Mauritia Species, Aguaje Palm, Moriche Palm

Very nice palm - grows very fast for a palm even as a seedling. I thought it quite interesting that the first leaf appeared as an adult ...Read Moreleaf with fan shape and quite tall!

I was lucky enough to see one of these at Fairchild Tropical Gardens in Miami. In requirments, they are like the ultra topical version of...Read More Ravenea rivularis, and need lots of water and tend to be very yellow.

This palm is very common in open wetlands south and east of Amazon, where it´s one of the main components of the ecossystems. The native...Read More populations of those areas - who knows this palm by the name of "Buriti" - rely on this palm to get food, fiber, oil, fuel, and construction materials all the year, even when it´s too dry and there´s nothing else growing around them. For being so useful, they give this palm an almost "sacred" status.

The fruits can be eaten in many ways, sweet or salty. The fleshy and yellow pulp is very tasty and nutritious, but to be more easily obtained, the fruit must be quickly boiled in hot water. It is covered with some weird scaly shell. The seeds are used for its edible oil. If I´m not mistaken, from the fruit (or is it from the liquid from the young inflorescences?) they make a fermented beverage called "Buriti wine".

The trunk is used as pillars for houses, and the leaves are used to cover and isolate those houses. From the leaves, they get a strong fiber, used to make baskets and such

This is a very ornamental palm but so tropical in its requirements, Hawaii is even a marginal climate for it but have seen some grown alo...Read Moreng the Hawaiian coast. It is from South American swamps where it is a pretty fast growing palm of some economic importance to those living in the Amazon basin. It can grow up to 80 feet tall and has the most wonderfully finely split fan leaves with drooping leaflets. To me it is one of the 10 most beautiful species in the world.