Calamus godefroyi

Calamus (KAL-ah-muhs) godefroyi (god'-froy)
Laos. Photo by Dr. John Dransfield, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew/Palmweb.
Scientific Classification
Genus: Calamus (KAL-ah-muhs) Species: godefroyi (god'-froy)
Synonyms
None set.
Native Continent
Asia
Morphology
Habit: Clustering Leaf type: Pinnate
Culture
Survivability index
Common names
wai nong (Lao Loum)

Habitat and Distribution

Indochinese endemic, Thailand (North-east), Laos (Central) and Cambodia.

Laos. Photo by Dr. John Dransfield, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew/Palmweb.

Culture

Cold Hardiness Zone: 10a

Comments and Curiosities

Uses: Stem used for handicrafts, shoot edible.

Conservation: Near Threatened. (ICUN Redlist 2011) The one Lao record is from a marshy valley on the Mekong floodplain. This area is used for dry season rice but floods too deeply to be used in the rainy season, at which time the paddies are rapidly re-occupied by sedges. Much of the marsh was probably once wooded but only scattered trees now remain, as well as degraded forest and bamboo scrub on the surrounding higher ground. Calamus godefroyi was reportedly once very abundant at the site, the local name of which translates as 'rattan lake', but it is now reduced to scattered clumps along banks and ditches in the marsh, with more plants in the surrounding scrub. In 2000 seedlings were common but few adult plants were found. One local man was so concerned by this decline that he has transplanted several clumps to his small-holding; these are thriving and were the source of the recently collected material. Editing by edric.

The species is considered restricted to the Lower Mekong basin and the Vientiane Plain in Lao PDR and northeastern Thailand. It has been recorded at several locations along the Mekong mainstream in flood prone locations not far outside the main channel, from Neak Loung in Cambodia (including from Siam Reap on the Tonle Sap Lake) through Kampong Cham to the Vientiane Plain in Lao PDR (Henderson 2009, RBG Kew 2011). The species has also been recorded from Viet Nam. (ICUN Redlist 2011)