Cycas rumphii (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

Cycas rumphii Miq.

Family: Cycadaceae

Synonyms

• Cycas circinalis L.

Vernacular names

• Indonesia: pakis haji, pakis raja
• Malaysia: paku laut, paku gajah, bogak
• Philippines: pitogo (Tagalog), bait (Sulu), sauang (Iloko)
• Burma: mong-tain
• Thailand: prong-tha-le (peninsular), maphrao-sida (Prachuap Khiri Khan), prong (central)
• Vietnam: thiên túê.

Distribution

India, Sri Lanka, South-East Asia, Australia, Micronesia, wild and cultivated.

Uses

The seeds are edible, prepared as flour. Fresh seeds are poisonous. The youngest leaves are eaten as vegetable. A kind of sago is prepared from the trunk. A poultice of the seeds and bark is used to cure sores and skin complaints. The plant is also important as an ornamental.

Observations

• Dioecious palm-like tree, up to 6 m tall, sometimes branched.
• Leaves in a dense terminal whorl, pinnate, up to 2.5 m long and with 50-150 pairs of leaflets.
• Flowers united in a cone, female cone terminal with numerous carpophylls, up to 50 cm long.
• Seeds ovoid-ellipsoid, 3-6 cm × 2.5-5 cm, orange.

Often along the sea coast and in forests at low altitudes.

Selected sources

• Backer, C.A. & Bakhuizen van den Brink, R.C., 1963 1968. Flora of Java. 3 Volumes. Noordhoff, Groningen, the Netherlands.

• Brown, W.H., 1951-1957. Useful plants of the Philippines. Reprint of the 1941-1943 ed. 3 Volumes. Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources. Technical Bulletin 10. Bureau of Printing, Manila, the Philippines.

• Burkill, I.H., 1966. A dictionary of the economic products of the Malay Peninsula. 2nd ed. 2 Volumes. Ministry of Agriculture and Co-operatives, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. 2444 pp.

• Hsuan Keng, 1972. Cycad seeds as food in Malaya. The Malayan Nature Journal 25: 101-103.

• Jones, D.T., 1984. Gymnosperms of Malaysia. The Cycads. Nature Malaysiana 9: 4-11.

• Ochse, J.J. & Bakhuizen van den Brink, R.C., 1980. Vegetables of the Dutch East Indies. 2nd ed. Asher & Co, Amsterdam. 1016 pp.

• Thierck, J.W., 1958. Economic botany of the cycads. Economic Botany 12: 3-41.

Authors

P.C.M. Jansen, J. Jukema, L.P.A. Oyen, T.G. van Lingen