Butia stolonifera

Butia stolonifera was an oddly growing palm assigned to the genus Butia found only once in Uruguay in the 19th century, but which now is considered to be uncertain as a valid species. Butia stolonifera was collected in 1869 by professor José Arechavaleta, purportedly from the Pan de Azúcar hill. Two plants were grown from his collection, one at Montevideo and one at the Rio de Janeiro Botanical Garden. By the turn of the century the palm in Rio de Janeiro had become a large mature specimen, and João Barbosa Rodrigues named it as a new species in 1901, calling it Cocos stolonifera. He formally described it in 1903, providing an illustration (shown right). According to the descriptions by Barbosa Rodrigues, this plant was acaulescent and caespitose, having a number of underground trunks splitting from the crown of roots. If truly a Butia, the plant was unique in that the trunks grew from rhizomes or stolons snaking underground up to a length of two metres; thus the plant colonised a larg......read more on Wikipedia.