Elaeis guineensis

[The Palm Nut]

You don't see any of these along the eastern coast of NSW and in South Queensland they are few most are well north of Gladstone. Its ashame as these palms do well even as far south as mine is. It hasent skipped a beat during winter and keeps on producing plenty of new frons year round. The adding bonus is that they will not produce fruit to attract the bats which can be a problem as I live along the colonies flight path. This picture of mine was taken last summer, the palm isnt much older than 5 or so years so the growth is fantastic.

Is there others that have this palm growing in NSW,WA,VIC, or SA?

Cheers

Mike

[Daryl]

Hi Mike,

There are a few in SE QLD. The old botanical gardens has one with 10 metres of trunk. Some local collectors have plants that are fruiting. Mine is doing well here, and has never complained, regardless of the weather that has been thrown at it. It is not too far off from forming a trunk. Yours looks like it enjoys your climate too!

regards,

Daryl

[The Palm Nut]

Hi Daryl, yes mine seems to love it here. While up in Port Douglas QLD they had these palms lining the road, it was a stunning sight.

Cheers

Mike

Hi Mike,

There are a few in SE QLD. The old botanical gardens has one with 10 metres of trunk. Some local collectors have plants that are fruiting. Mine is doing well here, and has never complained, regardless of the weather that has been thrown at it. It is not too far off from forming a trunk. Yours looks like it enjoys your climate too!

regards,

Daryl

[aussiearoids]

Scase shipped them in by the hundreds ,, there was/is an abandoned plantation of them somewhere up the Cape .

Recently some idiot has been poisoning them . They sure make Port Douglas look a little more like a resort than the little fishing village it used to be . I had abook given to me for my 18 th of 'Ghost Towns of Australia ' Port Douglas was 1 !!!

[boko]

Do you meen that the palms at Port douglas are gone??They are/where amazing!! I was over in Port douglas in ,89 for the first time ,they where just planted and already looked great. every tree was a little planet of plants and animals living in between the old leaves.

[aussiearoids]

NO , only a few Oil Palms are missing at Port Douglas .

#

That Council approves the relocation of 39 Oil Palms to replace the Oil Palms that have been poisoned and to balance the Oil Palm avenue along Port Douglas ...

www.cityofcairns.qld.gov.au/.../240106_Confirmed_Minutes(ordmtg).pdf - Similar -

#

2

[Walter John]

Oil have a few of those palms for meself...

[ariscott]

Hhhhmmm... native nazi?? The same thing happened to a few bismarkias near the Post Office here. Thank goodness, they didn't use strong enough poison. They are still alive and well...

Regards, Ari

[boko]

Hhhhmmm... native nazi?? The same thing happened to a few bismarkias near the Post Office here. Thank goodness, they didn't use strong enough poison. They are still alive and well...

Regards, Ari

I can,t believe people do stuff like that, a lot of idiots around i guess! over here people just steel them from your garden.

[Jose Maria]

I agree with the mention of these being fast growers.

Here in Costa Rica they are planted commercially, and in 2 years after transplanting from a nursery(1 year in nursery) they have already fruits that can be harvested.

The male flowers are hanging below, the female flowers have already produced the black fruit that will soon turn red when ripe.A bunch of female flowers is right in the middle.

Edited September 21, 2009 by Jose Maria

[Tyrone]

There are some small ones growing in collectors garden's here in Perth. We have two in the nursery and they're looking OK, but they probably don't like sitting in 3 inches of water all winter, and would look better in a drier warmer spot protected from 100kph gale force storm fronts.

I must admit, I'm not a big fan of this palm. I suppose they have their own beauty, but when you've seen people slash and burning SE Asian rainforests to put in millions of Oil Palms for palm oil production, I don't think I need one on my small suburban block. They won't be going extinct soon, that's for sure.

If you fly into Changi Airport in Singapore from the north, you will do a big circle over the southern tip of Malaysia at low altitude, and you'll be flying over a giant Oil Palm Plantation only 1 minute before you touch down. In 04 we flew further up into Malaysia to Tioman Island and you could see all the fires brning where they'd cleared the rainforest for Oil Palm plantations. Eventually the southern tip of Malaysia will be one big Oil Palm plantation with no native forests.

Best regards

Tyrone

[amazondk]

Tyrone,

Some time ago I did a bit of research on the whole subject of oil palm plantations. They are the highest producers of oil of any crop per hectare. I know that there has been a lot of land abuse in Malaysia and Indonesia. But, the tree is an important alternative for bil fuel and vegetable oil. I think that Brazil will become one of the largest producers of this oil in the future. But, in this case I do not see the palm leading to deforestation. To the contrary it will be planted to recover degraded land that has been deforested. The amount of degraded land in Amazonia, about 15 percent of the total is about the same amount of area as all of Indonesia put together. So, there is a lot of potential. I have three of them in a strategic spot on my place. When large they are a nice looking tree in my opinion. If I remember right in Costa Rica the oil palms are planted mostly on old banana plantations.

dk

[Tyrone]

Don, I'm sure Oil Palm plantations could be done responsibly, and by the sounds of it, that is happening in your part of the world. But greed and responsibility don't normally go hand in hand.

By the way, I'm not against anyone growing an Oil Palm either. It's just me. If I had more room I might consider one. But I've got to leave room for my Raphia palm, Caryota gigas, Roystonea oleracea and Parajubaea torallyi.

Best regards

Tyrone

[amazondk]

Tyrone,

They do take up a lot of space. I can only fit 3 in my overall plan because I have plans for more big palms like corypha, attaleas, bismarkias, etc. Ari sent me some bismarkia seeds, and I definately want to put a few of them in the ground. I already have 2.

dk

[Tyrone]

Bismarkia will grow like crazy for you. They'll be fast.

Best regards

Tyrone

[Jose Maria]

One of the good thing to be said about palm oil production is that it produces more than 5 times as much oil per hectare as the next runner up that´s soybeans...

There are now 57.000 hectares of oilpalm planted in Costa Rica, mostly on former banana plantations and grazing land, the most interesting forests here are luckily protected by national parks.

It´ s a big palm, the planting density per hectare is 143 palms maximum.