Cretan Date Palm
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 Cretan Date Palm woodland on Crete
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| Phoenix theophrasti Greuter |
The Cretan Date Palm (Phoenix theophrasti) is a small palm native to the eastern Mediterranean region, with a very restricted distribution confined to a few sites in Crete in southern Greece, and on the Datça and Bodrum Peninsulas in Muğla Province in southwest Turkey. Phoenix theophrasti make Europe's only palm forest, in Vai, a beach in the prefecture of Lasithi in eastern Crete.
It grows to 10 m tall, usually with several slender stems. The leaves are pinnate, 2-3 m long, with numerous rigid greyish-green linear leaflets 15-50 cm long on each side of the central rachis. The fruit is an oval yellowish-brown drupe 1.5 cm long and 1 cm diameter and containing a single large seed; the fruit pulp is too thin and fibrous to be worth eating and has an acrid taste though the fruits are sometimes eaten by the locals.
[edit] References and external links
- Johnson (1998). Phoenix theophrasti. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 09 May 2006.
- Davis, P. H., ed. (1965-1985). Flora of Turkey. Edinburgh.
- ARKive: Phoenix theophrasti
