it grows

The kapok or ceiba tree is found in tropical lowland rainforests on both sides of the Atlantic, from the Amazon basin and Central America through the Caribbean to West and Central Africa. It is one of the tallest trees of the New World tropics and a defining emergent of the canopy.

How to recognise it

A massive smooth grey trunk supports enormous plank buttress roots that can stand taller than a person. The trunk is studded with thick conical spines on young trees. The palmate leaves carry 5 to 8 leaflets, and the tree drops them briefly in the dry season. The fruits are large pods that split to release seeds embedded in fluffy white kapok fibre.

Uses

Kapok fibre is too short to spin into thread but is buoyant and resilient, historically packing life jackets, mattresses, and pillows before synthetic foams. Seeds yield an edible oil. The light wood is hollowed into dugout canoes across the tropics.

In culture

The Maya regarded the ceiba as the sacred tree of life, connecting the underworld, earth, and heavens. It is the national tree of Guatemala and Puerto Rico.