Digital Garden

Caryota urens L.

ഒലട്ടി പന

Family : Arecaceae

Synonym : No synonyms are recorded for this name

Common Names : Chundapanna, Olatti, Elephant’s palm, Jaggery Palm

Flowering Period : January – April

Distribution : Indo-Malesia

Habitat : Evergreen forests, also in the plains

Uses : The fibers are manufactured into ropes, brushes, brooms, baskets. From the pith a good variety of "sago" is obtained which is highly nutritious. Toddy is also obtained from this palm. Terminal bud is edible.

Key Characters :

Monoecious stout tall palms, trunk smooth with prominent annular leaf-scars. Leaves bipinnate. Spadix interfoliar, shortly peduncled, pendulous; spathes few. Flowers many, in triads with female flower in the middle. Sepals 3, rounded, imbricate. Petals linear-oblong, valvate. Stamens many. Ovary 3-celled, 3-gonous; ovule 1-per locule. Fruit globose, reddish purple; seeds plano-convex, subreniform.