Some painstaking cases of threatened palms are happening
in Hawaii. The genus Pritchardia is represented in the Hawaiian
Archipelago by 23 species.. A few of them are abundant in the wild
and cultivated in gardens but most are severely endangered, mostly
threatened by feral pigs. Some cases are extreme, such as the one
of P. munroi, which has only one single wild individual left. Here
are some of the statistics:
Kaua'i
Pritchardia napaliensis : less than 90 individuals
Pritchardia viscosa : only 2 mature individuals
Hawai'i
Pritchardia schattaueri : only 12 individuals
Pritchardia affinis : only 60 individuals
Moloka'i
Pritchardia munroi : only one single wild individual
O'ahu
Pritchardia kaalae : two populations
(Data from Johnson, 1996)
Seeds of Pritchradia munroi were distributed to
many botanic gardens in the early 70's. Nowadays many of the palms
grown from those seeds have died due to Lethal Yellowing or other
factors, and the few survivors are planted together with other species
of Pritchardia, giving rise to hybrid seeds. Thankfully, two adult
specimens of P. munroi are now growing and fruiting in the Jardin
Botánico Viera y Clavijo, in Gran Canaria. No other species
of Pritchardia are growing in this garden, so the hundreds of seedlings
produced are pure.
Paschalococos and the Disappearing Palms
