Ptychosperma elegans

[brodklop]

In Both of Brisbane's Botanical Gardens there are 2 distinct forms of palms labeled Ptychosperma elagans.

1 form is planted widely around Brisbane suburbs and Queensland and New South Wales at least as far south as Sydney where fine specimens are growing in the BG there.

This one looks the same as wild growing ones in coastal Queensland.

I have personally seen this one at Yeppoon in its southern most range and also at Makay in central Qld. These all have that typical Ptychosperma elegans.

Also I seen plants grown from seed collected from Cape York grown at Anderson Park in Townsville. These also have that typical look.

The other form is not seen except in palm enthusiast collections.

For the sake of clarity I will refer to P.elegans as the one widely grown and P.sp as the rarely grown form. Which may be P.elegans but a different form.

Who knows. That is the big question.

The major differences are in trunk width: P.elegans is double the width in the same growing conditions. P.sp is expanded at the base to the width of P.elegans.

Leaves: P.elegans has a generally up swept and straighter leaf, but P.sp has much more curved leaf shape.

Leaflets: P.elegans has about double the width to P.sp

Inflorescence. P.sp at mature fruit is more yellow orange while P.Elegans is more bronzey orange. P.sp flowers and fruits at a different time of the year in Brisbane to P.elegans.

In my opinion P.Solomonence looks more like P.elegans then this P.sp.

I know years back seed from The Solomon Is was brought back to Brisbane and we know they have many single stem Ptychospermas yet to be named.

Maybe seed got mixed up. I myself grew seeds from this source in those days and they looked a lot like this mystery P.sp.

Anyhow let the pictures do the talking.

Ptychosperma elegans next door in Brisnane suburb

P.sp showing curved leaves. thin leaflets and thin trunk

[brodklop]

Ptychosperma elegans trunk

P.sp half thickness

[brodklop]

P.sp expanded base

[brodklop]

P.sp infloresence and fruit

P.elegans fruiting at different time of year and not as colourful.

[brodklop]

P.elegans in wild at Makay (thanks Tyrone for photo)

P.elegans in Old BG Brisbane. Same tree as trunk photo

[brodklop]

P.sp in Old BG

P'sp at Mt Cootha in full sun

[Tyrone]

Brod, I've noticed the same thing. I have a few solitaires here and all of them are like the wild Mackay ones etc. But one I bought as P elegans looks different, just like the P sp you mentioned. The look of it doesn't seem to fit any described species I can find. It fits your pics of P sp though. It does fine here, I've got it growing amidst a couple of Carpentaria's and native gingers. It starting to trunk, but the trunk would be half the thickness of a normal solitaire. I think it's an undescribed species. Because it's solitary the first anyone thinks is P elegans.

Best regards

Tyrone

[Daryl]

Hi Brod, that is a nice looking palm. I have also seen a palm labeled as Ptychosperma elegans that is different to both of the palms you mention. It is larger than the typical form bit has longer arching leaves... more mysteries!

Daryl

[Jeff Searle]

Brod,

The first picture in post #1, is definitely P. elegans, and the second picture is definitely NOT P. elegans. The second specie could vary well be a hybrid, it's just too hard to tell from a photo. It could be a specie on it's own.

Jeff

[brodklop]

Tyrone, your one could be the one I have photographed here. There have been a few specialist nurserys growing these.

They transplant real easy with no setback at all.

Daryl, maybe the Ptychosperma elegans trunk photo is the robust one you were talking of. It's planted in the Old BG in the palm grove section near the Jubaeopsis. This is quite a robust tree.

Jeff, your right, it is different in so many ways. There are many dozens of these planted in the two BC in Brisbane and they are all the same. Which makes me think there not hybrids.

I have grown these from seed and they grow to be the same as the parent. Overall a very nice palm.

One more photo of mystery Ptychosperma

[Tyrone]

Hi Brod,

I got my P sp from a nursery in Carnarvon. I actually brought two back on a pallet amongst other things and sold the other one to a friend and his is doing fine too. I don't know where the Carnarvon nursery got it from but they buy a lot of things from QLD.

Best regards

Tyrone

[tanetahi]

Had you discounted the possibility that the slenderer one is Ptychosperma lineare?

I saw some a few months back in a private collection in Kuranda, far-north QLD, and wondered what they were. I image-googled a bit, and tentatively concluded they were likely to be P. lineare.

[Jerry@TreeZoo]

Brod,

I agree with Jeff that the first looks like what I call P. elegans and I don't recognize the second. However the trunk comparisons is a different story. Very seldom do P elegans trunks get that fat (around here anyway) and the second trunk looks more like elegans. P. solomonense is even more slender. Lineare is a clumper with black/purple fruit not red.

If your hands are like this guy in the Burger King commercial, it kind of throws off the measurements though.

[bubba]

This is an old picture of what I thought was P elegans. These are skinnier and perhaps P. lineare?

[tanetahi]

This is the one I was wondering about, in a private North Queensland collection.

It looks still slenderer than the mystery ones in Brisbane's botanic gardens, and slenderer than regular P. salomonense, although it has the crownshaft colour of the latter species;

This is Ptychosperma elegans growing wild beside the Kuranda Range Road on the Macalister Range escarpment behind Smithfield, north of Cairns;

Edited August 25, 2009 by tanetahi

[tanetahi]

You don't think its Ptychosperma macarthurii?

This is P. macarthurii in downtown Cairns, during the rainy season.

Edited August 25, 2009 by tanetahi

[Walter John]

These are definitely not lineares or macarthurs etc., I support Brod on this one, they are similar in dimensions with regard to trunk heights, widths, crownshafts with the obvious difference being the leaflets. I bet there's even more variations of P.elegans out there.

[DGP]

My mother-in-law has been growing a palm indoors for the last 30 years that she beleived was a Solitaire palm. It looks very similat to what Brod has labelled P. sp. and is about 3m tall.

In my recently acquired capacity as family palm nutter / expert, I reliably informed her that it couldn't be a Solitaire palm as it didn't have the jaggedy ends to the leaflets.

In response she went away and dug out of a drawer the nursery label that was on the plant when she bought it 30 years ago!

The label said "Seaforthia - the Solitaire Palm for indoors"

A little more research told me Seaforthia = Archontophoenix, so I figured the plant my mother in law has is a slender Bangalow, the thin trunk and slow growth due to being pot grown indoors.

But from what you Aussies are saying I could be wrong and this just a different form of P. elegans?

[8er-moni]

:drool: Thank you for the great pictures!

Ptychosperma elegans :D in Salzburg/Austria - with spider mites nearly the whole year :blink:

[grad85]

And my little ones from holland