THE PALMS OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS 
By O. BEccaRi 
(Florence, Italy) 
THREE PLATES 
The species of palms at present known to be indigenous to 
the Philippines number one hundred twenty, not including a 
few semiwild or cultivated forms. Of that number but about 
a dozen are species of relatively wide geographic distribution, 
all the others being endemic forms. The nonendemic element 
is in part derived from species growing in swamps or at the 
mouths of rivers, along the coasts of neighboring countries, and 
are the following: Oncosperma filamentosa, Oncosperma horrida, 
Caryota mitis, Licuala spinosa, Nipa fruticans, Korthalsia laci- 
niosa, and three species of Calamus. The following are also 
nonendemic Philippine palms: Actinorhytis calapparia, Arenga 
saccharifera, Corypha elata, Metroxylon Rumphii, Caryota Rum- 
phiana, Livistona cochinchinensis, and L. rotundifolia, some of 
which may have been introduced by man or by other means. 
Heterospatha elata, which is common in the Philippines, is 
reported as growing also in the Moluccas, but I have not seen 
specimens of it collected in those islands. In fact the genus 
Heterospatha is represented in the Philippines by four species 
and may be considered as a Polynesian element in the Philip- 
pine flora. With this exception and that of Adonidia, discussed 
below, all the Philippine endemic species belong to genera more 
frequently found in the Malay Peninsula, the Malayan islands, 
and in Cochinchina; these genera are Areca, Pinanga, Arenga, 
Caryota, Orania, Ptychoraphis, Oncosperma, Livistona, Kor- 
thalsia, Zalacca, Plectocomia, Calamus, and Daemonorops. 
Only one genus appears to be exclusively Philippine, Adonidia, 
mentioned above, which belongs in a group of palms very rich 
in genera and species in the Papuan and Polynesian regions, 
but only scantily represented in southern Asia and in Malaya 
proper. e 
It is rather surprising that some common Malayan genera 
are either not at all or at most very poorly represented in the 
Philippines. Thus the genus Jguanura is entirely wanting. In 
Licuala, a gefius with numerous species in the primeval Malayan 
; 295 
