I purchased as beaucarnea that has remarkably long leaves which, due to their length spiral as the hang down.

The only reference that I can find to a curly or spirally beaucarnea is the B. Guatamalensis

The only problem I have with that ID is that the B. Guatamalensis's new leaves come out red where mine are most definitely green.

Are there other beaucarneas that might fit my beaucarnea's specs???

Thanks

 

Richard

Edited September 4, 20196 yr by GDLWyverex

This looks like a quintessential B. recurvata. I always have a few, and here's my oldest. 

I have a couple of Beaucarnia, and the leaves definitely vary.  I have two of the Guatemalensis and they definitely sprout out red.  It fades a bit after a few inches of growth, so if yours is that type you might not see it immediately.  I also read that they vary color depending on the amount of sun.

Two of the regular green types I have indoors and the leaf shape and length is very different.  Both are long and recurving, but one has leaves about 3/8" wide and the other is almost 3/4" wide.  So even in the same plant type you'll see some variation.

Merlyn,

Just to avoid confusion, when you say "regular green type" - you are indicating B. recurvata, correct? 

Correct, most of what's sold is B. Recurvata.  I have 7 of those "regular green types."  I also bought two small ones with reddish emergent leaves that are B. Guatemalensis.  I have seen the occasional Guatemalensis for sale at the big box stores, they probably just don't know it's a slightly different plant.

There's also another variety called Beaucarnea Longifolia that looks nearly identical but has longer leaves.  I have no idea how to distinguish it from a regular Recurvata.

19 minutes ago, Merlyn2220 said:

Correct, most of what's sold is B. Recurvata.  I have 7 of those "regular green types."  I also bought two small ones with reddish emergent leaves that are B. Guatemalensis.  I have seen the occasional Guatemalensis for sale at the big box stores, they probably just don't know it's a slightly different plant.

There's also another variety called Beaucarnea Longifolia that looks nearly identical but has longer leaves.  I have no idea how to distinguish it from a regular Recurvata.

Might look over the Beaucarnia page on the " explore life on earth" web page ( site ) Was put together by Mark Olson and a team of Boanists down in Mexico. Lists numerous sp. w/ pics.  Site itself also contains several other pages detailing other interesting families they studied / documented. Worth a read as well. 

 

** Scratch that, just tried to find the pages again. Might have been taken down, or can't access them on the tablet 

Edited September 5, 20196 yr by Silas_Sancona
Edit.

14 minutes ago, Silas_Sancona said:

Might look over the Beaucarnia page on the " explore life on earth" web page ( site ) Was put together by Mark Olson and a team of Boanists down in Mexico. Lists numerous sp. w/ pics.  Site itself also contains several other pages detailing other interesting families they studied / documented. Worth a read as well. 

 

** Scratch that, just tried to find the pages again. Might have been taken down, or can't access them on the tablet 

I couldn't find it either.  Usually my first go-to place is either Palmpedia or LLifle.  Here's the LLifle page on Beaucarnea Longifolia:

http://www.llifle.com/Encyclopedia/TREES/Family/Dracaenaceae/33536/Beaucarnea_longifolia

46 minutes ago, Merlyn2220 said:

I couldn't find it either.  Usually my first go-to place is either Palmpedia or LLifle.  Here's the LLifle page on Beaucarnea Longifolia:

http://www.llifle.com/Encyclopedia/TREES/Family/Dracaenaceae/33536/Beaucarnea_longifolia

Digging around a bit, thinking Beaucarnea longifolia is an old name as it isn't listed as a species within the Genus. Is listed under Nolina however and, according to whats listed on iNat, is about to be relisted as Nolina parvifolia.  

These are the listed species for Beaucarnea:

compacta

goldmanii

gracilis

guatemalensis

hiriartiae

inermis

pliabilis

purpusii

recurvata

sanctomariana

and stricta. 

I was curious at lunch, so I looked up the Nolina vs Beaucarnea thing and ran across a great descriptive PDF:

https://oro.open.ac.uk/44988/1/Beaucarnea.pdf

Apparently Recurvata has leaves 90-180cm long and 1.5-2cm wide.  The very similar Gracilis are smaller leaves, 30-60cm long and 4-7mm wide.  Most photos I found show the Gracilis having short, spiky straight leaves, but the photo in the PDF looks like a Recurvata to me (Figure 7).  So who knows!!!

That PDF from 2015 makes it sound like Nolina is an old and discontinued genus, and Beaucarnea is the one they are keeping.  But that might have changed:

• The family placement of Beaucarnea has also changed in recent years. It was previously considered to be a member of the small family, the Nolinaceae, consisting of four genera: Beaucarnea, Calibanus, Dasylirion and Nolina (Walker, 2001a, b). This family is currently no longer recognised, and forms part of either a broadly circumscribed Asparagaceae (APG, 2009), or a more narrowly defined Ruscaceae (Nyffeler & Eggli, 2010); the latter position will be adopted in the forthcoming second edition of the Illustrated Handbook of Succulent Plants.

10 minutes ago, Merlyn2220 said:

I was curious at lunch, so I looked up the Nolina vs Beaucarnea thing and ran across a great descriptive PDF:

https://oro.open.ac.uk/44988/1/Beaucarnea.pdf

Apparently Recurvata has leaves 90-180cm long and 1.5-2cm wide.  The very similar Gracilis are smaller leaves, 30-60cm long and 4-7mm wide.  Most photos I found show the Gracilis having short, spiky straight leaves, but the photo in the PDF looks like a Recurvata to me (Figure 7).  So who knows!!!

That PDF from 2015 makes it sound like Nolina is an old and discontinued genus, and Beaucarnea is the one they are keeping.  But that might have changed:

• The family placement of Beaucarnea has also changed in recent years. It was previously considered to be a member of the small family, the Nolinaceae, consisting of four genera: Beaucarnea, Calibanus, Dasylirion and Nolina (Walker, 2001a, b). This family is currently no longer recognised, and forms part of either a broadly circumscribed Asparagaceae (APG, 2009), or a more narrowly defined Ruscaceae (Nyffeler & Eggli, 2010); the latter position will be adopted in the forthcoming second edition of the Illustrated Handbook of Succulent Plants.

Yea, i think there are too many "cooks in the kitchen" if you will at times when it comes to the constant arranging / re- arranging / rearrange even more of various genus, families / sub families, etc..  Hearing, ( ..and noticing, in some cases ) the entire Caesalpinia Genus is about to get the " break appart and reconfigure ( aka: confuse the snot out of everyone ) treatment" soon. Hopefully this isn't another case of humans full of  hot air trying to stroke their personal egos, and based on actual molecular / DNA differentials.  

6 hours ago, Merlyn2220 said:

Correct, most of what's sold is B. Recurvata.  I have 7 of those "regular green types."  I also bought two small ones with reddish emergent leaves that are B. Guatemalensis.  I have seen the occasional Guatemalensis for sale at the big box stores, they probably just don't know it's a slightly different plant.

There's also another variety called Beaucarnea Longifolia that looks nearly identical but has longer leaves.  I have no idea how to distinguish it from a regular Recurvata.

B. Longifolia is actually a synonym for the accepted name Nolina parviflora which though similar to the B. recurvata has a markedly more fissured trunk and the stem part of the trunk which emerges from the bulbous part of the trunk is much thicker than that of the B. recurvata.

Mine is more in keeping with B. recurvata in that respect. I've  put it out in the sun to see if it turns red with new leaf sprouts. That would be nice.

 

Richard

 

Edited September 5, 20196 yr by GDLWyverex