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Panama Hat Plant — photo by Scott Wieman

iNaturalist — CC, credited & licensed per image

Cyclanthaceae family

Panama Hat Plant Carludovica palmata

Panama Hat Plant is an introduced perennial herb, found in Puerto Rico. It grows to 52 ft.

More about this plant

Carludovica palmata is a species of flowering plant in the family Cyclanthaceae. It is not a true palm, but its leaves are similar to the leaves of some true palms, such as Chelyocarpus ulei. Unlike several true palms, C. palmata does not develop a woody trunk. Its female flowers have large stigmas, and its male flowers have a lot of pollen. Wikipedia →

Growing & care

USDA PLANTS · TRY

Size & form

Sources · Size & form

TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0) — Height · Foliage

USDA PLANTS — Lifespan

Height: 52 ft
Lifespan: Perennial
Foliage: Broadleaf

In the garden

Canopy layer — Sits in the canopy of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →

derived roles

Species characteristics from USDA PLANTS (public domain) + TRY (CC BY) — general guidance, not a guarantee for your exact site. Deer "browsing" is documented palatability, not a deer-proof claim.

Wildlife & pollinators

How pollinator value is scored →

Wildlife & visitors 3 mammals

Open records of who else uses Panama Hat Plant — a generalist food-web signal, kept separate from the keystone Ecological Value.

Recorded eaten by 3 mammals species (fruit, seed, browse):

Saguinus geoffroyi · Geoffroy's Tamarin

Saimiri oerstedii · Red-Backed Squirrel Monkey

Cebus imitator · Panama Capuchin Monkey

Interaction records (observations, not exhaustive) from GloBI → (CC0). Counts are distinct species; names are the most-recorded. Common names from Wikidata (CC0).

Species thumbnails re-hosted from iNaturalist — Creative Commons, credited per image (hover for credit). Click any species to see it on iNaturalist. Not exhaustive; many taxa have no openly-licensed photo yet.

How we know this (1) Methods & honest limits

Leaf build Direct fact

We read each species’ measured specific leaf area (leaf area per unit dry weight) from the Global Spectrum dataset and band it: thin & fast (high SLA), medium, or thick & tough (low SLA). The global median is about 10 mm²/mg.

Honest limits: A species-mean from pooled measurements — individual plants vary with light and site. A broad strategy signal, not a precise per-plant figure.

Díaz, S. et al. (2022) The global spectrum of plant form and function: enhanced species-level trait dataset. Scientific Data 9:755.

Derived values are computed from open data by a published method — labelled, cited, and never shown as a direct observation. Full methodology →

Sources for this entry (13) Open & cited

[01] Scientific name & family — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)

[02] Growth habit & duration — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)

[03] Native status & distribution — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)

[04] Common name — USDA PLANTS (via GBIF)

[05] Invasive / introduced status — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — native status

[06] Photos — iNaturalist — CC, credited per image

[07] Description — Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)

[08] Foliage — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)

[09] Height — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)

[10] Functional traits — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)

[11] Wildlife & visitors — GloBI — Global Biotic Interactions (CC0)

[12] Mycorrhiza — FungalRoot v2.0 · Meng et al. 2024 (Dryad, CC0)

[13] County range — GBIF Open Data — open-licensed occurrences (CC0/CC-BY) → county

Spot an error or have a better photo? Every field links to its source, and the whole dataset is open.

Cite this page Open data, please attribute

PlantKey’s data is open under CC BY-SA 4.0 — free to reuse and adapt, with attribution and the same licence. Photos keep their own per-image licence + credit (see Sources above).

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Ecological value

— Not scored

No host or pollinator records yet for this taxon — we don't infer a score we can't cite.

📍 In your area live

Introduced to the U.S.

Recorded in 1 state.

Open occurrence records place it in 4 counties across 4 states · GBIF (CC0/CC-BY)

Introduced — Puerto Rico

Recorded in 1 states/territories

Conservation

Invasive? Introduced

Toxicity & pet safety

Check the ASPCA pet database →

Educational, not veterinary advice. If you suspect your pet ate this plant, contact a vet or pet poison-control line.

Functional traits TRY · Dryad

Seed mass small

6 mg

small seed — straightforward to sow

Leaf nitrogen average

19.6 mg/g

leaf nitrogen — a rough guide to compost/mulch value

Leaf build thin & fast

Thin & fast

thin, low-cost leaves — a fast, light-hungry build built for quick growth (measured leaf area per weight 19.6 mm²/mg)

Leaf size very large

Very large

very large, bold leaves (measured leaf area ~809 cm²) — a coarse, dramatic texture

Mycorrhiza obligate

Arbuscular (AM)

partners with arbuscular fungi — the commonest symbiosis; helps reach phosphorus & water, aiding drought resilience

Deep dive — what these mean

Seed mass 6 mg — average weight of one seed. Bigger seeds are easier to hand-collect & direct-sow; dust-fine seeds need surface-sowing.

Leaf nitrogen 19.6 mg/g — measured leaf N. Higher = richer prunings for compost/mulch (a measured stand-in for "dynamic accumulator" claims).

Leaf build — how thick & tough the leaves are. Thin, lightweight leaves grow fast and crave light; thick, tough leaves last longer and shrug off shade, drought & grazing. (measured leaf area per dry weight, 19.6 mm²/mg)

Mycorrhiza AM — the root–fungus partnership it forms (AM = most plants; ECM = most forest trees; ERM = heaths; NM = none). Trades sugars for water & nutrients via shared soil networks.

Measured traits from TRY + Werner et al. (N-fix), Fan et al. (roots) & FungalRoot — general guidance, not species-specific prescriptions.

More modules coming