Zamia purpurea

Zamia purpurea is a small cycad with an underground stem from southern Mexico, known from the states of Veracruz and Oaxaca, where it grows in lowland evergreen tropical forest, particularly in the Uxpanapa region. Described in 1983, this species of the genus Zamia is named after the deep purple colour of its young female cones; its new leaves are coloured too, brown to reddish brown according to the original description, deep reddish purple according to a 1998 paper. The IUCN rates it Critically Endangered (2022 assessment).

Key facts about Zamia purpurea

  • Accepted name: Zamia purpurea Vovides, J.D.Rees & Vázq.Torres (1983), accepted by The World List of Cycads (version 2026.08.15) and by GBIF; POWO could not be consulted directly
  • Former names and synonyms: none
  • Family: Zamiaceae, order Cycadales
  • Common names: none attested, in English or in Spanish
  • Natural range: Mexico (Veracruz, Oaxaca); 100 to 150 m for the collections of the original description, 50 to 200 m according to a 2014 review
  • IUCN status: Critically Endangered (CR), criterion A4cd, assessment published in 2022
  • CITES and other protection: CITES Appendix II (whole genus, since 1977; seeds exempt under annotation #4); Annex B in the European Union; in Mexico, “in danger of extinction” under the NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010 standard
  • Documented hardiness: no data (see Cold hardiness)
  • Light and soil: understorey of evergreen and semi-evergreen tropical forest; soil not documented
  • Habit and adult size: a small plant about 50 cm tall or slightly more; underground, tuber-like stem at least 4 cm across, unbranched; 1 to 6 leaves 10 to 90 cm long, with 3 or 4 pairs of leaflets
  • In the UK, US and Australia: Montgomery Botanical Center (one accession, 1993), Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden and other American gardens; Royal Botanic Garden Sydney and Cairns Botanic Gardens; no British record
  • Toxicity: no data specific to the species; treat it as poisonous (see Toxicity and precautions)

How to recognise Zamia purpurea

It is recognised by its few broad, glossy leaflets with prominent veins, its tiny cones and the purplish-brown tint of its young female cones. The original description by Andrew P. Vovides, J.D. Rees and Mario Vázquez-Torres, published in 1983 in fascicle 26 of the Flora de Veracruz, gives the following characters:

  • Habit: a small dioecious plant, 50 cm tall or slightly more.
  • Stem: underground, tuber-shaped, at least 4 cm across, unbranched, marked with the scars of leaf bases and of fallen cataphylls.
  • Leaves: one to six, sometimes more, 10 to 90 cm long, forming an open crown, erect to spreading; petiole and rachis armed with a few short, thick prickles, silky to finely felted near the widened base.
  • Cataphylls: broadly to narrowly triangular, up to 4 cm long or more, felted.
  • Leaflets: 3 or 4 pairs, opposite or nearly so, 6 to 26.5 cm long and 2 to 8 cm wide, brown to greenish brown when young, then light to dark green, paler beneath, hairless and glossy; elliptic to lanceolate or broadly oblanceolate to obovate, with a slightly rolled margin, saw-toothed towards the acute tip.
  • Male cones: one, two or more, conical, 2.5 to 3 cm by 0.8 to 1 cm, covered in fine light brown down; about four pollen sacs per scale.
  • Female cone: conical, about 7 cm by 3.5 cm, purplish brown with light brown down when young, then almost black and nearly hairless, with a domed tip.
  • Seeds: about 1 cm by 0.7 cm, irregularly oval, with a pink to red fleshy coat.
  • Chromosomes: 2n = 16.

The Latin summary of the same text gives slightly different figures (leaves 10 to 83 cm, male cones 2 to 3 cm by 0.6 to 1 cm). For the authors, the species stands apart from the other Mexican Zamia by the colour of its hairless emerging leaves, its prominent veins, the gloss of its leaflets, the small size of its male and female cones, the colour and shape of the scales and the small number of pollen sacs.

The colour of the young leaves is described in two ways. The 1983 description calls the young leaflets brown to greenish brown and the leaves reddish brown on emergence. In 1998, in their description of Zamia lacandona, Bart Schutzman and Andrew Vovides write instead that the leaves of Zamia purpurea are “strictly” deep reddish purple on emergence; they add that its leaves are rather upright, with slightly arched but not sickle-shaped leaflets, that its male and female cones hang down, that its male cones are dark coffee-coloured and that the species is recognisable by its pronounced, often raised venation.

