Alolan Exeggutor......the original?

[Sirfetch’d]

This was briefly discussed in another thread(iirc) but I wanted to start a thread on Exeggutor alone. As we all know, Alolan Exeggutor has swept across the internet in various memes. With it's ridiculous appearance it has quickly become the most talked about new Pokemon in SuMo. That said, is this Pokemon potentially the original Exeggutor and should we be looking at the short stumpy Exeggutor as the odd guy? Let's take a look at the ORAS Pokedex entry for Exeggutor:

Exeggutor originally came from the tropics. Its heads steadily grow larger from exposure to strong sunlight. It is said that when the heads fall off, they group together to form Exeggcute.

While "tropics" could literally mean any island in the Pokemon world, what if Exeggutor originated in Alola and migrated to other regions where it could not reach it's tall form? Thoughts?

 

[blue]

Alola most definitely seems to fit the "tropics" description over any other Region imo. Considering how Alola is based off the tropical Hawaiin Islands, it would make sense for Exeggutor to originate from that location. I guess it has something to do with the weather and climate over there? One thing I would like to see is their heads falling off to form Exeggcute.

 

[Esper]

A tree wouldn't evolve to have a shorter neck/trunk unless it was adapting to an area with fewer trees and less competition for sunlight so the long neck has got to come from a place that's overgrowing with plant life. Alola doesn't seem (from the map anyway) to have more forested areas than some other regions. Alola doesn't even seem half covered with trees whereas Unova and Hoenn are mostly green on their maps, though that might just be because they're filler the way water is filler on the Alola map.

But it is a palm tree so it wouldn't make sense for it to come from Unova. Hoenn though, it's pretty tropical. At least subtropical. If we follow that the Pokemon regions match their real-world counterparts then Hoenn is the closest to the tropics of all the previous regions, being just within the subtropic zone. Johto-Kanto are close seconds on the border between subtropical and temperate, but Sinnoh, Unova, and Kalos are all very temperate. Only Alola (Hawaii) is actually tropical.

 

[Mister Coffee]

So I looked into it a little bit and there are different kinds of palm tree and more specifically there are some palm trees that grow short and fat and others that grow tall and skinny.

Spoiler:

*bulbagarden.net image removed*=

Spoiler:

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If you want to get even deeper into the more specific palm tree species that Exeggcutor is most likely based on, it is probably the "Acoelorrhaphe wrightii". Which is a species of palm that can be found naturally in a variety of different ecosystems, but the most interesting feature about it is that it grows to a natural 10-15 feet in most climates but apparently if it is grown in tropical, high sun exposure climates it can grow to 20-25 feet tall.

 

[kingdenas]

In the Pokémon Sun and Moon website, they say that the people of the Alola Region think that the Alola Exeggutor is the real Exeggutor after all. Look:

Spoiler:

So, with this info and the Exeggutor's Pokédex entrie (the one which says it comes from the tropics, which points to the Alola Region), the rumour of Alola Exeggutor being the original Exeggutor might be true! But, as colours said, we don't know how it managed to gain its Psychic-type then :/ (assuming that the Alolan Exeggutor is the original)

 

[manfromjohto]

Given Alola's apparent climate as much more sunnier than others, it's probable that the lack of sunlight in other regions has caused Exeggutor's head/neck to shrink to the ones that we're most accustomed to seeing.

What I'm interested in knowing is exactly how it managed to develop Psychic powers/abilities if it was originally a dragon.

Confused about why they weren't growing to full size, the heads put all their power in trying to focus hard enough to grow further, instead getting their psychic abilties back.

 

[Smiffy01]

I'm actually more inclined to believe this as executor is supposed to look like a coconut tree anyway so this stands to make sense that he is originally from the alolan islands!