Acrocomia intumescens

[Gileno Machado]

Here are a few pictures taken in Sirinhaém, state of Pernambuco, NE Brazil, of Acrocomia intumescens in habitat. These palms, now recognized again by Harri Lorenzi and Larry Noblick in their new book Flora Brasileira as separate species from Acrocomia aculeata (as originally described by Martius in the 19th century) is actually very distinctive from its cousins. The smooth trunk when mature, the belly in the stem at varied heights and the tasty edible big fruits are quite unique. It is also very different from A. crispa (formerly Gastrococos, from Cuba), which are very spiny palms and have small fruits and quite different seedlings. The habitat location of A. intumescens (Macaíba) is actually very small in Northeastern Brazil, usually found at a short distance from the coast.

[Gileno Machado]

A few more:

[Gileno Machado]

...

[Lowey]

Thanks for the pics Gileno, and for the information, interesting palm

[peachy]

Thanks Gileno, I love Acrocomias but everytime I buy the seeds nothing happens. Impossible to buy here too. I had never heard of this species before...its a very pretty palm. Another lovely thing I will probably never have.

Peachy

[Walter John]

Cool Gileno, Acrocomia cool.

thanks for the pics..

[Kumar]

Thanks Gileno, I had not even heard of this species, much less seen it, so it is very interesting to know something new. It looks as though it has been fashioned out of bits and pieces of other palms !

[Eric in Orlando]

Great looking palms ! Glad to see another species of Acrocomia has been restored !

[Trópico]

Wow! Stunning palm. Going by your pictures they seem to be rather solitary and occur mostly by the roadside. Did you see more stands further removed from the road? Do you know how the seeds get dispersed?

[GTClover]

Very beautiful palm!

[Jeff in St Pete]

Gileno, From a distance those two Acrocomia intumescens kind of look like Royals.

Cool palms, thanks for the photos!

[paulgila]

awesome!!!

is that just natural graasland surrounding the palms or crops of some kind?

[Lowey]

awesome!!!

is that just natural graasland surrounding the palms or crops of some kind?

Sugar cane mostly

[Gileno Machado]

Thanks Gileno, I love Acrocomias but everytime I buy the seeds nothing happens. Impossible to buy here too. I had never heard of this species before...its a very pretty palm. Another lovely thing I will probably never have.

Peachy

Hi Peachy, Acrocomia intumescens seeds are difficult to sprout and may take a long time too but once in the ground these palms usually take off fast. Please PM me your mailing address. I'm planning to send a few of these seeds to some friends in Australia soon and I'll make sure they'll forward you something as a gift...

[Gileno Machado]

Wow! Stunning palm. Going by your pictures they seem to be rather solitary and occur mostly by the roadside. Did you see more stands further removed from the road? Do you know how the seeds get dispersed?

Thanks for the comments Lowey, Paul, GTClover, Wal, Jeff, Eric and Kumar...

Frank, this species is still common around these parts, despite the pressure for sugarcane plantation and clearings of habitats. The locals usually spare them from destruction because the fruits are highly appreciated for dessert. Now they're increasing the plantings for urban landscape design and avenue line ups. A few years ago they'd prefer to plant only Royals, coconuts and Sabal. Those individuals bordering the local roads in sugarcane plantations were probably dispersed by humans in the past, after chewing up the fruit. I'll try to photograph some areas where they occur in aboundance soon. I guess these palms actually prefer soils with predominance of clay and organic matter. They're drought tolerating palms and may even take some cold with no problem. I saw a few cultivated ones doing great in Minas Gerais state at the Inhotim Botanic garden, where the weather is much cooler than up here. Alberto took a few seedlings to his frosty tableland in the south last year...I wonder if they're still doing fine there...

[GTClover]

Hi All, I really like this palm and I was roaming around the internet looking for information on it and ran across this interesting presentation that I thought would interest a lot of you. I'd love to hear what PalmTalkers think about this old but also potentially more important use in the search for fossil fuel alternatives and particularly as a resource for countries with emerging economies.

Here's an excerpt:

Promising palms for bioenergies

Suitable characteristics for industrialization

Ability to grow where the oil palm (Elaeis

guineensis), the most productive species, cannot

• Mesic/dry climate : Acrocomia, Attalea

• Saline, windy conditions : Cocos, Acrocomia

(some ecotypes), Attalea (some species)

Oil yield > 1000 l/ha/yr

High energy balance (output/input > 4)

Reasonably fast growing

Multiple use of biomass components as coproducts

or whole biomass harvest

Environmentally friendly

And another:

Interest of the genus Acrocomia

Potential new source of income in semi-arid areas of tropical America

Can develop on poor/eroded soils, resists to fire and light frosts (some ecotypes) Domestication/improvement needed to accelerate germination (1-4 years), growth (5-8 years to maturity), synchrony of fruiting within a raceme, oil yield, and to reduce spines (heavily armed species) Currently investigated for industrialization in Mexico, Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina

Here's the link

Susan

Edited July 10, 2010 by GTClover

[John Case]

Running ther numbers, it looks like the entire Caribbean landmass will have to convert to Acro fields inorder to make a small business profit. 1000 litres per hectare is not much compared to the demand for oil energy today..perhaps a small and local application can be construted in order to limit the imports......

[kelen]

wonderful palm Gileno! I still don't get it. Do you have some seedling photos? I would like to see the first leaf.

