Mahka!

I have had two thorns in my left hand for over a month now. Swimming through the dark river, I suddenly met with a spiny mahka frond. Fortunately I was able to dig most of the thorns out of my skin, but a few have remained. Mahka thorns are so sharp that they can pierce heavy rubber boot soles, yet so brittle that they tend to break into tiny pieces when one tries to extract them. After burning the fallen brush so that planting can begin, mahka are one of the first plants to begin growing again.

Mahka (literally, “thorn”) palms are the toughest trees in the Amazon. Thorns up to nine inches long cover their trunks, frond stalks, and even each individual leaf. Wasps love mahka palms because, they assume that no one disturbs a nest in a thorn tree. Clearing planning grounds with my friends, I have been stung several times by angry insects protesting the destruction of their thorny home.

When cutting a swath of forest to plant, cutting down mahka palms takes the most time. Dispatching a young stand of mahka requires holding each stalk with a forked stick to direct its fall as you chop it with a machete. Mature palms require a chainsaw, which can send fragments of thorns flying if the tree is not prepared correctly. Even then, the tough trunk of the mahka tree can ruin the chainsaw. Oh, and when a mahka tree falls, stand out of the way.