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Here, my rain gauges recorded ~0.25 in of rain. Just outside of downtown, it rained hard enough to inundate the right lanes of the highways. My yard is approaching 7 in. of rain for a month where the average is close to 9in. Still a deficit, but hard to complain when there are other areas below an inch of rain. Mulching and amending with organic material looks to be a necessity for Florida palm gardening anymore. @sonoranfans also mentioned dense planting and canopy to shelter from direct sun. The benefit of protection during cold events is a nice bonus. If you're just starting to grow palms in Florida, this is a good foundation for dealing with our seemingly unending droughts and cold fronts followed by record heat in the spring.

This is the big ome year before last

Will it survive? Probably. However, the treasure coast is not quite south enough to guarantee coconut survival long term. Generally, Palm Beach and south is considered to be the safe zone. There are coconuts up here that are “coming back” but honestly they all look bad. The picture is not very clear, but this one doesn’t look great. The fact that it aborted the fruit is a clear indication of stress.

Coconuts realy starting to come back! Inland hudson fl just on the edge of a super cold spot. That spot less than 2 miles away as the crow Flys saw 15 deg this year. Just up the road saw 20 to 22. I got to 24. These coconuts take a beating every year and come back every time.

had a cloudburst last evening, my bucket says about 3/4 inch in about 40 mins. At times it rained quite heavy with some puddles int he yard. Hoping it slowed the premature yellowing of leaves. The radar at the time looked like we got hit by a suddenly appearing higharea a few miles wide. I'll take it and whatever we get. Ironically this was the day after our once a week irrigation day.

A small update of my coconut. We had a lot of rain this season but also one day we had a crazy hailstorm that I've never seen before. The hail was more than ½ inch in diameter. I had some damage on some palms and some fruit trees. The cocos survived without to protect it. Next year I should cover the soil on the rainy winter days as somebody suggested here. As I see, the best for my climate is as dry as possible soil in the winter and a lot of water in the summer. Now that the weather is hot, I water it daily. If I would start from the beginning I would do things differently learning from my mistakes. I hope to see others with similar climate with mine here in south mediterranean give it a try.

E. Equatorialis throwing a couple 6ft. Leaves.

Please help me identify this cycad; It is about 20 years old now, and I thought the main trunk was dead but it's flushing with onset of rains!

E. Kisambo

E. Ituriensis. Almost lost this one last year as I deep soaked it right before 2 weeks of solid clouds and drizzle. The outer part of the caudex started to desicate. I quit watering it and it threw a little 3 leaf flush. It is currently throwing a 5 leafer so hopefully in the clear!

Several of my big Encephalartos are starting to flush. Here is E. Laurentianus

Seeking suggestions to bring the palm back to good health. It lives in side most of the year; however, the frons started to droop and turn brown the last couple months so I cut them off. Been using palm tree booster but now wondering if it has root rot. It’s been in the same pot for 3-4 years.

Looks like everything is hanging in there. I think with the protection you have , losses will be minimal if at all. There truly is safety in numbers. I will say that , as my garden filled in and the canopy grew , plants go through winter better . Harry

The title I have chosen is self-explanatory I guess... As we all know selling/sending plants from the US to other countries is highly restricted while on the other hand it is totally free and unregulated among the countries of the European Union. It would help us members from European countries if we had our own thread for swapping and selling seeds and plants. The UK should not be in btw since sending plants to and from the UK is also subject to strict regulations after Brexit.

Looks like umbellata to me (sorry for the spelling). If it is a dammaropsis you are so lucky. I've also been searching for ages!

That area is semi protected but in a real cold year it may get a mild frost. I haven’t seen below zero since the winter of 2023 thankfully. In open exposed areas I’ve definitely seen below minus 2C. Not good. These guys yellow a little in that situation and sail through. By summer they’re crankin. The sun came out today after a bit of drizzly rain. I thought I’d take a picture of the water flowing through the area. BTW further back in the thread Tim said I’m closer to Sydney weather than Melbourne which is true. I wish I had Sydney winters though. They’re glorious and sunny. Anyway to give my climate an eastern states perspective the closest I can find to my winter temps is Nowra. I may be a tad cooler at night in winter but definitely wetter by about a factor of 50% to 100% more than Nowra. My garden has already seen a min of 0.5C with no damage this year. There’s a lot of winter to go though. Generally though if my lakes fill up, the risk of a hard frost disappears. There could be an exception though but if the rains are late, beware. My lakes filled up on June 15 but it can take until early August to do that in a dry year. The earliest I’ve seen was May 3rd. That was the year the place flooded. No frost that year. I think once the atmosphere gets more moisture in it, the chance of cloud cover increases and the risk of frost decreases.

I stand corrected by @Silas_Sancona and other sages of the desert.

A bit of colour with a Chambeyronia and a couple of chamaedorea flowers!

It’s a boy, observe daily they are tricky!

A nice old Livistona Australis flowering.

So far no damage that has been detrimental for a palm grower. With temperatures dropping to 5 degrees Celsius, cold and wet, everything seems to be doing well. A few winter cold spots on some brassiophoenix schumanii, but I had them written off last winter and was wanting to just throw them out. But apart from that the rest seem to be fine, even some good growth on a few things. But the real winter is only just around the corner, let’s just say it’s not over yet!

They most likely used the elaitor as nesting material, if your after any more metallica let me know I got a few floating around.

You can see why they are not a popular little animal in many ways. They get stuck into there fair share of things in my garden, not to mention the seedlings. It’s a continuous process of trapping them. No baits iam to green for that, I even let them go after trapping them. Heaven forbid as to why I do that!

Rats and mice have a lot to answer for with damage in many ways.

Looking great Tyrone...that's going to be super nice when they all start trunking. Do you get frost in that area?