31 minutes ago, Tyrone said:

Well here’s the thing. If Dowes description is 100% correct, Archontophoenix cunninghamiana has ramenta on the midrib. His description doesn’t say - sometimes absent. So maybe we are looking at an undescribed species due to that one thing, or, it is Archontophoenix cunninghamiana without ramenta. Either way is purely an academic discussion. Probably worth further investigation. It’s pretty cool though.

It's one of those moments when we're willing it to be something new, lol! Agreed though, it's pretty cool either way.

Maybe Archontophoenix, like Rhopalostylis, just has a small number of highly variable species? The isolation of a population like the one at Eungella is potentially a first step towards speciation.

14 hours ago, Jonathan said:

There's no ramenta on the midrib of the pinnae on my palms, at least not yet...I'd have thought they'd have adult leaves by now? Does this mean they're not cunninghamiana??

Ramenta develops very early in A cunninghamiana. If your palms haven’t got it now, then they never will. Until last week I always thought of A cunninghamiana always having ramenta, but you’re now the second person to have confirmed plants in cultivation from seed collected from this population stay true to type and do not exhibit ramenta.

42 minutes ago, Tyrone said:

Well here’s the thing. If Dowes description is 100% correct, Archontophoenix cunninghamiana has ramenta on the midrib. His description doesn’t say - sometimes absent. So maybe we are looking at an undescribed species due to that one thing, or, it is Archontophoenix cunninghamiana without ramenta. Either way is purely an academic discussion. Probably worth further investigation. It’s pretty cool though.

Yeah agree with all that. One of 2 things must be true - the Dalrymple purple Archontophoenix are a new species, or the description of A cunninghamiana needs to be updated to include possibility of absence of ramenta ultimately it comes down to the question of ‘what is a species’. Perhaps genetic study can help decide if there’s enough difference between these palms and other A cunninghamiana from other locales vs the differences between other Archontophoenix sp.

3 minutes ago, Jonathan said:

It's one of those moments when we're willing it to be something new, lol! Agreed though, it's pretty cool either way.

Maybe Archontophoenix, like Rhopalostylis, just has a small number of highly variable species? The isolation of a population like the one at Eungella is potentially a first step towards speciation.

I’ve wondered about this. If you think about some species like Prestoea acuminata, various Geonoma sp like G undata, even Washingtonia filifera now that W robusta is lumped in, then the differences between Archontophoenix species (I’m thinking especially A alexandrae, maxima, myolensis and tuckeri) are relatively small. Recently genetic study is becoming much more accessible and affordable so hopefully there can be a study to understand the relationship between all of the Archontophoenix species.

9 minutes ago, tim_brissy_13 said:

I’ve wondered about this. If you think about some species like Prestoea acuminata, various Geonoma sp like G undata, even Washingtonia filifera now that W robusta is lumped in, then the differences between Archontophoenix species (I’m thinking especially A alexandrae, maxima, myolensis and tuckeri) are relatively small. Recently genetic study is becoming much more accessible and affordable so hopefully there can be a study to understand the relationship between all of the Archontophoenix species.

I'm still very confused about about the differences between A. alexandrae, tuckeri, maxima, and myolensis - only having access to potentially mislabeled or hybridized material here in the States. A. maxima in particular is an enigma here, I think that name gets applied a lot to plants that have nothing to do with the Walsh River species. I've spent a lot of time looking at Dowe's description and any other online sources and have no confidence in being able to tell them apart, even when looking at seed.

Meanwhile A. cunninghamiana displays at least as much variation across that huge range and is lumped together as one species, I agree I would love to see someone look at the genetics.

3 hours ago, aabell said:

I'm still very confused about about the differences between A. alexandrae, tuckeri, maxima, and myolensis - only having access to potentially mislabeled or hybridized material here in the States. A. maxima in particular is an enigma here, I think that name gets applied a lot to plants that have nothing to do with the Walsh River species. I've spent a lot of time looking at Dowe's description and any other online sources and have no confidence in being able to tell them apart, even when looking at seed.

Meanwhile A. cunninghamiana displays at least as much variation across that huge range and is lumped together as one species, I agree I would love to see someone look at the genetics.

And that's the nub of the issue really - the huge range of A cunninghamiana. It would seem more incredible to me if the Eungella population was not at least a distinct sub species to the palms at Batemans Bay in southern NSW...nearly 1600 km to the south...a similar distance to that between San Diego and Seattle.

The population at Eungella is further isolated by around 200km of Brigalow, ie seasonally dry woodland pretty hostile to palms, so there can't have been much, if any, gene flow from other populations since the formation of the Brigalow belt. It's a fascinating scenario, and would be great to get some scientific input at some point...we need a botany grad looking for a phd thesis!

I grew these from open-pollinated seed off of a palm on Fort Myers Beach, FL that i also grew from seed that was purchased from Ortanique as A. purpurea circa 2004.

if you look closely at the ones in the middle of the row, they have a little violet on the crown shaft. I am convinced that these are a A. purpurea x alexandrae hybrid.

JD