PALM 



PALM 



2437 



PALM. Palms are amongst the most striking plants 

 in tropical floras. The tall mostly straight unbranched 

 trunks surmounted by a spreading canopy of huge pin- 

 nate or digitate leaves distinguish them from nearly all 

 other forms of vegetation. They are widely spread in 

 warm regions, being most abundant in America and 

 Asia and few in Africa. They are particularly conspic- 

 uous in the Pacific Islands. Although the palms are 

 such bold and interesting plants, the species are imper- 

 fectly understood. This is due to the great difficulty 

 of making herbarium specimens, to the fact that the 

 greater number of botanists are residents of regions in 

 which palms do not grow, and to the differences of 

 opinion as to the relative importance of the various 

 botanical characters. Many of the palms have been 

 named first from cultivated specimens, and often before 

 the flowers and fruits are known. When the specimens 

 finally come to fruit, the names are usually shifted, 

 causing much confusion. The proper generic position 

 of a palm may be unknown for several years after it 

 becomes popular in the horticultural trade. Consider 

 the changes in nomenclature which have occurred in 

 palms that have been referred to the genera Areca and 

 Kentia. 



The species of palms are not very numerous as 

 compared with orchids, composites and grasses. They 

 probably do not greatly exceed 1,200, as at present 

 known, although more than that number have been 

 described. Bentham & Hooker accept 132 genera, and 

 Drude, in Engler & Prantl's "Pflanzenfamilien," 

 accept 128 genera. Most of the genera are small, and 

 many of them are monotypic. The largest genera are 

 Calamus, with about 200 species, all Old World, mostly 

 Asian; Geonoma, with about 100 species, all American; 

 Bactris, about 100, American; Chamsedorea, with 

 about 60. all American; Licuala, with 30, ranging from 

 eastern Asia to Australia; Desmoncus, about 25, 

 American; Cocos, 30, all confined to America but the 

 coconut, which is now cosmopolitan; Pinanga, with 

 about 25 species, of the oriental tropics; Areca, nearly 

 two dozen, oriental. Many of the species, particularly 

 in the small genera, are restricted to very small geo- 

 graphical regions, often to one island or to a group of 

 islands. The palms represent an old type of vegetation, 

 and they are now, probably, on the decline, as measured 



General characteristics. 



The members of this family are essentially tropical 

 in habitat, are highly ornamental in appearance, and 

 many of them also of very great economic value, their 

 fruits, stems and leaves not only entering largely into 

 the manufactured products of both Europe and America 



2725. Flower and fruit of Pritchardia Wrightii. a, flower in 

 anthesis, with one segment remaining attached to corolla-tube; b, 

 flower in lengthwise section, segments and anthers wanting; c, 

 anther, dorsal view; d, anther, ventral view; e, lengthwise section 

 of carpel; /, young fruit, with remains of sterile carpel at apex; g, 

 section of kernel, showing entire seed inside; h, section of seed 

 along line of raphe. 



in geological epochs. Perhaps the most complete 

 account of the botany of certain groups of palms is by 

 O. Beccari in such works as: "The species of Calamus," 

 "Le Palme Americane della tribu della Corypheae," 

 "Notes on Philippine Palms," and many smaller 

 papers. O. F. Cook has also written extensively of 

 the American species. 



2726. Flowers and fruit of Thrinax Wendlandiana. a, top part 

 of flowering branch! et; b, flower; c, fruiting perianth, seen from 

 above, from which the fruit has been taken; d, fruit; e, longi- 

 tudinal section of seed, through embryo. 



but also providing both food and shelter for thousands 

 of the inhabitants of tropical countries. One notable 

 characteristic of palms in general is their unbranched 

 stems, the exceptions to this rule being very few and 

 mostly limited to the members of one genus, Hyphaene, 

 of which the doum palm of Egypt, H . thebaica, is the 

 best example. While these unbranched stems form a 

 prominent feature in connection with this order of 

 plants, yet great variations are found in size and habit, 

 some of them towering up like a slender marble shaft 

 to a height of more than 100 feet and then terminating 

 in a crown of magnificent plume-like leaves, while others 

 may reach a height of only 3 to 4 feet when fully 

 developed, and some species are permanently stemless. 

 In some examples the stems are so long and slender that 

 a scandent haoit is the result; these rope-like stems of 

 the rattan palms in particular are described as wander- 

 ing through the tops of some of the great trees of the 

 Malayan Peninsula to a length of several hundred feet, 

 reported as long as 1,700 feet, but report unreliable. 



The foliage of the palms is of two chief kinds, the 

 fan-veined leaves, in which the venation radiates from 

 a common center, and the feather-veined, in which the 

 veins run out from the sides of a long midrib, the leaf 

 being frequently divided into long narrow segments. 

 Of the first group, the common fan palm, Livistona 

 chinensis, is a good example, while the date palm, Phce- 

 nix dactylifera, and also the coconut, Cocos nucifera, 

 are common examples of the feather -veined class. 

 There are also minor characteristics of foliage that 

 mark many of the genera, some having pinnate leaves 

 with erose tips, a few having bipinnate leaves (as Car- 

 yota wrens), others with flabellate leaves having erose 

 segments, and many with the segments of the leaves 

 bifid or split at the tips. 



The flowers of palms in general are not specially 

 attractive either in size or coloring, many of them being 

 greenish white or yellow, and some orange or red; but 

 these flowers are produced in prodigious quantities by 

 some of the species, perhaps the most prolific in this 

 respect being the talipot palm (Corypha umbracidifera), 

 which throws up a branching inflorescence to a height 

 of 30 feet above the foliage, such an inflorescence 

 having been estimated to include fully 60,000,000 

 flowers ! This, of course, applies only to wild specimens. 



The seeds of palms are also found in many sizes and 

 various shapes, ranging from the size of a pea in some 

 of the Thrinax to the unwieldy fruit of the double coco- 