Hybrids

No natural hybrid has been documented. In cultivation, the French specialist nursery Cycadales.eu offers two hybrids that it raised itself: one between Zamia splendens and a smooth-leaved form of Zamia purpurea, which the nursery calls “Smooth” and describes as the smaller of the two known forms of the species, a cross that Australian growers had already made with excellent results according to the same nursery; and one between Zamia spartea (female parent) and Zamia purpurea (male parent), whose seedlings already show leathery, deeply veined leaflets like those of Zamia purpurea. No named cultivar is known.

Possible confusion

As early as 1983, the authors considered Zamia purpurea closer to the Zamia of Central America than to those of Mexico, in particular to Zamia skinneri, whose sterile type has very similar leaflets: broad, toothed, glossy and with raised veins. But Zamia skinneri, then reported from Panama and Costa Rica, is a larger plant, with a trunk that can reach 1 m according to the descriptions of the time, female scales marked by a horizontal groove and 2n = 18 or 22; Zamia purpurea is smaller, with an underground stem, leaves reddish brown on emergence and purple female cones turning almost black.

In Mexico, Nicolalde-Morejón and colleagues (2011) place it in the “Zamia katzeriana complex”, with Zamia katzeriana, Zamia cremnophila and Zamia lacandona: species of the south-east of the country with underground stems and broad (3 to 11 cm), leathery leaflets, easy to confuse without cones. They add, however, that its channelled leaflets with clearly visible veins, a feature unique among the species of what they call Megamexico (Mexico and northern Central America), bring it closer to the Zamia skinneri complex.

In 1998 Schutzman and Vovides also compared the neighbouring species: Zamia splendens has bright pink or green new leaves and leaflets not curved like a sickle, as in Zamia purpurea; Zamia cremnophila has hanging leaves and upright cones; Zamia standleyi has leaflets folded lengthwise; Zamia lacandona has arched leaves, reddish-brown young leaves and an upright female cone. Other Mexican Zamia have brightly coloured new leaves, such as Zamia vazquezii and Zamia splendens (Cycadales.eu). Finally, Zamia loddigesii also grows in the Uxpanapa region (Gómez Díaz, 2025); the characters given in the original description of Zamia purpurea, three or four pairs of broad, glossy, veined leaflets and tiny cones, separate the two.

Taxonomy

Zamia purpurea is an accepted name according to The World List of Cycads, and GBIF gives it as accepted; POWO could not be consulted directly. The species was described in 1983 by Andrew P. Vovides, J.D. Rees and Mario Vázquez-Torres in fascicle 26 of the Flora de Veracruz (pages 28 to 31, figure 5), devoted to the Zamiaceae of the state and written by Vovides. The name has never been placed in synonymy.

Its place in the genus has been discussed. In 1998 Schutzman and Vovides put it in a group of five related species, with Zamia splendens, Zamia cremnophila, Zamia standleyi and Zamia lacandona, all with 2n = 16 except the last. According to Lindstrom and colleagues (2024), the phylogeny of the genus published by Calonje and colleagues in 2019 placed it in a “purpurea” clade with Zamia splendens, Zamia katzeriana, Zamia lacandona, Zamia cremnophila and Zamia grijalvensis; the 2019 paper itself has not been consulted. The transcriptome-based study by Lindstrom and colleagues (2024), which sampled a plant from Oaxaca, finds that Zamia purpurea is more genetically distinct than previously realised: it appears nearer to Zamia meermanii, of Belize, and sister to all the other species of its subclade (III-A). In the trees built by concatenating the data, however, it forms a small group with Zamia oreillyi, Zamia standleyi and Zamia sandovalii, sister to subclade III-A.

Etymology and history

The epithet comes from the Latin purpureus, “purple”, and refers to the deep reddish-purple colour of the immature female cones (The World List of Cycads, after Haynes, 2022).

The holotype was collected by Andrew Vovides in Veracruz on 30 January 1982 (Vovides 734); it is kept in the herbarium of the Instituto de Ecología in Xalapa (XAL). The original description cites other specimens from the municipalities of Hidalgotitlán and Jesús Carranza, in southern Veracruz, and one from Xalapa; Edmundo Saavedra’s illustration was drawn from the collection Rees 1654, from Hidalgotitlán.

