\ 
: PALMAE 125 
what compressed, obovoid, more or less angular, fibrous, 1-seeded carpels. 
(From the Malay name.) 
A monotypic genus. 
1. N. fruticans Wurmb. Nipa, Sasa (Tag.). 
Rootstock stout, subterranean, the trunk none. Leaves at the ends of 
the rootstocks, 5 to 10 m long, the petioles stout; leaflets numerous, rigid, 
lanceolate, slenderly acuminate, up to 1 m long, 2 to 7 cm wide. Male 
inflorescence brown, erect up to 1 m in height. Peduncles of the female 
inflorescence stout, 1 m high or less, the fruit globose, nodding, up to 30 em 
in diameter. Carpels numerous, dark-brown, striate, smooth 10 to 14 cm 
long, compressed, obovate. Seed hard, white. (Fl. Filip. pl. 386.) 
Along tidal streams, occasional, but usually immature specimens near 
Manila; along tidal streams throughout the Philippines. India through 
Malaya to Australia. 
6. COCOS Linnaeus 
Stout, unarmed, monoecious palms. Leaves long, pinnate, the leaflets 
narrow, acuminate. Spadix axillary, at first erect, later drooping, panicled, 
the branches bearing scattered female flowers below and more numerous 
males above, or often with males intermixed with females. Spathes 2 or 
more, short, the bracts various. Male flowers unsymmetric, the sepals 
small, valvate, the petals oblong, acute. Stamens 6. Female flowers much 
larger than the males, ovoid, the perianth enlarged in fruit. Sepals 
imbricate. Petals shorter than the sepals. Ovary 3-celled. Fruit large, 
ovoid, 1-seeded, the pericarp thick, fibrous, the endocarp very hard, with 
3 basal scars or pores. (From the Portuguese coco or coquo, “monkey,” 
from fancied resemblance of the 3 scars at the base of the fruit to a mon- 
key’s face.) 
Species about 30 in tropical America, 1 cosmopolitan in the tropics. 
*1. C. NUCIFERA L. Niog (Tag.); Coco (Sp.); Coconut. 
A tall palm reaching a height of 25 m, the trunk stout, marked with 
annular scars, base thickened. Leaves 4 to 5.5 m long, crowded at the 
apex of the trunk, the petiole stout, 1 m or more in length; leaflets very 
numerous, linear-lanceolate, acuminate, coriaceous, up to 1 m in length. 
“ Inflorescence 1 m long or less. Fruit variable in shape and size, obovoid 
to subglobose, often obscurely 3-angled, 15 to 25 cm long. Albumen lining 
the bony endocarp. (FI. Filip. pl. 364.) 
Frequently cultivated, fl. all the year; throughout the Philippines in 
cultivation. Undoubtedly a native of tropical America, but of prehistoric 
distribution all over the tropics; there is no evidence of its being an 
indigenous plant in the Philippines. 
7. ELAEIS Jacquin 
Erect unarmed palms, the trunks solitary. Leaves large, pinnate, the 
segments narrow, acuminate, the lower ones reduced to spines. Inflorescence 
axillary, branched, short, dense, the spadices stout, the peduncles short, 
subtended by laxly imbricate bracts, the male and female flowers in different 
inflorescences. Male flowers small, imbricate, in dense cylindric spikes. 
Sepals oblong or lanceolate, concave, imbricate. Petals oblong. Stamens 
6, the filaments united into a thick cylindric tube. Female flowers much 
larger than the males, arranged in congested branched inflorescences, the 
