Pachypodium baronii
| Pachypodium baronii | |
|---|---|
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| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| (unranked): | Angiosperms |
| (unranked): | Eudicots |
| (unranked): | Asterids |
| Order: | Gentianales |
| Family: | Apocynaceae |
| Genus: | Pachypodium |
| Species: | P. baronii |
| Binomial name | |
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Pachypodium baronii Costantin & Bois |
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Madagascar palm (Pachypodium baronii), also known as bontaka, is a flowering plant in the Dogbane family Apocynaceae (which has been recently merged with Milkweed family Asclepiadaceae). It has the habit of a robust shrub with a spherical or bottle-shaped trunk. It has several cylindrical branches at the top.
This plant is endemic to Madagascar, where it grows in open deciduous forest on Mesozoic calcareous rock and granite or gneiss on the western side of the island at low elevations. It is known in Madagascar as "Bontaka". It is also endemic from Befandriana Nord to Mandritsara.
Constantin and Bois first described Pachypodium baronii as a species of the genus Pachypodium in 1907.
Pachypodium baronii is a robust, globose (spherical)- to bottle-shaped shrub in habit. Its trunk is subglobose, not quite globose or spherical, mostly narrowed at the base with dimensions of 20 to 40 cm (8 to 15.5 in) in length by 20 cm (8 in) by 50 cm (19.5 in). At the top of the trunk, it abruptly narrows into one or several cylindrical branches that are 30 cm (12 in) to 50 cm (19.5 in) by 4 cm (1.5 in) by 8 cm (3 in) in diameter, tapering to 3 cm (1 in) to 4 cm (1.5 in) in diameter.
Pachypodium baronii typically grows to 1 to 3.50 m (3.3 to 11.5 ft) high. Its bark is colored pale grey or grey-green and is smooth, but sometimes retains remnants of leaf scars. Branchlets are 1.5 cm (0.59 in) to 7 cm (3 in) in length by 0.8 to 1.5 cm (0.31 to 0.59 in) in width. They are covered with paired often curved spines that measure 2 by 9 mm (0.079 by 0.354 in) long to 1 to 4 mm (0.039 to 0.157 in) in diameter at the base of the branchlet. Its basal (lower) part of the branchlet is conical and laterally compressed at 0.33 to 0.66 times the spine's length. The spines are often red and pubescent, hairy when young, turning medium to dark brown and glabrous and smooth.
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