Butterfly palm

The Essence

"Sabinaria magnifica is the only species in the genus Sabinaria, described in 2013 from the Darién Gap on the Colombia–Panama border and one of just two palms known to be endemic to that region. It is a solitary, unarmed understorey palm with a smooth light-brown stem 1–6 m tall, carrying a crown of 20–35 palmate leaves. The leaves are the plant's signature: rigid, circular blades 1.4–1.6 m across, split almost to the base into two large halves that give the butterfly-like outline behind its trade name, glossy above and silvery-whitish beneath. The British palm systematists William J. Baker and John Dransfield called them "spectacular" and the most distinctive character of the genus, and Gloria Galeano called the plant "the most beautiful of all Colombian palms". It is monoecious, with mostly unisexual flowers — the feature that separates it from its Amazonian sister genus Itaya — and the pistillate flowers are hidden by large, tightly appressed, persistent rachis bracts. The fruits are obovoid to subglobose, 3.6–4.4 cm long, ripening from green through yellowish-green to black, and sit tightly packed and concealed among the leaf bases, often buried under leaf litter."

Although known to local mule drivers, the palm was first collected scientifically by the Colombian botanist Saúl Hoyos in 2013. Photographs Hoyos sent to the palm systematist Rodrigo Bernal suggested a new species in the tribe Cryosophileae and possibly an entirely new genus, and Bernal, Galeano, Hoyos and Norman Echavarría returned to collect flowers and fruit; the holotype was gathered later that year at Quebrada El Brillante, about 8 km southwest of Capurganá in the municipality of Acandí, Chocó. The manuscript reached Phytotaxa just ten days after that expedition and was published on 8 November 2013. Rare Palm Seeds, which was the first to introduce the palm to cultivation, described it as the most exciting and baffling discovery in palms since Tahina spectabilis. A later phylogenetic study by Ángela Cano and collaborators, using four nuclear genes and the plastid matK gene, confirmed its placement in the tribe Cryosophileae and identified Itaya as its sister genus. No IUCN Red List assessment exists: the describing authors stated that too little was known of the species' distribution for an assessment to be possible. They noted no major imminent threats at the site but recorded selective logging, warned that the zone lies close to the heavily deforested Urabá region, and urged high priority for protecting the area. Between 2014 and 2015 part of the forest where the palm was first found was cleared for agriculture. Locally, the large leaves are used casually as umbrellas.