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Nypa fruticans
Nypa fruticans, known as the attap palm (Singapore), nipa palm (Philippines), and mangrove palm or buah atap (Indonesia), buah nipah (Malaysia), dừa nước (Vietnam), Ging Pol in Sinhala in Sri Lanka and gol pata (Bangladesh), dani (Burma). It is the only palm considered a mangrove in the Mangroves Biome. This species is a monotypic taxon, the only one in the genus Nypa, grows in southern Asia and northern Australia within the Indomalaya ecozone. Nypa fruticans, the Nipa palm, has a horizontal trunk that grows beneath the ground and only the leaves and flower stalk grow upwards above the surface. Thus, it is an unusual tree, and the leaves can extend up to 9 m (30 ft) in height. The flowers are a globular inflorescence of female flowers at the tip with catkin-like red or yellow male flowers on the lower branches. The flower yields a woody nut, these arranged in a cluster compressed into a ball up to 25 cm (10 in) across on a single stalk. The ripe nuts separate from the ball and are floated away on the tide, occasionally germinating while still water-borne.
Spotted on Oct 30, 2011
Submitted on Nov 16, 2011
1 Comment
Hai, I'm from Malaysia in one of the state called Sarawak our neighbor is Brunei and our fellow Malaysian Sabah.
We are in process of developing a small traditional Nipa Palm institute for our local folks. Most of our nipa palm were not harvested and only one area call Betong Division were the main producer of nipa sugar and it is under supply.
As all have nipa palm can produce a lot more other products out of it such nipa roof from it leaves, nipa sugar for cake making, liquor, it sap as syrup, vinegar (very high quality organic vinegar), salt (organic), it fruits can be process as nato de coco (correct if i'm wrong), and also can made as broom.
In our place in Sarawak its production is done manually and research is ongoing on how it can be produce with new technology.
We are also working it as community based activity fro the rural folks who have a lot of this palm surrounding them.
Maybe anybody out there would like to comment or share information regarding nipa palm at your area and maybe anybody out there would like to learn on harvesting of nipa palm products in traditional way. I'm glad if you guys like to share what have been done with nipa palm as an economic generation for the individual and community.
Thank you