Common names

No common name is attested, in English or in Spanish.

In the wild

Zamia purpurea is endemic to Mexico, in the states of Veracruz and Oaxaca (The World List of Cycads). The original description places it between 100 and 150 m, in tall evergreen and semi-evergreen tropical forest and in medium semi-evergreen tropical forest, particularly in the evergreen forest of Uxpanapa; it records cones forming from April to September. The review by Nicolalde-Morejón and colleagues (2014) gives an altitude range of 50 to 200 m, in the Gulf of Mexico biogeographical region.

A 2025 study of the extinction risk of the cycads of Veracruz (Gómez Díaz) gives recent figures: 14 known localities, an extent of occurrence of about 4,700 km², 70 % of it in Veracruz, where the species occurs in nine municipalities, and a population estimated at some 2,000 individuals. Southern Veracruz, and Uxpanapa in particular, is one of the richest areas of the state for cycads, with four species: Zamia purpurea, Zamia loddigesii, Ceratozamia euryphyllidia and Ceratozamia dominguezii. Like other cycads, it forms coralloid roots that house nitrogen-fixing cyanobacteria.

Conservation status and regulation

The species is rated Critically Endangered (CR, criterion A4cd) on the IUCN Red List, in the assessment by J.D. Bösenberg published in 2022 (as given by The World List of Cycads and confirmed by GBIF; the Red List page could not be consulted). This criterion corresponds to a severe population reduction over a period covering both past and future, linked to the decline of the habitat and to exploitation.

In Mexico the species is listed as “in danger of extinction” under the NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010 standard (Nicolalde-Morejón and colleagues, 2014; Gómez Díaz, 2025). The 2025 study estimates habitat loss at 47 % and the share of the range lying outside protected areas at 95 %: no protected area covers Uxpanapa, although it is rich in cycads. The author also notes that the IUCN assessment lacked locality data for this species, which he supplemented from GBIF and herbarium records.

Like all Zamia except Zamia restrepoi, which is in Appendix I, Zamia purpurea falls under CITES Appendix II, where the genus has been listed since 4 February 1977. International trade in the plants is therefore allowed, but requires an export permit issued by the country of origin. The listing carries annotation #4: seeds, pollen, seedlings and tissue cultures obtained in vitro and transported in sterile containers are not covered by CITES. In the European Union the species falls under Annex B of Regulation (EC) No 338/97, whose current list is set by Regulation (EU) 2026/1383, applicable since 29 June 2026. Species+ has an entry for the species that confirms this status (checked on 11 October 2026).

This general information does not replace the official texts: check the regulations in force before buying or exchanging plants or seeds, ask the seller for proof of origin, and prefer plants raised from cultivated seed.

Growing Zamia purpurea

No growing advice specific to the species has been published, but Zamia purpurea is present in specialist collections. The French nursery Cycadales.eu shows a cultivated adult plant, which it says has reached the maximum size of the species, and cites it among the Mexican Zamia with brightly coloured new leaves.

In its growing notes, Cycadales.eu (Lavaud, 2023) places Zamia purpurea in its group of Zamia from Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, rated of “medium” difficulty. For this group it advises:

  • a free-draining compost, slightly limy or neutral; any type of water;
  • in winter, 5 to 10 °C (41 to 50 °F) with daytime rises to 20 to 25 °C (68 to 77 °F), the compost fairly dry but never parched during cool periods;
  • at least four to six months a year of summer temperatures, 15 to 20 °C (59 to 68 °F) at night and 25 to 30 °C (77 to 86 °F) by day.

These are recommendations for a group: Zamia purpurea comes from lowland evergreen forest, wetter than the habitat of many species in the group, and these values are not observations made on the species.

On the French forum Fous de palmiers, a cycad grower reported in February 2014 that he had obtained a few seeds of Zamia purpurea, which he described as a modest-sized Mexican Zamia with pleated leaves and red emerging leaves; he gave no later news of how they grew.

Outdoor and in-ground cultivation

No outdoor cultivation has been documented outside Mexico. A frost-free, humid tropical climate, such as that of southern Florida or Hawaii, where the species is held in botanic gardens, is the only kind in which it could be grown in the open; whether these plants grow outdoors or under glass is not recorded.

