Ravenea moorei

Ravenea (rah-vehn-EH-ah) moorei (moor'-ee)
Palm-trees.org.
Scientific Classification
Genus: Ravenea (rah-vehn-EH-ah) Species: moorei (moor'-ee)
Synonyms
None set.
Native Continent
Africa
Morphology
Habit: Solitary Leaf type: Pinnate
Culture
Survivability index
Common names
Inazi (fide St. John, but this resembles Swahili for coconut).

Habitat and Distribution

Endemic to the Comoros.

Photo, Palm-trees.org.

Comoro Islands: Grande Comore. Secondary submontane rainforest; 500-800 m.

Description

Robust tree palm. TRUNK to 20 m, 11-35 cm in diam., with a hemispherical base up to 105 cm across and some 40 cm high, diameter near the crown about 13 cm (from a photo), scars visible, internodes about 20 cm long in the lower trunk, much shorter towards the apex; nodal scars not very prominent; bark grey-brown; base of crown bulbous. LEAVES 11-19 in crown, porrect or spreading, straight, held on edge in distal half, 2.26-3 m long; sheath up to 60 x 19.5 cm, soon splitting, margins with long fine fibers, abaxial surface covered with thick tomentum, white in unexposed areas, turning brown on exposure, becoming thinner distally; petiole 10-25 cm long, 2.4-4.5 cm wide, 1-1.5 cm thick, adaxially flattened, abaxially ± rounded, sparsely tomentose abaxially, glabrous adaxially; rachis 1.3-2.4 m long, abaxially rounded, adaxially shallowly grooved or keeled (keel to 10 mm wide, narrowing in the more distal part to a sharp narrow keel), laterally grooved, sparsely tomentose to whitewaxy abaxially, in mid-leaf 1.7-2 x 1.2 cm across; leaflets 60-80 on each side of the rachis, the proximal very crowded, 15-54 x 0.8-1.7 cm, median 49-70 x 2-2.5 cm (interval 2.5-2.8 cm), distal 12-43 x 0.4-1.7 cm, main veins about 5, the midrib the largest, prominent adaxially, abaxially bearing a few conspicuous, close, regularly arranged large pale ramenta, transverse veinlets obscure, caducous tomentum present abaxially near the base. STAMINATE INFLORESCENCE solitary (only known dead) about 90 cm long, branched to 2 orders; peduncle about 35 cm long, 1.5 cm across, rounded in cross section, bracts not known; rachillae numerous, slender, up to 15 cm 1.5 mm.

Culture

Cold Hardiness Zone: 10a

Comments and Curiosities

This is a dioecious genus.

One of the two Comoro Ravenea species; this is the larger of the two, the other (R. hildebrandtii) is much smaller. Before 1986 this palm was grown under the name R. hildebrandtii, but that taxon is almost unknown in cultivation outside Fairchild Tropical Garden. The species is named after Professor H.E. Moore, the great expert on palms, who collected the type. (J. Dransfield and H. Beentje. 1995)/Palmweb.

Conservation: IUCN Redlist - Critically Endangered. Seed of this species was collected by DeArmand Hull in October 1993 at the north end of Grand Comore at c. 500 m, above Mitsamouli; only two female trees were seen by Mr. Hull. He considers them highly endangered due to continuing agricultural pressure on the forest in this area. Only two female palm trees are known from a patch of forest last seen in October 1993 (J. Dransfield and H. Beentje. 1998)/Palmweb.

This is a tillering palm, it exhibits saxophone style root growth (it has a heel), keep top third of heel above soil elevation!