Zombia antillarum

zombi palm

The spines on the trunk of this palm make it one of the most striking. These dense spines obviously helped protect the core of this palm from harm from hungry herbivores. There aren’t really any herbivores currently living on the palm’s native island of Hispaniola large enough to pose a significant enough threat to warrant such spines. Fossil records, however, show us that creatures known as giant ground sloths (up to 17ft. in height!) once roamed the forests of Caribbean islands and would have posed a destructive threat to the relatively small zombi palm, which only grows up to about ten feet tall. The sloths probably learned pretty quickly to find other plants to snack on and to avoid running too carelessly through the forest.

The common name and Latin genus name of this palm is derived from its connection to Haitian Vodou culture. Spines have been used to prick voodoo dolls and it is believed that oil from the seeds can be used to awaken a zombi back to life. Sometimes traditional legends, while seemingly a bit hard to believe if taken literally, have aspects of truth that are alluded to indirectly. For instance, while oil from the seeds may not actually awaken a zombi back to life, it may have stimulant properties similar to caffeine that causes someone sleepy to become energized. So when our tree produced fruits, I extracted the seeds to see if the oil from one or two seeds was enough to produce any sort of tangible effect on me after ingestion. Of course I researched beforehand to make sure the seeds weren’t going to make me drop dead. Nevertheless, you still get a bit of adrenalin enter your system when you try something purportedly powerful for the first time. While there was no effect I could perceive within a few minutes after ingestion, I knew that effects can be latent, so I paid attention to my body over the next few hours, fortunately or unfortunately with no effects detected. Perhaps I need more seeds for more oil or maybe I just need to truly be a zombi to experience the resuscitating effects.

Other zombi lore associated with this palm includes the use of leaves along the edges of roofs in order to prevent zombies from being posted there by their masters. If this is an indication of the stuff you need to worry about protecting yourself against when living on other Caribbean islands, I’ll keep to the Keys, thank you.

Zombi palm can grow a bit farther north than the Keys and does well in sun to partial sun. It is a very slow-growing plant and produces multiple trunks, making a fine screen.