Cycas media

Cycas media is a tree-like cycad endemic to eastern Queensland, Australia, widespread and locally common in open or closed forest from south of Mackay to the coast of Cape York Peninsula. Described in 1810 by Robert Brown, together with Cycas angulata, this member of the genus Cycas is one of the first two Australian cycads to be named. In 1873 George Bentham merged all the Australian cycads into it, so the name long covered plants now placed in other species; older names such as Cycas normanbyana and Cycas kennedyana, both synonyms of Cycas media, are still met with. The species has three subspecies and is listed as Least Concern by the IUCN. In Australia it is known as the nut palm.

Key facts about Cycas media

  • Accepted name: Cycas media R.Br. (1810), accepted by The World List of Cycads (version 2026.08.15) with three subspecies, media, banksii K.D.Hill and ensata K.D.Hill; the World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP), on which POWO is based, also accepts it (consulted through GBIF on 31 October 2026)
  • Former names and synonyms: Cycas gracilis Miq. (1863), Cycas normanbyana F.Muell. (1874), Cycas kennedyana F.Muell. (1882), Cycas rumphii subsp. normanbyana (F.Muell.) Schuster, Cycas gracilis var. glauca Regel and var. viridis Regel (Hill 1996)
  • Family: Cycadaceae, order Cycadales
  • Common names: “nut palm” (Flora of Australia); “ricketty bush” in part of Queensland (Hill 1992)
  • Natural range: Australia, eastern Queensland, from south of Mackay to the coast of Cape York Peninsula east of Coen; Species+ also lists Papua New Guinea (see Taxonomy)
  • IUCN status: Least Concern (LC), assessment by J. D. Bösenberg (2020) published in Red List version 2023-1, after that of K. D. Hill (2010); the three subspecies are also assessed LC
  • CITES and other protection: CITES Appendix II (seeds exempt under annotation #4); Annex B in the European Union
  • Documented hardiness: no measured threshold; a single report, from Brittany (France), of a potted plant with 40% of its foliage scorched after nights of −5 to −6 °C (23 to 21.2 °F) in January 2009 (see Cold hardiness)
  • Light and soil: eucalypt woodland and closed forest, sometimes rainforest; well-drained, often sandy soils on slopes (subspecies media)
  • Habit and adult size: trunk up to 3 m, rarely 6 m, 10 to 18 cm in diameter; leaves 0.7 to 2.3 m long
  • In the UK, US and Australia: widely grown in Australian botanic gardens (Sydney, Mount Annan, Melbourne and Cranbourne, Brisbane, Cairns, Canberra and others); in the United States at Montgomery, Fairchild, the Huntington, Lotusland and some fifteen other gardens; Kew, Oxford and Hull in the United Kingdom (BGCI)
  • Toxicity: poisonous; the cause of a neuromuscular disease of cattle in Queensland (see Toxicity and precautions)

How to recognise Cycas media

Among the Australian cycads, Cycas media is recognised by its glossy green, hairless leaves, its almost flat leaflets, whose midrib stands out far more beneath than above, and its relatively small seeds (Hill 1996; Flora of Australia). Description after Hill (1992) and the Flora of Australia:

  • Trunk: up to 3 m, rarely 6 m, 10 to 18 cm in diameter, covered with persistent leaf bases and cataphylls.
  • Leaves: 70 to 230 cm, flat or slightly keeled (opposite leaflets at an angle of 140 to 180°), mid to dark green, semi-glossy to very glossy, with 160 to 300 leaflets; petiole 30 to 70 cm, spiny along 10 to 80% of its length. Young growth is densely covered with a pale orange-brown down that does not persist.
  • Median leaflets: 13 to 24 cm by 5 to 10 mm, narrowing to 2.5–4.5 mm at the base, 7 to 13 mm apart, hairless, with slightly to clearly recurved margins.
  • Cataphylls: linear, sharp, 6 to 12 cm long.
  • Male cones: ovoid, 15 to 25 cm by 8 to 15 cm, orange to orange-brown; microsporophyll blade 25 to 33 mm, ending in an upturned spine of 6 to 10 mm.
  • Megasporophylls: 20 to 37 cm, with rusty or grey down, bearing 4 to 10 ovules; blade narrowly triangular to ovate, 35 to 100 mm by 17 to 32 mm, evenly toothed with 18 to 32 lateral spines 4 to 10 mm long; terminal spine 15 to 45 mm.
  • Seeds: ovoid, 31 to 39 mm by 26 to 35 mm, green turning orange-yellow, not glaucous; sarcotesta 3 to 4 mm thick.