Container cultivation

Its small size, underground stem and few leaves make it a good pot plant. Use a free-draining compost, give it summer warmth, and keep it frost-free in winter, at 5 to 10 °C (41 to 50 °F) at least, in a warm glasshouse or a bright room, as advised for its group.

In cultivation in the UK, US and Australia

In short: present in several American gardens, declared by two Australian gardens, absent from British records.

  • United States: the online catalogue of Montgomery Botanical Center (Coral Gables, Florida) lists one accession, number 93928, from 1993 according to its numbering; BGCI also records it at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden (Miami), the Edison and Ford Winter Estates (Fort Myers, Florida), the Missouri Botanical Garden (St. Louis), the San Diego Zoo botanical gardens (California) and the botanical garden of the University of Hawaii at Hilo (catalogue and BGCI queried on 25 October 2026).
  • Australia: Royal Botanic Garden Sydney and Cairns Botanic Gardens (Queensland), according to BGCI.
  • United Kingdom: no record in BGCI.

A BGCI declaration shows that a garden held the plant at some point, not that it is alive there today. Elsewhere, BGCI records it at the Francisco Javier Clavijero Botanic Garden in Xalapa (Mexico) and at Prague Botanical Garden (Czech Republic).

Propagation

Propagation is by seed. The plant is dioecious: a male and a female plant are needed and, in cultivation, hand pollination. No germination data specific to the species have been published; in cycads, germination is slow. The seeds, with their pink to red fleshy coat, should be cleaned with gloves on. They are exempt from CITES under annotation #4; given the state of the species in the wild, only seed from cultivated plants is acceptable.

Pests and diseases

No pest or disease specific to the species has been documented. In cultivation, Zamia are mainly at risk from stem and root rot in cold, sodden compost.

Cold hardiness

There are no data on the cold tolerance of Zamia purpurea. It lives in lowland evergreen tropical forest, between 50 and 200 m, nothing suggests that it tolerates frost, and no source gives a minimum temperature.

Mediterranean and European experience

No in-ground cultivation has been reported in France or Italy, and no dated frost episode concerns the species; the French forum Fous de palmiers mentions it only once, for a purchase of seed in 2014. On the Italian forum Tropicamente, a grower from Ravenna listed it in March 2009 among the cycads he hoped to grow, noting from photographs of plants grown in Hawaii that the new leaves are chocolate-coloured at first; his suggestion of USDA zone 9b hardiness, inferred from cultivation in southern California, rests on no observation. At the Jardin zoologique tropical in La Londe-les-Maures (Var, on the French Riviera), no observation of this species has been published. For readers in Mediterranean-type climates such as California or southern Australia, it should be kept frost-free.

United Kingdom, United States and Australia

No cold record has been published, on forums or by botanic gardens. Trebrown, a British nursery, gives it USDA zone 9b, a commercial rating, not a measured result. In the UK it is a plant for a heated glasshouse or a warm room.

Toxicity and precautions

No toxicity study specific to Zamia purpurea has been published. The risk is, however, documented in the genus and in other cycads: Zamia contain toxic glycosides (cycasin, macrozamin), from which methylazoxymethanol is derived, and for Zamia furfuracea the ASPCA cites cycasin and BMAA, a neurotoxic amino acid, with vomiting, bloody diarrhoea and liver damage in dogs, cats and horses; the seeds are the most dangerous part. In the absence of evidence to the contrary, treat the plant as poisonous: keep seeds and leaves out of reach of children and animals, and wear gloves to clean seeds. If any part is swallowed, contact a poison centre, a doctor or a vet straight away.

Traditional uses

No traditional use of Zamia purpurea is documented.

Frequently asked questions

Where does Zamia purpurea grow?

Only in southern Mexico, in the states of Veracruz and Oaxaca, in lowland evergreen tropical forest, particularly in the Uxpanapa region, at about 50 to 200 m.

Why is it called “purpurea”?

Because of the deep purple colour of its young female cones, which later turn almost black. Its new leaves are coloured too: reddish brown according to the original description, deep reddish purple according to a 1998 paper.

How big does it get?

It stays small: about 50 cm tall, with an underground stem and one to six leaves no longer than 90 cm. It is therefore well suited to pot culture.

Does it have a branched stem?

