Paradise Palm

The Essence

"Licuala mattanensis is a small, solitary fan palm of lowland Borneo, described by Odoardo Beccari from Sarawak material he collected in 1865; the type and an isotype are held at Kew (K000207560 and K000207561). Old wild plants develop a slender trunk to about 3 m. Two varieties are accepted, var. mattanensis and var. paucisecta, and the horticultural trade sells the latter under the cultivar name 'Mapu'. The species is grown almost entirely for its foliage: the mottled, tessellated 'Mapu' and 'Tigrina' forms are by far the most cultivated, described by Monaco Nature Encyclopedia as standing among the most ornamental palms but also among the most difficult to cultivate. Documentation is thin. There is no English Wikipedia article, iNaturalist holds only 18 observations, and the species has no IUCN Red List assessment, GBIF's Red List service returning NOT_EVALUATED. L. G. Saw's 2012 revision of Licuala in Borneo (Kew Bulletin 67: 577-654) is the standard modern treatment, but its text is paywalled and no conservation category for this species could be retrieved."

Beccari published the species in Malesia 3: 86, but the date is not settled between Kew-linked databases: PALMweb and GBIF both cite 1889, while IPNI's record for the same name gives 1886, with the collation "Malesia 3: 86, t. 7". Type and isotype material was collected by Beccari in Sarawak in 1865. The second variety, var. paucisecta Becc., was published later, in Webbia 5: 51 (1921). GBIF also records living plants of the species in the Mixed Planting Garden at Semenggoh Nature Reserve, Kuching.