A 1990 note reproduced on the wiki of the Australian society PACSOA describes a plant 2.7 m tall and 64 cm in diameter, with 42 to 45 leaves and about forty megasporophylls: these are the measurements of a single plant, earlier than Hill’s revision, not general values.

The three subspecies are separated as follows (Hill 1996; Flora of Australia):

  • subsp. media: leaflets 5 to 7 mm wide, with clearly recurved margins; longest cataphylls 6 to 9 cm; leaves 70 to 180 cm; seeds 34 to 39 mm by 32 to 35 mm;
  • subsp. banksii: leaflets 7 to 10 mm, with slightly recurved margins; longest cataphylls 7 to 10 cm; leaves 100 to 200 cm; seeds 31 to 36 mm by 26 to 32 mm;
  • subsp. ensata: leaflets 7.5 to 9 mm; very long, hard, sharp cataphylls 10 to 12 cm long; leaves 140 to 230 cm; seeds 33 to 36 mm by 29 to 32 mm.

Hill’s key (1996) separates banksii by cataphylls shorter than 90 mm, whereas his description, like the Flora of Australia, goes up to 100 mm: cataphyll length alone does not always separate banksii from ensata, which their ranges keep well apart.

Hybrids

Intermediate populations are documented where Cycas media meets its neighbours. Ken Hill (1992, 1996) reports intergradation with Cycas platyphylla near Irvinebank, west of the Atherton Tableland, and with Cycas ophiolitica between Mackay and St Lawrence, as well as transitional forms between subspecies media and banksii around Gordonvale and the Herberton Range. He also saw, in the broader, more sickle-shaped leaflets of plants near the coast around Cooktown, a possible contribution from Cycas silvestris (Hill 1992).

Hill also attributed to a hybrid swarm between Cycas media and Cycas ophiolitica some populations of the Broadsound and Connors ranges. Paul Forster described them in 2011 as a distinct species, Cycas terryana, disputing that interpretation; no published genetic study settles the question.

Possible confusion

  • Cycas megacarpa, further south (from Mount Morgan to Goomeri): leaves generally shorter and more keeled, fewer leaflets, larger seeds and a more slender trunk. This species has been grown in Australia under the name Cycas kennedyana, although the type of that name belongs to Cycas media (Hill 1996);
  • Cycas silvestris, from north-eastern Cape York: broader leaflets and a smooth trunk that sheds its leaf bases and cataphylls after a few years;
  • Cycas ophiolitica: keeled leaves, more or less glaucous leaflets, narrower and more crowded, petiole with grey or white down, fewer ovules per megasporophyll (Hill 1992);
  • Cycas terryana: very brittle leaves and rachis, pale fawn down on young growth and cataphylls, orange-brown in Cycas media (Forster 2011);
  • Cycas orientis, from the Northern Territory: leaflets with flat margins, not recurved (Hill’s key, 1996).

Taxonomy

Cycas media is a name accepted by The World List of Cycads; the World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP), on which POWO is based, also accepts it (consulted through GBIF on 31 October 2026). In his revision of the Australian cycads, Ken Hill (1996) places it in section Cycas, subsection Endemicae, and makes it the type species of series Endemicosae, which brings together three species of the east coast of Australia: Cycas silvestris, Cycas media and Cycas megacarpa. Subspecies banksii and ensata were described in the same revision.

