''Cycas riuminiana'', commonly known as the Arayat pitogo or simply pitogo, is a species of
cycad
Cycads are seed plants that typically have a stout and woody (ligneous) trunk (botany), trunk with a crown (botany), crown of large, hard, stiff, evergreen and (usually) pinnate leaves. The species are dioecious, that is, individual plants o ...
endemic to
Luzon
Luzon ( , ) is the largest and most populous List of islands in the Philippines, island in the Philippines. Located in the northern portion of the List of islands of the Philippines, Philippine archipelago, it is the economic and political ce ...
,
Philippines
The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
. It is also locally known as ''bayit'' in
Tagalog
Tagalog may refer to:
Language
* Tagalog language, a language spoken in the Philippines
** Old Tagalog, an archaic form of the language
** Batangas Tagalog, a dialect of the language
* Tagalog script, the writing system historically used for Tagal ...
and ''sawang'' in
Ilocano, among other names.
Distribution
There are five subpopulations of ''Cycas riuminiana''.
*
Pampanga
Pampanga, officially the Province of Pampanga (; ; ), is a province in Central Luzon in the Philippines. Lying on the northern shore of Manila Bay, Pampanga is bordered by Tarlac to the north, Nueva Ecija to the northeast, Bulacan to the east, ...
province, near
Mount Arayat
Mount Arayat is an isolated, potentially active stratovolcano in the Central Luzon plains. Located within the vast agricultural lands of Pampanga, it rises to a height of above sea level. Its southern half lies within the municipality of A ...
*
Bataan
Bataan (, , , ; ) , officially the Province of Bataan, is a province in the Central Luzon region of the Philippines. Its capital is the city of Balanga while Mariveles is the largest town in the province. Occupying the entire Bataan Peninsula ...
province, near Morong and Bagac
*
Batangas
Batangas, officially the Province of Batangas ( ), is a first class province of the Philippines located in the southwestern part of Luzon in the Calabarzon region. According to the 2020 census, it has a population of 2,908,494 people, making ...
province, near Lobo
*Isabela province, near
Mount Dipalayag
*Aurora province, near
Baler
A baler or hay baler is a piece of farm machinery used to compress a cut and raked crop (such as hay, cotton, flax straw, salt marsh hay, or silage) into compact bales that are easy to handle, transport, and store. Often, bales are config ...
Uses
Young curled-up fronds of ''C. riuminiana'' are edible and can be cooked as vegetables. The ripe seeds are poisonous, but they can be crushed and soaked in water several times to remove the toxins before being dried and processed into a flour-like substance used for making small cakes or gruels.
See also
* ''
Cycas circinalis
''Cycas circinalis'', also known as the queen sago, is a species of cycad known in the wild only from southern India. ''Cycas circinalis'' is the only gymnosperm species found among native Sri Lankan flora.
Taxonomy
''C. circinallis'' is nati ...
''
* ''
Cycas rumphii
''Cycas rumphii'', commonly known as queen sago or the queen sago palm, is a dioecious gymnosperm, a species of cycad in the genus ''Cycas'' native to Indonesia, New Guinea and Christmas Island. Although palm-like in appearance, it is not a palm ...
''
References
riuminiana
Endemic flora of the Philippines
Flora of Luzon
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