Can You ID This Plant?

[Brettster]

I am trying to find the name of this particular plant, which are grown in abundance around my neighborhood. Anybody know?

second image in particular shows what I hate about them: the tips of the leaves are as sharp as needles, and have drawn blood from me on more than one occasion when I've passed them on the sidewalk. A couple of times it damned near pierced my eyeball -- if I hadn't been wearing glasses, I'd be blind in one eye today. I will often return with a kitchen knife and amputate the more menacing of of the leaves.

[David E. Ross]

It's some kind of "feather" palm. "Feather" refers to the form of the leaves, which have leaflets along a center stalk. That is, the leaves are pinnately compound, "pinnate" meaning "like a feather".

Another form is "fan" palm, the leaves of which radiate from a small area at the end of a stalk. That is, the leaves are palmately compound, "palmate" meaning "like a hand with the fingers extended".

There are a few other leaf forms, but feather and fan account for most palms.

Do a Web search on "palm" with either "feather" or "pinnate".

[Brettster]

A plant expert ID'd this as a Phoenix reclinata, adding that it had been planted inappropriately. "They make a huge, suckering plant with about a ten foot or more circumference," he said. "They need room. It needs to be in the open."

I guess that's what it is...

[David E. Ross]

The common name for P. reclinata is Senegal date palm. It can grow quite large.

If there are other P. reclinata within a mile or so, this might not have been planted. Large birds eat the fruit from mature trees and spread the seeds. "Volunteer" seedlings are quite common.

I suggest you contact the property owner and inform him or her about the eventual size of this tree, the hazard (and thus liability) it currently creates for people walking nearby, and the future damage it might cause the adjacent structure.

[lannerman]

that this is what we call in the UK. The Canary Island Date Palm, Phoenix canariensis and yes it is vicious and yes it is fast growing.

Regards from Cornwall UK Lannerman.

[Brettster]

Thank you very much! That is PRECISELY what it is!

Brett