The history of the name explains many of the confusions. Robert Brown described Cycas media and Cycas angulata in 1810. In 1873 George Bentham reduced all the Australian species to Cycas media, noting that the group needed critical study in the field. Ferdinand von Mueller then described Cycas normanbyana (1874) and Cycas kennedyana (1882) from inadequate material, and Robert Pilger recognised only Cycas media, Cycas cairnsiana and Cycas normanbyana for the whole of Australia in 1926. In 1932 Schuster placed Cycas armstrongii and Cycas angulata in the typical variety of Cycas media and treated three Kimberley species as varieties of it: hence the names Cycas media var. furfuracea, var. basaltica and var. lane-poolei, which today refer to Cycas furfuracea, Cycas basaltica and Cycas lane-poolei (Hill 1996).

Ken Hill (1992) brought order to this complex: he placed Cycas normanbyana and Cycas kennedyana in synonymy, because their distinguishing characters occur at random in most populations of Cycas media, and described several related species, including Cycas megacarpa, Cycas ophiolitica and Cycas silvestris. He then provisionally included in Cycas media plants from the Port Moresby area, in Papua New Guinea, pending further study. He dealt with the cycads of this group in New Guinea in a 1994 paper, and his 1996 revision, like the Flora of Australia and The World List of Cycads, restricts Cycas media to eastern Queensland. Species+, the CITES database, still lists Papua New Guinea in the species’ range: this divergence probably reflects the older concept of the species.

Hill’s revision places subspecies banksii on the east coast of Queensland, from north of Cooktown to south of Cairns.

Etymology and history

The epithet comes from the Latin medius, “in the middle, intermediate”; what Brown was alluding to remains uncertain (Haynes 2022, as cited by The World List of Cycads). The subspecies honour Joseph Banks (banksii) and, for ensata, evoke a sword (Latin ensatus), an allusion to the long, sharp cataphylls (Hill 1996).

The type is a collection by Robert Brown kept at the British Museum (holotype, Bennett number 3106 p.p., a number also given to his collection of Cycas angulata), with an isotype at Kew. It was probably made on 16 October 1802 on Calder Island, in the Cumberland Islands off Mackay (Hill 1992, 1996). The plant had been collected earlier, however: according to Hill (1996), Joseph Banks, botanist on Cook’s first voyage, was the first European to collect the subspecies that bears his name, in 1770, at the Endeavour River.

In Europe the plant has long been grown: the 1897 catalogue of plants grown in the open air in Thomas Hanbury’s garden at La Mortola, near Ventimiglia on the Italian Riviera, lists Cycas normanbyana, now Cycas media; the Hortus Mortolensis of 1912 still lists it, but its cultivation notes record the plant as lost, without giving a cause.

Common names

In English, the Flora of Australia gives “nut palm”, and the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney labels its plants of the species “Nut Palm”. Hill (1992) reports that the species is called “ricketty bush” in part of Queensland, after the “rickets”, the disease it causes in cattle. In the horticultural trade, the names Cycas normanbyana and Cycas kennedyana have been widely applied to forms of Cycas media, but also, wrongly, to two other Queensland species further south (Hill 1996).

In the wild

Cycas media is widespread and locally common in eastern Queensland, in open or closed forest and sometimes in rainforest, from south of Mackay to the coast of Cape York Peninsula, east of Coen (Hill 1996; Flora of Australia). Each subspecies occupies part of the range:

  • subsp. media: from Cardwell to St Lawrence, locally abundant in coastal eucalypt forest, usually on well-drained, often sandy sloping sites;
  • subsp. banksii: from north of Cooktown to south of Cairns, abundant near the coast, especially in tall eucalypt forest;
  • subsp. ensata: coastal plain north of Silver Plains, to about Lockhart River, in the transition zones between tall eucalypt forest and rainforest, with the palm Livistona muelleri, on deep alluvial sands on flat ground.

The PACSOA wiki describes sites near the coast, on scrubby slopes, in gullies and up onto ridges, most of them showing signs of fire; it illustrates a plant regrowing a crown of leaves after a fire. A study by Robert Ornduff (1991) in north Queensland found, according to its abstract, no difference in leaf number or height between male and female plants; beetles of two genera were collected on male cones shedding pollen, and the stingless bee Trigona carbonaria was seen collecting pollen there.

