Trunk to 20 m tall, 30 cm wide, grey, usually flared at the base. Leaves bright green, in an open rounded crown, sometimes with a few dead hanging leaves. Leaf stalks prickly, red-brown and forming a characteristic criss-cross pattern on young trees. Leaf blade quite deeply divided. Leaflets of mature fronds lacking cottony threads. Junction of leaf and stalk (hastula) is about 3-5 cm long, more or less triangular with a woolly patch beneath. Panicles hanging well beyond the crown. Flowers white. Fruit about 1 cm across, round, black.

Mexico

The epithet robusta is misleading as this is a much taller and more slender trunked palm than W. filifera.

Occurs in north-western Mexico and Baja California, growing in gullies, often near the sea.

A widely planted, highly visible palm which lends itself well to planting in groups of mixed age. Plants are extremely tolerant of high winds and grow well in coastal districts.

Tall palm with a narrow grey trunk and a rounded crown of bright shiny green leaves without threads and long panicles hanging well beyond the leaves. When young the leaf stalks have large (not fine as in W. filifera) hooks on the margin and leaves deeply cleft to about two-thirds their length.

NSW: Sydney (Royal Botanic Garden Sydney); Albury (Albury Botanic Gardens); Camden (Macarthur Park); Narrandera Park; Wagga Wagga (Victory Gardens). Vic: Caulfield Park; Charlton (High St., 2 specimens); Moonee Ponds (Queens Park); Footscray (Fooscray Park); Hamilton (Hamilton Botanic Gardens).; Kew (Victoria Park); Melbourne (Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria (Melbourne Gardens)); Mildura (Deakin Ave. & elsewhere); Merbein (various plantings in the district but most notable is a long and bizarre avenue along the main street outside the township); St Arnaud (Queen Mary Gardens); St Kilda (boundary line, finest in state, Catani Gardens); Melbourne (Treasury Gardens); Williamstown (Williamstown Botanic Gardens); Yackandandah Gardens (7 trees about 20 m tall); Yarraville (Yarraville Gardens).

Source: Jones, D; Spencer, R. (2005). Arecaceae. In: Spencer, R.. Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia. Volume 5. Flowering plants. Monocotyledons. The identification of garden and cultivated plants. University of New South Wales Press.