anybody buy a "Yubaea/Jubaea Palms (part Butea)" from ebay?

[Joe NC]

So back in February I was all excited and ready to start planting things for the spring, and I purchased  a "Jubaea Butia hybrid" from e-bay on impulse.  Actually the listing was for  "Yubaea/Jubaea Palms (part Butea)"  I was a little hesitant on the ID of the plants for sale from the included photos, but I was one of the first people to bid on these and got a 10 gallon size (hybrid?) palm in the mail.  I guess I wasn't too worried about the exact parentage of this plant, since I paid less for it (including shipping) than I would buying a 5 gallon size straight Butia from a local big box store. I don't think the seller realized how much it was going to be to ship a plant this size across the country, and the total shipping cost was more than I paid for the plant.    After it showed up in a questionable state (shipped for a week in an empty cardboard box only loosely wrapped in a single piece of burlap, bare root and fronds chopped or broken) it has amazingly managed to shake off the shipping treatment and has put out quite a few fronds this summer.

So my question is, who else bought one of these "Yubaea" palms?  Several were sold according to the listing, and I know that my fellow east coast Jubaea fans who post here are probably some of the only people crazy enough to order one of these.

Did anybody else buy one of these, and what are your thoughts and experiences with it so far?

Mine is much fatter at the base than other Butia of a similar height, and also seems to have much shorter length petioles before the leaflets start.  It also doesn't have any spines yet, but it seems lots of Butia don't start growing any actual spines until they are bigger.  I can convince myself that it is probably at most an F2 hybrid, but I can also be swayed that it is just a Butia. I don't know? 

 

                  

Short petioles before leaflets start, no spines (yet)

   

Short and wide.  Also showing some damage from the shipping.

[5150cycad]

That definitely looks like it could be a hybrid to me, however I am not an expert. You should post this under the discussing palms forum. I am sure someone could probably give u a positive ID

[TexasColdHardyPalms]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I looked at those outside Sacramento last August and they are 100% Butia. I can't remember the guys name but he was European with a very thick accent and had just short of 1000 of them (in poor health). I went ahead and purchased twenty 25g F1 hybrids out of the fallbrook area instead. 

[Ben in Norcal]

7 minutes ago, TexasColdHardyPalms said:

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I looked at those outside Sacramento last August and they are 100% Butia. I can't remember the guys name but he was European with a very thick accent and had just short of 1000 of them (in poor health). I went ahead and purchased twenty 25g F1 hybrids out of the fallbrook area instead. 

Yeah, I saw these on eBay and thought there was nothing other than Butia to them.  

[Brad Mondel]

Same here. I didn't purchase because of typos and inaccuracies in the post. 

[Joe NC]

1 hour ago, TexasColdHardyPalms said:

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I looked at those outside Sacramento last August and they are 100% Butia. I can't remember the guys name but he was European with a very thick accent and had just short of 1000 of them (in poor health). I went ahead and purchased twenty 25g F1 hybrids out of the fallbrook area instead. 

Yeah sounds like the same guy at the same place for sure.  Some of the pics of the smaller sized palms in the posting made me think that they possibly could be hybrids?  When I asked in a message before buying, the seller insisted that they were in fact hybrids, 70%-90% Jubaea which I knew would have taken multiple intentional back crosses with pure Jubs and was highly unlikely.  I hoped that maybe the seed was collected from one of the west coast F1 Jubaea hybrids that are in public park, and he had a nursery full of 25% Jubaea F2's.  His packing for shipping was crap, and the condition of the palm was pretty rough. Not only was it beat up from its cross country trip, what fronds were left on were very yellow from a nutrient deficiency.  I would have been very angry had I paid any more for the plant.  The price on that listing more than doubled after I bought one. I figured if it was just a plain on pindo I still paid less for it than I would have paid for one this size locally. (but it would have been in way better condition) So I took a chance....  I did ask the seller if he could send me a plant with the least recurved fronds, as some of the smaller sized ones in the photos from the posting were fairly strict and I thought they might have a higher chance of actually being hybrid, or at least I would buy a form of pure butia that I like.  He agreed to pick out one with straight fronds.  The one I got in the mail is very recurved, but he cut most of the leaves off to make it look upright before shipping (lol).

Below is a photo I saved from the posting showing the "yubaea/butea" palms.  It's not my photo...

Edited September 15, 2016 by Joe NC
typos