Palms

What to look for

• A trunk that does not branch, usually topped by a crown of large leaves called fronds.
• Fan-shaped (palmate) fronds, with leaflets spreading from a point, or feather-shaped (pinnate) fronds, with leaflets along a central stalk.
• No annual growth rings in the trunk. Palms are monocots, like grasses and lilies.
• Flowers in branched clusters, followed by fruit that usually has a single seed. A coconut is the fruit of the coconut palm.

Fan palms and feather palms

Fan palms have rounded fronds divided like the fingers of a hand. Cabbage palmetto, the state tree of Florida and of South Carolina, is a fan palm of the south-eastern coast, and so are the Washingtonia palms of the south-west. Feather palms have long arching fronds with leaflets down both sides: date palm, queen palm and coconut palm are examples.

Telling them apart

Start with the frond shape, then look at the trunk (smooth, ringed, or covered in old leaf bases), whether there is a smooth green crownshaft where fronds join, and the fruit. Palm species are many and often hard to separate from a photograph, so a local palm guide is the best next step.

Native palms in the United States

Only a few palms are native to the United States, mostly in the south-east: cabbage palmetto, saw palmetto, needle palm and a few others, plus the California fan palm in the south-west desert. The palms in streets and gardens in warm regions are mostly planted from elsewhere.

Palms in cooler places

A few palms tolerate cold, notably the needle palm and the Chinese windmill palm, which are grown as far north as the coast of the mid-Atlantic and the British Isles. Look for a rounded fan of fronds with a hairy, fibrous trunk.