244 WEST AFRICAN FORESTS AND FORESTRY 



Hyphcene. Dum Palm or Forked Palm. Kaba, Kodago, Kwalo 

 (nut), Goriba (Dr. Dalziel's Hausa list). 



It is found in the Zaria and Niger provinces of Nigeria. 



The only branched palm in West Africa. It attains a 

 height of 30 feet. It is more or less gregarious in habit, though 

 the individual groups of palms are not very large. It is appar- 

 ently somewhat fire-resisting, though this may be due to its 

 being found amongst the dry-zone vegetation. The stem is 

 short and the two forks often crooked, so that little or no use 

 is made of the wood by the natives. The seeds are turned 

 into buttons, and so have recently obtained a value for this 

 purpose. They were first sent to England from the Soudan, where 

 apparently the tree is much more common than in West Africa. 

 Borassus flabelliformis, var. ^thiopica. Palmyra or Black Run 

 Palm, Fan Palm, Bottle Palm, Arac Palm. Agbon, Olodu, 

 Igoti (Yoruba) ; Oluwa (Benin). 



It is a common tree in the dry-zone forest regions of Ibadan, 

 Benin, Onitsha, and Ogoja provinces of Nigeria. This palm, 

 with the swollen upper part of the bole making it appear more 

 like a large inverted bottle, is thus not to be mistaken for any 

 other. The huge fan-shaped leaves distinguish it from either 

 the Coconut Palm or the Oil Palm. In the distance, too, 

 the leaves appear more silvery-green, and not the yellow-green 

 of the Coconut, or the bright, fresh green of the Oil Palm, 

 or the sombre dark green of the Wine Palm. A large mass 

 of coconut-shaped nuts, but with a smoother, more yellow 

 surface, and more cylindrical in shape, without the ridges of 

 the coconut, are another feature of this tree. At the base 

 of each nut the old sepals of the flower remain, appearing like 

 large dark-brown leaf scars. The young seedlings are easily 

 seen amongst the grass, sticking up as they do like little 

 silvery-green fans of varying size, in detail showing the 

 folds of a fan most distinctly, the leaf opening out in a similar 

 way to a fan. The bole is dark brown and practically smooth, 

 showing no leaf scars, and only faintly lined vertically down 

 the stem. The base is only slightly swollen, and the roots 

 do not form a large mound round it, as is the case with the 

 Oil Palm, and to some extent with the Tombo Palm. Inside 

 the fruit there are two or three large, flattish nuts. 



The timber is fibrous, hard, but very durable and quite 

 termite proof. Although the upper part of the stem is hollow, 

 long sectional pieces, four by two, and even thicker, can be 

 cut out. It planes up with a smooth surface, and the grain 

 looks very pretty with the thick fibres. It nails fairly well 

 and splits longitudinally. 



