State Tree of Florida, Sabal Palm
Its History and Uses
Chosen as the state tree of Florida in 1953 the sabal palm, or cabbage palm is native to Florida and coastal regions of North and South Carolina and Georgia and is the state tree of both South Carolina and Florida. The name “cabbage palm” comes from its edible immature leaves, or “heart,” which has a cabbage-like flavor.
The sabal palm (Sabal palmetto) is the most widely distributed palm in Florida. It grows in almost any soil and has many uses, including food, medicine, and landscaping. The 1953 Florida legislature designated the sabal palm as the state tree, and the 1970 legislature mandated that the sabal palm should replace the cocoa palm on the state seal.
Sabal palms are only possible to grow from seed. They are easy to transplant and may thrive in full sun or part shade, but they will grow slower in the latter. Cabbage palms are well-suited to life in south Florida as hurricane-resistant plants, and they are frequently employed as street trees. The fronds of the cabbage palm were used to make baskets, and both the fronds and the trunk were used to build shelters by indigenous Floridians.
The sabal palm’s leaves emerge from a terminal bud called as “heart,” which is edible and has a cabbage-like flavor, hence the species’ popular name. “Heart of palm” and “swamp cabbage” are two names for the bud.
Sabal palmetto is a popular landscape plant in subtropical areas because of its salt and drought tolerance, as well as its mild cold hardiness. Few, if any, are produced from seed in nurseries due to their unusually long establishment period and ubiquity on southern ranchlands. Instead, established plants with small rootballs are dug in the wild since almost all of the removed roots die and must be replaced by new roots in the new location. To reduce transpiration, the bulk of the leaves is removed at this time.
The sabal palm is fire, flood, coastal conditions, cold, high winds, and drought resistant. Despite this, Texas phoenix palm decline, a phytoplasma currently found on Florida’s west coast, has caused recent mortality. And can grow to over 60 feet high and over eight feet wide in diameter.
Age and growth rates of sabal palm have been studied by the University of Florida, and preliminary results indicate some startling news: under average conditions in the wild, plants require ten to fifteen years or more from seed to the first sign of a trunk at ground level; thereafter, trunks will grow about six inches.
Sabal palm’s fruit, leaves (rarely eaten), and stems are edible. The fruits, which really amounts to a thin skin coating on the seeds, are edible raw. The hard seeds that are located inside the fruit may be ground into flour (often the fruit and seed are ground up together).
The heart of the palm (the very inner core) is a nutritious food source at any time. Cut off the top of the tree to obtain the palm heart (the palm tree die when the heart is removed). Cut off the top three feet of the tree below where the fronds (leaves) are growing. Pull off or cut away the leaf stems to reach the inner core. The core is cylindrical, white, and consists of leek-like layers of undeveloped leaves.
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