Date

Phoenix dactylifera, commonly known as the date palm, is a flowering-plant species in the palm family, native to the region from the Gulf States to India, cultivated for its edible, sweet fruit called the date; it is the type species of the genus Phoenix, which contains 12 to 19 species of wild date palms. The species is now widely cultivated across northern Africa, the Middle East, Australia, South and Southeast Asia, Portugal, Spain, the coastal Mediterranean basin and the desert regions of Southern California, and has naturalized in many tropical and subtropical regions worldwide. Date palms can reach up to 30 meters in height, growing singly or in clumps of several stems from a single root system, and grow slowly enough to live more than 100 years when properly maintained, bearing oval-cylindrical fruit 3 to 7 centimeters long.