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Caryota mitis
Also called Clustering Fishtail Palm, Clustered Fishtail Palm, Tufted Fishtail Palm
In Singapore: Fishtail Palm, Common Fishtail Palm, Burmese Fishtail Palm, Clustered Fishtail Palm, Rabok, Rebuk, Meridin, Dudok, Tukas, 短穗鱼尾葵, 叢立孔雀椰子 (Native to Singapore, Least Concern)
Burmese fishtail palm is a clustering palm with fishtail-shaped leaflets, grown mainly as an outdoor ornamental in warm, humid climates. Give it bright light, steady moisture and warmth, and keep it out of frost.
Caryota mitis, known as the clustering fishtail palm or fishtail palm, is a species of palm native to Tropical Asia from India to Java to southern China, now sparingly naturalized in southern Florida and in parts of Africa and Latin America. The species was originally described from Vietnam in 1790. In Florida, it grows in hummocks and in disturbed wooded areas.
The fruit of C. mitis is saturated with raphides, sharp, needle-shaped crystals of calcium oxalate. The raphides are strong irritants that cause damage and later itching upon contact with skin, and if ingested, the mouth. This is a result of the physical structure of the raphides, and not any chemical reaction.
Cultivated mainly as an ornament plant in Cambodia, where it is named tunsaé töch, traditional healers burn the heaps of felted hairs from the leaves' axils to treat ill limbs of patients.
[Contains information from Leaf Area Index (LAI) and Heritage Trees from data.gov.sg (National Parks Board), made available under the terms of the Singapore Open Data Licence version 1.0]
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Caryota mitis by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
