THE EVOLUTION AND PRESENT SITUATION OF THE DATE PALM (PHOENIX DACTYLIFERA) GROVE OF ELCHE (SPAIN)

In Elche (South of Spain), there is a group of about 200.000 date palms, some of which gathered in huertos, creating a landscape similar to a date palm grove.
Although under a legal regulation, its conservation is uncertain because date palm cultivation, as a crop, has lost most of its economical interest the last fifty years.

The genuine palm grove landscape concerns only two areas: first, the urban historical palm grove, that is losing its traditional appearance due to the urbanisation and to the lack of agriculture activity in the huertos and in which a high percentage of the trees is on decline; second, the more recent plantation of the Hondo that maintains all the characters of a typical palm grove.
Between these two zones there is a rural area with a very degraded date palm landscape.

Concerning the historical palm grove, would it not be more profitable to set aside the genuine agriculture structure of huerto and to imagine a new form of space more adapted to the present needs and to the financial capacity of the city? In the rural area, the recent researches carried on, associated with a more multidisciplinary and global reflexion, would allow the development of the date palm landscape by offering new opportunities for the date cultivators.

II International Symposium on Ornamental Palms & other Monocots from the Tropics

M. Ferry, D. Greiner

landscape, date palm culture, palm leaves, date fruit

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.1999.486.41