These trees are in downtown LA right near the Disney Concert Hall. The pics are from mid July, 2010. I've been trying all night to track them down, but none of my searches are bearing fruit. Long, thin, tan-colored, papery seed pods, dark yellow, orchid-like flowers, and opposite-compound, acuminate leaves with deep, pinnate venation. None of these fancy words have helped me track down an ID so far :)
The pod and flower shapes are very much alike catalpa. Could it be Yellow Catalpa, Catalpa ovata? If not, then this is some relative of it from Bignoniaceae.
What about one of the yellow Tabebuia? The leaves, flowers and pods description matches. See http://www.statemaster.com/encyclopedia/Tabebuia Most of what I've seen says they flower in the spring before the leaves come out, but one site mentioned one that can flower several times a year. That was for a pink one, but maybe a yellow one does that too.
Did you ever get a name for this? It's exactly the tree I'm looking to ID, at the Honolulu Zoo. Flowers are marked at the throat like Tabebuia, but the leaves are simple (or maybe pinnately compound - I can't tell from your photos or mine). Pods are longer than what I'm seeing for Tabebuia or Tecoma; it seems most of the Tabebuia have Tecoma synonyms anyway. Here is a Tecoma stans photo that looks possible, unlike most of the other Tecoma stans photos I see, so maybe it's not identified correctly: http://www.thegardener.co.za/kb/assets/A Gillian/Tecoma-stans-alien.jpg It really looks like your leaf margins are not serrated, and that's what I thought on the tree at the zoo, so that's another thing that makes me think it's not Tacoma stans. I do think it has to be in the Bignoniaceae family.
Wait - I have a good possibility - Markhamia lutea. At least it occurs in Hawaii, has the throat markings, corolla petals are shaped similarly, leaves are shiny, pinnately compound, leaflet margins are entire (not serrated), pods are long, flat and a little twisted, in bunches. I really think this is it. Starr Environmental pages do it again for me. Plants in Hawaii on Flickr - Bignoniaceae [Edited] I see that I have some photos of this species from Kauai, NTBG McBride, label had old name, looks similar to me. I'm attaching a photo of the trunk, to confirm the match, assuming that I labelled it correctly. Too bad I had no memory of this. I do remember being excited about it at the time, stopped the gardeners to ask about it, and they found the label for me (I have a photo of them showing me the tag).