Conservation status and regulation

Cycas media is not threatened. The IUCN Red List lists it as Least Concern (LC): according to the Crossref metadata, the latest assessment, carried out by J. D. Bösenberg on 18 September 2020, was published in Red List version 2023-1, after that of K. D. Hill (carried out in 2009, published in 2010); subspecies media, banksii and ensata have each been assessed LC (Bösenberg, 2019, published in 2023). GBIF confirms these categories (consulted on 21 October 2026). In 1996 Hill considered neither media nor banksii threatened, and asked for a fuller survey of ensata, abundant but isolated.

The main documented pressure comes from cattle farming: because the plant poisons livestock, all cycads were long declared noxious weeds in Queensland, and many landholders carried out eradication campaigns, still practised in some areas in the early 1990s (Hill 1992).

Like every species of the genus except Cycas beddomei, Cycas media falls under CITES Appendix II, where the family Cycadaceae has been listed since 4 February 1977. The listing carries annotation #4 (CoP20 version, in force since 5 March 2026): seeds, pollen, seedlings and tissue cultures obtained in vitro and transported in sterile containers, and cut flowers of artificially propagated plants are not covered by CITES, whereas international trade in the plants themselves requires an export permit. In the European Union the species falls under Annex B of Regulation (EC) No 338/97, whose annexes in force are set by Regulation (EU) 2026/1383, applicable since 29 June 2026. Species+, the official CITES database, confirms this status.

This general information does not replace the official texts: check the regulations in force before any purchase or exchange, ask the seller for proof of origin and prefer plants raised from seed in cultivation.

Growing Cycas media

No growing recommendations specific to Cycas media have been published by a botanic garden or institution. The French nurseryman Simon Lavaud (Cycadales.eu), in a 2021 note on growing Australian cycads in a European climate, ranks Cycas media among the species of “medium” difficulty, the easiest group, together with Cycas megacarpa, Cycas ophiolitica and Cycas silvestris.

Outdoor and in-ground cultivation

In its native Queensland and in the warmer parts of Australia, the species is grown in the ground in botanic gardens (see below). Outside Australia, in-ground cultivation is documented only historically, at La Mortola on the Italian Riviera, where the plant listed in 1897 had been lost by 1912.

Container cultivation

Amateur reports point the same way as Lavaud’s advice. On the French forum Fous de palmiers, a collector growing some forty species of cycads in pots reported in September 2013 that his Cycas media had suffered no losses but was not growing normally. In the United Kingdom, northern Europe and the colder parts of the United States, a pot moved into a bright, frost-free glasshouse or conservatory for the winter is the only practice documented; no in-ground trial is documented in these climates.

In cultivation in the UK, US and Australia

Cycas media is one of the most widely grown Australian cycads in public collections.

  • Royal Botanic Garden Sydney: its Garden Explorer catalogue lists 17 plants of wild origin received in 2022 (accession S2022-0156) under the name “Nut Palm”, plants of subspecies media of wild origin in beds 102j, 65g and 130b (accessions of 1990 and 1994), and a plant of subspecies ensata of wild origin (1994) in bed 65i. The catalogue does not say whether the beds are in the open, although Sydney’s climate makes this likely.
  • Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria: the living collection census lists three plants (accession RBGC 104097) in the “Weird and Wonderful” garden of the Australian Garden at Cranbourne, south-east of Melbourne, planted in December 2012.
  • Australian National Botanic Gardens (Canberra): a 2004 press release reports that seventeen large cycads and palms salvaged from road clearing in Queensland, including Cycas media, were planted as part of a project for the main entrance display and the Rainforest Gully; their later fate is not reported.
  • Other Australian gardens declaring the species, or one of its subspecies, in BGCI PlantSearch: Australian Botanic Garden Mount Annan, Brisbane Botanic Gardens Mount Coot-tha, Cairns, Cooktown, Mackay, Noosa, Hunter Region, Adelaide (Botanic Garden and State Herbarium of South Australia), James Cook University in Townsville and the System Garden of the University of Melbourne.
  • United States: the Montgomery Botanical Center (Coral Gables, Florida), where cycads are grown outdoors, lists the species and subspecies banksii (two accessions of 2024) and ensata in its catalogue, although some of its Cycas media records carry a database note pointing to Cycas cairnsiana, which calls for caution; BGCI PlantSearch also lists Fairchild, the Huntington, Lotusland, San Diego Zoo, the Missouri Botanical Garden, the University of California Botanical Garden at Berkeley, the Los Angeles County Arboretum, Descanso Gardens, Marie Selby, the New York Botanical Garden and several Hawaiian gardens.
  • United Kingdom: Kew, Oxford (subspecies media) and Thwaite Gardens of the University of Hull declare the species in BGCI PlantSearch; no British garden documents it in the open, and it is presumably grown under glass, as are almost all cycads in British gardens.

