PALMACEAE 243 



PALMACEAE. Palm Family. 



Commonly trees with fibrous roots and columnar unbranched trunks covered 

 with leaf-scars or the bases of leaf-stalks and bearing a tuft of large leaves at 

 summit. Leaves sharply plaited when young, eventually tearing more or less 

 along the lines of the folds. Flowers minute, conunonly monoecious, in ours 

 perfect, borne in a large inflorescence enclosed by a spathe. Perianth in two 

 circles, an outer 3-lobed calyx and an inner 3-parted corolla. Stamens 6, inserted 

 on the corolla-tube. Carpels 3, separate or united, each 1-ovuled. Fruit a berry, 

 drupe or nut. — Genera 128 and species about 1200, almost entirely in. the tropics. 



1. WASHINGTONIA Wendl. Fan Palm. 



Trees with fan-shaped much folded blades and long petioles armed with stout 

 hooked spines along the margins. Pistil 1; ovary 3-celled; style and stigma 1. 

 Fruit a berry. — Species 3, Southern and Lower California and Sonora. 



Bibliog.— Parish, S. B., California Palnis (Gard. & For. 3:51-52,-1890); Contribution 

 towards a knowledge of the genus Washingtonia (Bot. Gaz. 44:408-434, figs. 1-12, — 1907); 

 Eoezl and the type of Washingionia (Bot. Gaz. 48:462^63,-1909). 



1. W. filifera Wendl. California Fan Palm. (Fig. 37.) Columnar 

 tree 20 to 75 feet high, the trunk 1 to 3 feet in diameter at the enlarged base, 

 covered with a scaly i-ind and sometimes clothed quite to the ground with a 

 tliatch of dead persistent recurved leaf-bases ; leaves fan-shaped, 3 to 6 feet long, 

 with 40 to 60 folds, torn nearly to the middle, the divisions copiously fibrous; 

 petioles 2 to 5 feet long, very stout ; flowers borne in a branched panicle on long 

 stems, the whole 8 to 12 feet long; berries borne on pedicels 1 to l^/o lines long, 

 black, oval, 3 to 3i/o lines long, with thin flesh surrounding a large seed which 

 is flattened somewhat on the ventral side ; endosperm horny. 



Westerly and northerly sides of the Colorado Desert, on or above the old 

 beach line of the one-time interior sea, always in moist spots or oases, from near 

 sea-level to 3500 ft. 



Loes. — West side of Colorado Desert (south to north) : Pabn Sprs., 9 mi. e. of Vallecito 

 Sprs. (palms now destroyed, U. S. Geol. Sur. Water-Supply Paper 224:85); Mountain Pabn 

 Sprs., a few miles southerly from the preceding sta. ; several trees in Hell-hole Canon, Mt. San 

 Ysidro; Palm Canon of San Ysidro, the lowest group in the caiion {V^ mi. from mouth of 

 gorge) has about 86 large trees and 45 small ones (Button & Jepson), the entire caiion said 

 to contain a thousand; Indian Caiion, opening n. into Collins Valley, trees in all the western 

 side-caiions where there is water and also at intervals in upper part of main caiion (Button 

 & Jepson) ; Thousand Palms Caiion, opening into Collins Valley (the number of trees does 

 not justify the name — Wm. Sehnoka) ; Las Coyotas, Coyote Caiion; Seventeen Palms, at 

 southeasterly base of the Santa Eosa Mts. in the Sheep Hills; Dos Palraas, easterly from 

 Piiion Flat, Santa Rosa Mts., 3500 ft. alt.; Palm Canon of San Jacinto, about 100 trees; Lukens 

 Caiion, 50 or 60 trees; Murray Caiion, about 100 trees; Andreas Caiion, about 35 trees; side 

 caiion of Snow Creek, n. slope Mt. San Jacinto, about 12 trees; 7 mi. further west, caiion with 

 2 trees, the trees now destroyed (Jepson, Silva Cal. 172). 



North side of Colorado Besert (west to east) : Whitewater Caiion; Seven Palms (easterly 

 from Palm Sprs. sta.) ; Willis Palms (F. H. Willis ranch, 4 mi. northeasterly from Edom 

 sta.) ; Thousand Palms, a vei-y fine assemblage in Thousand Palms Canon, 4^4 mi. northeast 

 of Edom sta.; Hidden Palms, 2 groups in a canon 1 mi. e. of preceding locality); Pushwalla 

 Palms in Pushwalla Canon, next east; thence eastn'ard a number of groups along the base of 

 the mountains north of Indio, including the Twelve Apostles group; northerly from Mecca 

 and about 6 mi. southerly from Shaver Well are two small palm groups in caiions; cluster on 

 the alkaline flats near Mecca (Carnegie Publ. 193: 106); Bos Palmas (two palms at a spring 

 6 mi. e. of Salt on sta.) ; said to occur also in Ked Canon, Chuckawalla Mts. (Parish, PI. World 

 17:123), which would bo the most easterly locality; Twcuty-niuo Palms, 40 mi. n. of Mecca, the 

 most northerly locality; 4 mi. e. of Cottonwood Sprs., Cottonwood Mts., about 100 trees in a 

 eanon ace. E. C. Jaeger. 



Refs.— Washingtonia filifera Wendl. Bot. Zeit. 37:68 (1879); Jepson, Silva Cal. 172, 

 pis. 6, 55 (1910). Var. robxuta Parish, Bot. Gaz. 44:420 (1907). W. rohusta Wendl. Gart. 

 Zeit. 2:198 (1883). Var. viicrosperma Bccc. in Parish, I.e. W. filamentosa Ktze. Rev. Gen. 

 PL 2:737 (1891); Sargent, Silva N. Am. 10:47, pl. 509 (1891). N eowasUngtonia filamentosa 

 Sudw. U. S. D. A. Div. For. Bull. 14:105 (1891). 



