Buccaneer palm

The Essence

"Pseudophoenix sargentii is a solitary, slow-growing, crownshafted palm of dry calcareous coasts, ranging from south Florida through the Caribbean to southeast Mexico and Belize. It carries 7-16 blue-green, glaucous pinnate leaves above a short, waxy crownshaft, and its branched inflorescences bear yellow flowers followed by scarlet fruits about 1-2 cm across. Growth is famously slow, typically only one or two new fronds a year. Combined with high drought, salt and wind tolerance, that suits it to exposed limestone sites, but UF/IFAS notes that its slow growth and lack of cold tolerance have prevented it from being widely used in Florida landscapes, and Zona (2002) points out that the same slowness has encouraged the destructive practice of transplanting wild specimens into gardens. The species is assessed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List and is state-listed as Endangered in Florida, where a February 2015 survey of Elliott Key found only three wild adults. Flora of North America reports that the genus Pseudophoenix is probably insect-pollinated, since its greenish-yellow flowers produce nectar and attract numerous bees, and that the fruits of P. sargentii float when dry and are thought to be water-dispersed (Read 1968), although their red colour and fleshy mesocarp suggest animal dispersal as well (Zona and Henderson 1989)."

In Florida the palm was historically known only from Elliott Key, Long Key and Sands Key. Flora of North America records a precipitous decline in the Florida Keys as these attractive palms were removed for use in landscaping, and Zona (2002) reports the species extirpated from Long and Sands Keys, where it once grew; the Florida Native Plant Society attributes the near-elimination of the Keys populations to a combination of theft, vandalism, habitat destruction and Hurricane Andrew. The Center for Plant Conservation records fewer than 50 specimens remaining on Elliott Key (Lippincott 1995), and a February 2015 survey there found only three wild adults, none showing current signs of reproduction (Magellan and Griffith 2017). The reintroduction effort is a rare example of a successful multi-agency long-term programme to conserve a long-lived palm: nursery plants raised at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden were planted at 13 sites in the Florida Keys in the early 1990s, and of 265 palms planted, 115 (43%) were still alive in 2004, adding to the 221 wild individuals existing at the time, increasing the total number of wild plants by 27% and improving the population's age structure (Maschinski and Duquesnel 2007). Not every site succeeded: Hurricane Andrew passed directly over one introduction site in 1992, and on Sands Key two plants were alive in June 1992, a single survivor remained in 1994 and none survived by 1998, leading to the conclusion that Sands Key was no longer suitable habitat. Elsewhere, Zona (2002) records extirpation near Sosua on the north coast of the Dominican Republic through coastal development, threats from coastal development and agriculture in Mexico, and the Navassa Island population reduced to a single adult palm, with introduced goats eating seeds and seedlings and preventing reproduction. A healthy population with many reproductive adults was found in 2009 in the Shipstern Nature Preserve, northeastern Belize. In the Bahamas the Leon Levy Native Plant Preserve states the species is not known to be used medicinally, is commonly used in the horticultural industry, and that historically the sap has been used to make alcoholic beverages and the fruits have been used for feeding animals. The genus remains taxonomically unsettled: Read (1968) recognised several infraspecific taxa, but Zona (2002) endorsed Read's own later view that the island populations do not deserve formal rank, because specimens cannot be readily distinguished without knowing their geographic origin, while growers report that the Navassa Island form grows noticeably faster, with wider-spaced trunk rings.