A BGCI listing records that a garden has declared the plant at some point; it does not prove that the plant is alive today. No dated growing report from an English-language forum is documented.

Propagation

The plant is dioecious: a male and a female plant are needed for seed, and sowing is the usual method. On the Fous de palmiers forum, a grower reported in January 2008 that 4 out of 10 seeds, sown in an aquarium fitted out as a germination box, had germinated, the others having rotted (black and empty) after almost six months. No published germination data exist for the species. Seeds are exempt from CITES under annotation #4; ask for seed from cultivated plants.

Pests and diseases

No disease or pest specific to Cycas media is documented in cultivation. In Europe, the main risk reported for Australian cycads is root rot when the substrate stays damp in cool weather (Lavaud 2021). The beetles seen on male cones in the wild (Ornduff 1991) are not described as pests. Like all Cycas, it can be attacked by the Asian cycad scale, Aulacaspis yasumatsui.

Cold hardiness

No cold-hardiness threshold has been measured or published for Cycas media. The only dated report found comes from France and concerns a potted plant; it does not set a limit.

A grower in Concarneau (Finistère, Brittany, France) reports on the Fous de palmiers forum that after three cold nights in early January 2009, when the thermometer fell to −5 to −6 °C (23 to 21.2 °F) at the coldest point of his garden, the foliage of his potted Cycas media was 40% scorched; he thought the following summer’s growth was not compromised. The message implies that the plant had stayed outdoors without saying so, and the outcome is not reported. For readers in comparable mild, wet maritime climates, such as south-west England, this single report suggests that the foliage does not withstand such a frost unscathed; it is not a rule.

No other dated cold record is documented, on the forums or in botanic gardens. The presence of the plant in the open at La Mortola in 1897 shows that it was tried on the Riviera, without telling us anything about its tolerance of cold. The Jardin zoologique tropical at La Londe-les-Maures, in the south of France, has published no observation on this species.

Toxicity and precautions

Yes, Cycas media is poisonous, and it is one of the cycads whose toxicity is best known in Australia. Like other Cycas, it contains cycasin, which is converted in the body into methylazoxymethanol, toxic to the liver and nervous system, along with a neurotoxic amino acid, BMAA. Hill (1992) notes that Cycas media is widely known in Queensland as the cause of “rickets”, a degenerative neuromuscular disease of cattle, and the Flora of Australia states that the seed is poisonous raw. The ASPCA lists the sago palm (Cycas revoluta) among plants poisonous to dogs, cats and horses. Keep seeds and leaves out of reach of children and pets, and wear gloves to clean seeds. If any part is swallowed, contact a poison centre, a doctor or a vet straight away.

Traditional uses

The seeds of Cycas media were an important food resource for Aboriginal people (Hill 1992). The Flora of Australia, after Whitelock (2002), describes their preparation: the seeds are roasted in the fire and left in the ashes overnight; the shell is removed, the kernel ground into flour, and the flour left in a cloth bag in a stream for another day before being eaten. According to the same source, starch from the stems can be used as a paste and glue. These methods must not be copied: incomplete detoxification exposes to serious poisoning.

Frequently asked questions

Where does Cycas media grow?