No. The original description gives an underground, tuber-shaped, unbranched stem.

How can it be told from Zamia splendens?

By the new leaves and the leaflets: deep reddish purple or reddish brown in Zamia purpurea, bright pink or green in Zamia splendens; Zamia purpurea has only three or four pairs of glossy leaflets with raised veins, and very small cones.

Is it endangered?

Yes, severely. The IUCN rates it Critically Endangered (2022), Mexico protects it as a species in danger of extinction, and almost all of its range lies outside protected areas.

Is it hardy?

No hardiness has been documented. It comes from lowland tropical forest; in the UK and other frost-prone climates, grow it frost-free, in a warm glasshouse or indoors.

Is it poisonous?

It must be assumed so. No analysis concerns the species, but the cycads studied contain serious toxins, especially in the seeds.

Further reading on Succulentes

Sources

Reference sites

Bibliography

  • Vovides, A.P., Rees, J.D. & Vázquez-Torres, M. (1983). Zamiaceae. Flora de Veracruz 26: 28–31, fig. 5. [Original description of Zamia purpurea; full text read.]
  • Schutzman, B. & Vovides, A.P. (1998). A new Zamia (Zamiaceae, Cycadales) from eastern Chiapas, Mexico. Novon 8(4): 441–446. https://doi.org/10.2307/3391871 [Comparison of the species of the group; read in the BioStor copy on Internet Archive.]
  • Gómez Díaz, J.A. (2025). Assessing the extinction risk of Veracruz cycads. Cambridge Prisms: Extinction 3: e7. https://doi.org/10.1017/ext.2025.5 [Full text read.]
  • Nicolalde-Morejón, F., González-Astorga, J., Vergara-Silva, F., Stevenson, D.W., Rojas-Soto, O. & Medina-Villarreal, A. (2014). Biodiversidad de Zamiaceae en México. Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad, suppl. 85: S114–S125. https://doi.org/10.7550/rmb.38114 [Full text read.]
  • Nicolalde-Morejón, F., González-Astorga, J., Vergara-Silva, F. & Vovides, A.P. (2011). Perspectivas sistemáticas de Zamia (Zamiaceae) en Megaméxico: de la taxonomía alfa a los códigos de barras genéticos. Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad 82: 341–355. [Full text read.]
  • Lindstrom, A., Habib, S., Dong, S., Gong, Y., Liu, J., Calonje, M., Stevenson, D. & Zhang, S. (2024). Transcriptome sequencing data provide a solid base to understand the phylogenetic relationships, biogeography and reticulated evolution of the genus Zamia L. (Cycadales: Zamiaceae). Annals of Botany 134(5): 747–768. https://doi.org/10.1093/aob/mcae065 [Full text consulted on PubMed Central.]
  • Calonje, M., Meerow, A.W., Griffith, M.P., Salas-Leiva, D., Vovides, A.P., Coiro, M. & Francisco-Ortega, J. (2019). A time-calibrated species tree phylogeny of the New World cycad genus Zamia L. (Zamiaceae, Cycadales). International Journal of Plant Sciences 180(4): 286–314. [Not consulted; “purpurea” clade cited after Lindstrom et al. (2024).]
  • Nicolalde-Morejón, F., Vovides, A.P. & Stevenson, D.W. (2009). Taxonomic revision of Zamia in Mega-Mexico. Brittonia 61(4): 301–335. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12228-009-9077-9 [Reference revision cited by The World List of Cycads; not consulted.]
  • Bösenberg, J.D. (2022). Zamia purpurea. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2022: e.T42137A69836112. [Current assessment, CR A4cd; reference given by The World List of Cycads, category confirmed by GBIF; the Red List page could not be consulted.]
  • Lavaud, S. (2023). Comment cultiver les Zamia en climat tempéré. Cycadales.eu. [Growing advice for groups of species; read directly.]
  • Haynes, J.L. (2022). Etymological compendium of cycad names. Phytotaxa 550(1): 1–31. https://doi.org/10.11646/phytotaxa.550.1.1 [Source of the etymologies given by The World List of Cycads; not consulted directly.]
  • Calonje, M., Stevenson, D.W. & Osborne, R. (2026). The World List of Cycads, version 2026.08.15. Montgomery Botanical Center, Coral Gables. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21958524 [Reference checklist; consulted directly.]