Palms   Copernicia alba

Common Names: Caranday Wax Palm, "caranda-i" from the Guaranies Indians. Distribution & Habitat: Open forest and pampas in Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay, and Argentina. Description: Is common to see in one population palms with grey or green leaves and are known variations (ecotypes) in the form and size of the trunk or/and size and form of the leaves and petioles. Grows in open areas to aproximately 20m tall, and the trunk is utilized to build bungalows. Fruits are blacks and ovoids when mature, seeds ovoids, germinate easily if fresh. General: Not well known in cultivation, this palm is the most cold resistent of all Copernicias . It grows in the north of my country in lowland areas (pampas), in some locations mixed with Syagrus romanzoffiana , Trithrinax campestris , Trithrinax biflabellata or Acrocomia totai , only in one area is possible to see mixed with Butia yatay and the lowland form of Trithrinax campestris , and in other area of the northwest mixed with Trithrinax shizophylla .

Figure 1. C. alba leaf detail.

Contributed by:	Gaston Torres Vera Cordoba, Argentina (Text)
	Rolf Kyburz, K-Palms (Figure 1)

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