''Acoelorrhaphe'' is a genus of palms with single

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

''Acoelorrhaphe wrightii'', known as the Paurotis palm, Everglades palm or Madeira palm in

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

World Checklist of Palms
''Acoelorrhaphe''
Germplasm Resources Information Network
''Acoelorrhaphe wrightii''
/ref>International Plant Names Index (IPNI)
''Acoelorrhaphe''
/ref> and cubas, tique, and papta in Spanish. It is native to

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

, southeastern

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

, the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

the Bahamas The Bahamas (), officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to ...

, and extreme southern

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

where it grows in

swamp A swamp is a forested wetland.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p. Swamps are considered to be transition zones because both land and water play a role in ...

s and periodically flooded forests. It is a small to moderately tall palm that grows in clusters to , rarely tall, with slender stems less than diameter. The leaves are

palmate The following is a list of terms which are used to describe leaf morphology in the description and taxonomy of plants. Leaves may be simple (a single leaf blade or lamina) or compound (with several leaflets). The edge of the leaf may be regular o ...

(fan-shaped), with segments joined to each other for about half of their length, and are wide, light-green above, and silver underneath. The leaf petiole is long, and has orange, curved, sharp teeth along the edges. The flowers are minute, inconspicuous and greenish, with 6

stamen The stamen (plural ''stamina'' or ''stamens'') is the pollen-producing reproductive organ of a flower. Collectively the stamens form the androecium., p. 10 Morphology and terminology A stamen typically consists of a stalk called the filame ...

s. The

trunk Trunk may refer to: Biology * Trunk (anatomy), synonym for torso * Trunk (botany), a tree's central superstructure * Trunk of corpus callosum, in neuroanatomy * Elephant trunk, the proboscis of an elephant Computing * Trunk (software), in rev ...

is covered with fibrous matting. The fruit is

pea The pea is most commonly the small spherical seed or the seed-pod of the flowering plant species ''Pisum sativum''. Each pod contains several peas, which can be green or yellow. Botanically, pea pods are fruit, since they contain seeds and d ...

-sized, starting orange and turning to black at maturity.''Flora of North America''
genus account
an
species account
/ref>Huxley, A., ed. (1992). ''New RHS Dictionary of Gardening''. Macmillan . The genus name is often cited as ''Acoelorraphe'',USDA Plants Profile
''Acoelorraphe wrightii''
/ref> a spelling error to be corrected under the provisions of the ICBN. The genus name is a combination of three Greek words meaning ''a-'' 'without', ' 'hollow', and ' 'needle', an allusion to the form of the fruit. The species is named after the American botanist Charles Wright.Grisebach, August H. R. (1866) Catalogus Plantarum Cubensium

Cultivation and uses

The Paurotis palm was formerly plentiful in the Florida

Everglades The Everglades is a natural region of tropical climate, tropical wetlands in the southern portion of the U.S. state of Florida, comprising the southern half of a large drainage basin within the Neotropical realm. The system begins near Orland ...

, but many plants were taken for the nursery trade. The palm is now protected in the wild by Florida law and its numbers are increasing again. Trees propagated from seed or by sawing apart the base of a cluster are available in nurseries. It is hardy to central and southern Florida and is cultivated as a landscape palm.Bush, Charles S. and Morton, Julia F. (1969) Native Trees and Plants for Florida Landscaping (pp.11-12). Department of Agriculture - State of Florida.

Gallery

Image:Petiolespines.JPG, Petiole spines Image:Fruitcloseup.JPG, Fruit

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q140088 Livistoninae Trees of the Caribbean Trees of Central America Trees of the Southeastern United States Trees of the Bahamas Trees of Southeastern Mexico Trees of Veracruz Trees of Colombia Monotypic Arecaceae genera Garden plants of North America