Caryota urens
Solitary fishtail palm · also Kithul palm, Toddy palm, Wine palm
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Caryota urens is a solitary-trunked palm with distinctive bipinnate, fishtail-shaped leaves and a grey trunk, growing up to 20 meters tall. It is monocarpic, flowering once and then dying after fruiting, which provides food for various animals like fruit bats and civets. This salt-tolerant palm thrives in rainforest clearings and requires high water, though its fruits contain irritating oxalic acid crystals.
Where it grows
Trees in each city's inventory, with the share of that city's named trees this species accounts for.
- 200.01%—7.2 in
- 40.00%—31 in
No city in this list records planting dates for this species, so age is blank throughout.
Traits
- Form
- Palm
- Foliage
- Evergreen
- Mature height
- 30–35 ft
- Canopy spread
- 16–20 ft
- Growth rate
- Fast
- Water needs
- High
- Drought tolerance
- Low
- Wildlife value
- High
- Tolerates
- coastal, salt
Trunk diameters across every city: median 7.4 in, mean 11 in, 90th percentile 12 in. Measured at breast height, as published by each inventory.
Native range
Terrestrial ecoregions where this species is native. Trees in the dataset mostly stand well outside it.
Tropical & Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests
- Sri Lanka lowland rain forests
Other Caryota in the catalogue
2 of the top 2,000 species are in this genus.