In eastern Queensland, Australia, from south of Mackay to the coast of Cape York. It is widespread and locally common in eucalypt woodland and closed forest.

Does it also grow in New Guinea or the Northern Territory?

No, according to Hill’s revision (1996), the Flora of Australia and The World List of Cycads. Hill provisionally included plants from Port Moresby in 1992, and Species+ still lists Papua New Guinea. The Northern Territory plants once included in it, such as Cycas armstrongii, are now separate species (Hill 1996).

How can it be told from Cycas megacarpa?

By its longer, flatter leaves with more leaflets, its smaller seeds and its thicker trunk. Cycas megacarpa grows further south.

What does media mean?

“In the middle, intermediate”, in Latin. Robert Brown did not explain his choice, and the allusion remains uncertain.

Is it hardy?

No reliable figure exists. The only published report, from Brittany in 2009, describes 40% of the foliage scorched on a potted plant after nights of −5 to −6 °C (23 to 21.2 °F); no limit has been measured.

Can it be grown outdoors in the UK?

It is not documented. No in-ground trial is documented in Britain or northern Europe; the known reports concern potted plants, sheltered or brought indoors for the winter.

Is it poisonous?

Yes. Its seeds are poisonous raw, and the plant is known in Queensland for causing a neuromuscular disease in cattle.

Is it endangered?

No. The IUCN lists it as Least Concern, like its three subspecies; it remains covered by CITES (Appendix II), like all cycads.

Further reading on Succulentes

Sources

Reference sites

Bibliography

  • Brown, R. (1810). Prodromus florae Novae Hollandiae et Insulae Van Diemen 1: 348. R. Taylor, London. [Protologue; reference after Hill 1992 and The World List of Cycads.]
  • Hill, K.D. (1992). A preliminary account of Cycas (Cycadaceae) in Queensland. Telopea 5(1): 177–206. doi:10.7751/telopea19924964 [Typification, synonymy, description, hybrids, toxicity to cattle.]
  • Hill, K.D. (1994). The Cycas media group (Cycadaceae) in New Guinea. Australian Systematic Botany 7(6): 527–541. doi:10.1071/SB9940527 [Treatment of the New Guinea plants.]
  • Hill, K.D. (1996). A taxonomic revision of the genus Cycas (Cycadaceae) in Australia. Telopea 7(1): 1–64. doi:10.7751/telopea19963040 [Series Endemicosae, subspecies banksii and ensata, range, history of names.]
  • Hill, K.D. (1998). Cycadaceae. In McCarthy, P.M. (ed.), Flora of Australia 48: 597–635. CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne. [Consulted in its updated online version (profiles.ala.org.au).]
  • Forster, P.I. (2011). Cycas terryana P.I.Forst. (Cycadaceae), a new species from central Queensland. Austrobaileya 8(3): 356–363. doi:10.5962/p.299813 [Comparison with Cycas media.]
  • Ornduff, R. (1991). Size classes, reproductive behavior, and insect associates of Cycas media (Cycadaceae) in Australia. Botanical Gazette 152(2): 203–207. doi:10.1086/337880 [Only the indexed abstract was consulted.]
  • Hill, K.D. (2010). Cycas media. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2010: e.T42035A10634093. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2010-3.RLTS.T42035A10634093.en [LC assessment; reference checked on Crossref and The World List of Cycads.]
  • Bösenberg, J.D. (2023). Cycas media. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2023: e.T42035A68904786. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2023-1.RLTS.T42035A68904786.en [LC assessment dated 18 September 2020; reference checked on Crossref, category confirmed by GBIF.]
  • Haynes, J.L. (2022). Etymological compendium of cycad names. Phytotaxa 550(1): 1–31. doi:10.11646/phytotaxa.550.1.1 [Source of the etymologies given by The World List of Cycads.]
  • Calonje, M., Stevenson, D.W. & Osborne, R. (2026). The World List of Cycads, version 2026.08.15. Montgomery Botanical Center, Coral Gables. doi:10.5281/zenodo.21958524 [Reference checklist.]