Palmiste marron

The Essence

"Pseudophoenix lediniana is a solitary, unarmed palm endemic to Haiti, on Hispaniola, in the southwest of the country. Robert William Read described it in 1968 from wet forest along small canyons around Riv. Levange, in the Departement de l'Ouest. A 2014 field and population-genetic study by Rodriguez-Pena and colleagues confirmed that wild plants are restricted to a single population on almost inaccessible, unstable limestone cliffs along a ravine in southern Haiti near Jacmel: six fragments holding approximately 71 adults and 2 juveniles, with no seedlings located, threatened by landslides during the rainy season, massive forest clearance, and burning for charcoal extraction and subsistence crops. The same study found only four of seven microsatellite loci polymorphic and the population highly inbred, with levels of genetic variation much lower than in Pseudophoenix ekmanii, which is protected within a national park and has several, larger populations. The two are the only Critically Endangered species of the genus, and the IUCN lists P. lediniana as Critically Endangered (assessment by Cinea and Timyan, 2018). In cultivation it is said to be the fastest-growing of all Pseudophoenix and a lovely ornamental, but it remains uncommon outside botanical gardens and enthusiasts' collections."

The species was published by Robert William Read in Gentes Herbarum 10: 189 (1968). One heterotypic synonym is listed: Pseudophoenix elata O.F.Cook ex Burret, Kongl. Svenska Vetensk. Acad. Handl., ser. 3, 6(7): 21 (1929).