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Well done Richard, keep it up, he who stops is lost.

$9350 on 100 Sabinaria seeds?!!

That’s coming along nicely . A very large growing space . Harry

Those are very nice . How old is that Basilonga ? I have had a double in the ground for a couple of years and have found them to be super slow growing. Harry

The Archontophoenix palms are very root sensitive . Most times new plantings can show a bit of struggle , especially in sunny , hot weather. They are water lovers , for the most part , so keep them hydrated . They will adapt , eventually. Some are faster than others , many factors determine how rapidly. Yours look healthy so , with time , should be beautiful there . I agree that the wood chips would be beneficial , rather than the highly reflective white rock . Harry

Here's our last week of winter, and to be honest, it feels like we haven't really had one this year. Two frosts so light they were gone by 8.30 and a couple of gloomy below 10 degree days, and that's all she wrote, apparently...however I've fallen for that old trick before, so it won't be me starting the summer thread this year! Looking like 19c for the last day of winter, could be a scary fire season ahead.

I did the maths on my sabinara 55 out of 100 plus import cost, $170 they each owe me, to get my money back. So $250 each palm so I make $80 bucks per sabinara and that doesn’t include my growing costs. So really say $60 bucks I make for one sabinara. Which is quite reasonable considering the fact it’s imported seeds. As you say you’re syagrus seed ventures went out the window, and to justify that sort of money, its not a good incentive for one to import seeds. And that’s what the main issue is, how rare is rare. And a palm nut collector will and I have pay top end for that holy grail palm. Sell all my sabinara for $45 each and another grower is going to grow them on and sell them for $250 or higher. It seems you can’t win importing seeds at the going economic rate we are seeing. Being realistic about the whole palm growing and finding that market to supply due to demand!

I think you might have a male hemp plant, which won't produce potent buds but can still be calming. For legal and lab-verified flower,

Water water water. King palms are semi-aquatic and are literally impossible to overwater but very easy to underwater, especially in hot weather. Daily watering would not be out of the question. Wood mulch would be much better and healthier for the palms than the icy white rock mulch.🙂

And how is Mr sancho going?

Agreed.

The poor old kerriodoxa, give me the subtropics any day, you can have those hurricanes.

Nothing beats a nice stroll in a garden and even better if it’s got palms. Some good pictures thanks.

Dypsis basilonga and a couple of chamaedorea tenella, a bit of eye candy!

Good news for this duo of rare palms surviving winter in the ground. Both planted mid summer and they both survived temperatures down to 2 degrees celcius in cold wet conditions. We have two great zone push winners!

It should be fine, just let it get used to its new home. It does look like a couple of leaves have a little sunburn. It will sulk a little but it should be fine and in a year or so you won’t even notice it had sulked. You may lose the odd lower leaf. From what I can see is that the top crown of growth and new leaf is ok.

I thought I'd share this because it's pretty bizarre. The soil in the pot was from compost that was made on the property. Here in McNairy County Tennessee. The only washingtonia seeds I've had recently were Filifera Seeds from Midland TX that I decided to experiment with. But I didn't spread them around anywhere. The only seeds I've spread on our property were Sabal minor seeds and Sabal Palmetto seeds. And I can't for the life of me figure out where in the world would a Washingtonia robusta come from. The closest Washingtonia Robustas that I know of are over 300 miles away. You can see A sabal palmetto coming in that pot too but like I said I've been spreading sabal palmetto around.

Honestly, most of the damage was with inga trees. I won’t be planting anymore of that species on my farm.

Here's another interesting thing around Hornsby, I have absolutely no idea how to even get to this. It's so remote and there isn't a single road that goes anywhere near it. It's like maybe 2 or 3 miles away from a road. It's Directly on the Hatchie River. I may boat down to this spot and some point to look and see if this is sabal minor. But it could also literally be anything

I would definitely say this area is 8a, as a matter of fact it's safe to assume all of the counties including the one i live in 15 minutes to the East are 8a. Something id like to point out here is this ridiculous beast. This is a cropped image so the quality is kinda bad. But is it just me or is that fullest, most Globular, stickless lollipop, of a sabal minor ever? this is one of the larger ones in Hornsby. I don't think I've ever seen a sabal minor anywhere that looked like that.