[Gileno Machado]

Hi All, I really like this palm and I was roaming around the internet looking for information on it and ran across this interesting presentation that I thought would interest a lot of you. I'd love to hear what PalmTalkers think about this old but also potentially more important use in the search for fossil fuel alternatives and particularly as a resource for countries with emerging economies.

Here's an excerpt:

Promising palms for bioenergies

Suitable characteristics for industrialization

Ability to grow where the oil palm (Elaeis

guineensis), the most productive species, cannot

Mesic/dry climate : Acrocomia, Attalea

Saline, windy conditions : Cocos, Acrocomia

(some ecotypes), Attalea (some species)

Oil yield > 1000 l/ha/yr

High energy balance (output/input > 4)

Reasonably fast growing

Multiple use of biomass components as coproducts

or whole biomass harvest

Environmentally friendly

And another:

Interest of the genus Acrocomia

Potential new source of income in semi-arid areas of tropical America

Can develop on poor/eroded soils, resists to fire and light frosts (some ecotypes) Domestication/improvement needed to accelerate germination (1-4 years), growth (5-8 years to maturity), synchrony of fruiting within a raceme, oil yield, and to reduce spines (heavily armed species) Currently investigated for industrialization in Mexico, Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina

Here's the link

Susan

Thanks for the link and all the information Susan.

They've been researching a lot with some palm species in Brazil lately, interested in biodiesel production for the future. I've read that they've found out that a hybrid in Attalea genus (A. X teixeirana) has proved to achieve a maximum oil production/hectare so far, and also it starts fruiting at early stages.

Some countries are already planting millions of palms for this purpose, mostly Elaeis guineensis I think, but these extensive plantings can also impact negativelly the local habitats and interfere with the ecologic balance, I think. The ammount of biodiesel expected from these crops will not of course be sufficient to replace all fossil fuels we burn everyday but it will certainly help a lot to reduce emissions in the future. There are actually several big towns with polution problems that are slowly converting and adopting biodiesel for use in urban transportation now, like São Paulo. I believe the legislation is also previewing an increase of biodiesel percentage in the general fuel for the next years too. The goal is 5% for 2013 and 20% for 2020. Who knows if the Acrocomia will play an important role too, someday...

[GTClover]

Hi Gileno, I thought the article might be of interest to you being a palm guy and a Brazilian which was specifically spoken of as potentially benefiting from this technology! I just ran another interesting article featuring Brazil and bioenergy in Nature called "Brazil's biotech boom" The focus in this case, I think is sugarcane and not palms, but it's still interesting. I know Brazil has done a lot in biofuels with corn, but it would be better in my mind to focus on making making ethanol and other liquid fuel substitutes from non food sources. But that's a whole other topic! I don't think that any one technology will replace fossil fuels, but every little bit helps. The article can be found here: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v466/n7304/full/466295a.html

Susan

[EduB]

Very interesant information Gileno,

the "Intumensces" variety? is very similar to "Acrocomia totai", except for the belly, but here we can find some Acrocomia´s with this characteristhic too.

You can see a lot of pictures and information of Acrocomia at: www.acrocomiasolutions.com

We have developed a method for fast germination succesfully, but our actual market is national (Paraguay) and for oil extraction purposes. I´d like to know how palms lovers can import palms seeds from any place in the world? Someone have had experience with shipments and custom´s requirements?

Best regards.

Eduardo.

[Tulio]

Hi Eduardo,

Can you share with us your method for fast germination?

Thanks,

[amazondk]

I would like to know about the germination as well.

dk

[Al in Kona]

I'd like to know the method for faster germination of Acrocomia seed also.

[EduB]

I'd like to know the method for faster germination of Acrocomia seed also.

Tulio, Amazondk and Al,

pitifully I can´t give you details because it is proprietary method developed for our Company, it took 4 years of research and a lot of resources.

Our goal is to provide homogeneous and healthy Acrocomia´s pre germinated seeds for nurseries, actually all of them are in Paraguay, where there is a increasing interest in Acrocomia plantation´s for oils, expellers and solids fuels production from the fruits. We provide pregerminated seeds (in first development state) not seeds. This pregerminated seeds are sown in pots with apropriated conditions and they are ready to go to the plantation as fast as 6 months. You can see further information about this product and our Acrocomia´s "Know how" here. Our seeds are from the former "totai" species (or breed?), but actually this is classified as "aculeata".

Currently, we are yet researching how to ship this material to other countries (legal and sanitary conditions), for that reason i asked about your experiences in importing others seeds species in your countries (in small quantities).

Thank you and I hope you will understand my position in revealing the method.

Eduardo.

[amazondk]

Eduardo,

I understand you concern. But, it would be nice to get the few seeds I have to germinate faster, if at all. As to importing germinated seeds to Brazil that is not really difficult if the importer and exporter follows proper phyto-sanitary proceedures. I do know that germinated african oil palm seeds are regularly imported to Brazil from Costa Rica.

dk

[peachy]

Eduardo, importing seeds to Australia is not difficult. They have to be clean, dry and each species in a seperate bag with the name written on it. On the actual package must be written palm seeds, then the species. The package is opened by quarantine officials and if everything is okay then they are forwarded to the recipient.

Peachy

[bayside mike]

Nice pictures, thanks for sharing.

They kind of look like gastracocos crispa without the spines.