Pondoland palm

The Essence

"Jubaeopsis afra, long known as Jubaeopsis caffra, is a clustering, multi-stemmed South African palm and the only species in its genus. Genera Palmarum records it as the sole African member of subtribe Attaleinae, notable for stems that branch dichotomously, both at the base and aerially by forking, and for an exceptionally high chromosome count of 2n = 160-200; phylogenetically it is placed as sister to all other Attaleinae except Beccariophoenix. The genus name records a resemblance to Jubaea, the Chilean wine palm, in floral and fruit characters. The round orange fruits look like miniature coconuts, roughly 2 cm across, with white 'meat' and a small amount of milk inside, and they are eaten by local people and by baboons. Weaver birds make heavy use of the palm for nesting material. Within each flower group the male flowers shed pollen before the neighbouring female is receptive, an outbreeding mechanism; pollination is presumed to involve insects but is not documented. The wild population is very small. SANBI's Red List records two subpopulations: the larger, on the Mtentu River, holds roughly 20-50 mature individuals and lies outside any protected area, while a smaller one on the Msikaba River sits inside Mkambati Nature Reserve. The population trend is stable, and PlantZAfrica notes that it is vegetative reproduction, rather than seed, that is presently maintaining the natural population of adult individuals. Recorded threats are harvesting of the fruits for food, collecting for the horticultural trade in which the species is very popular internationally, and fire damage along the upper cliff margins. Tree SA gives it South African Tree No. 27 and remarks that there may now be more trees growing in California than in South Africa. PlantZAfrica is blunt about what this means for would-be growers: its advice is 'DON'T!' - the palm is protected, there is no legal source of seed, and seedlings are almost certainly raised illegally too."

Scientific documentation of the palm began in 1898, and Odoardo Beccari described it as a new genus in 1913, in Webbia volume 4; sources differ on the exact page. Tree SA notes that the species has been successfully planted in California and remarks that there may now be more trees growing there than in South Africa.