I know my climate is a lot more milder than yours, but iam also planting out tropicals. I pretty well much planted the whole winter in my garden. Except for a couple of super special one offs which I only planted out mid last week. Plant what you have and hope for the best ifbit has already lived in a container in your collection plant away. Some areas in garden can get hydrophobic with the sand I have. You can get a wetting agent or a little detergent helps with hydrophobic soil.

Whether SAPW over there or RPW here, they have arrived to stay. Terribly sorry saying it, but you are bound to spray preemptively monthly in order to prevent or minimize effects of infestation. I have been following this practice since two decades. That said spraying is not a heavy task, provided you are properly equipped. A high pressure oil motored pump and a telescopic cane are indispensable. You do not have to spray the whole crown, just few liters directly in to the growing point and the immediately surrounding it leaf bases. I use a solution one sachet (not the whole content of the bag) of Merit and 15 mm of a contact insecticide in 100 lt water. I sprayed yesterday and today I have found a dead bug below my Livistona mariae Like I written in the beginning, regular, monthly spraying does not guarantee 100% prevention of infestation but it certainly prevents a severe infestation by the time first signs of latter become visible. Here is a recent example in my juvenile Jubaea. Initial infestation did not progress deeper in to the growing point and as new leaves and spears were emerging signs became visible on certain spot of the leaves but newest spear is absolutely free of any marks. Newest spear is absolutely healthy

I've done some research on this and if I recall right, I think someone online said that someone went on a trip down south so many decades ago (maybe the 1960's) maybe to Florida or somewhere like that and brought some sabal minor back with them and then they have spread and naturalized all over that little Tennessee town since then. So they are most likely naturalized in this area rather than native but it is still very impressive. They certainly seem to thrive there. There are a few other areas where sabal minor has naturalized in Tennessee. One area I know of in zone 7b Tennessee is where the owner of a property planted some sabal minor in the 1960's and there are now dozens of them all over his property and some even across the road by a fence. I'm guessing birds carried the seeds and perched on the fence and dropped them there. But the thing about sabal minor is it may produce many seeds but most of the seedlings usually are going to end up in one small area even over the span of decades. I'm guessing this is due to their seeds being relatively heavy and many of them probably just dropping right by the parent plant. They seem to expand there native range extremely slowly. Birds seem to really like sabal minor seeds but they seem to digest them very quickly and drop them very quickly a short distance away from the parent plants. Since the last ice age, it has taken them a very long time just to get up to their known native range. Another problem is humans keep destroying the environment so there is less and less favorable habitat for sabal minor to expand into as time goes on. So since the 1960's, that area that I was talking about in Tennessee, the sabal minor reproduced and spread a lot but only in a relatively small area, only reaching to barely across the road by a fence. I'm guessing Hornsby, Tennessee is zone 8a? The area I am talking about is in zone 7b. Back in the 1960's, I'm not sure what the cold hardiness zone for each place was. It's very interesting to think of what kinds of winters all these sabal minor in Tennessee have endured over all these decades. The problem is sabal minor just spreads so slowly northward or in any direction (unless I'm guessing if water is involved like a creek or something to help move seeds). If sabal minor spread faster, I'm sure they would probably already be proven native in Tennessee and all over most of Tennessee. Sabal minor don't have feet like animals and people do and cannot simply walk to where they want.

I was at Jeff's place a few days before the storm, buying some palms. He seemed pretty concerned. I spoke to him a few days ago on the phone. He said he had one large palm blow down, but that he had others of the same variety come through intact. Flooding was the worst problem he faced. Too many neighbors above him had cleared their land bare, which let the rainwater flow over the properties and into Jeff's place. He said the nursery sections were fine. My place on the east coast north of Hilo came through the storm fine. No palms lost, only a couple of bananas blown down.