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What's struggling and what is doing well? Are your Texas natives also on irrigation? I have everything on drip irrigation and turks caps (local native), Hamelia patens (Florida native), and porterweeds (Stachytarpheta, Mexico) all look great in the sun and heat.

Nothing better than going for it and getting great results. Good one, and advice is always free and mistakes are costly. One great advantage of talking with other growers, and another is I learnt something new today, thanks for sharing your experience!

A couple of nice varieties of palms for the garden in the future, the merriillii are a surprise growing pretty good for seedlings in winter, I thought for sure cold damage. And the lytocarum are as tough as nails so always happy with them. Some good ones for the tropical look in the garden in a few years time.

Transplant as into the ground or repot them into larger containers? Into the ground easy just plant them. Repotting even easier, palms like the next size container up ie 200mm container into a 240mm container. A small 70mm tube into a 100mm or 140mm and so on. They also require a good root system before transplanting, if you can lift the palm up by the stem and they don’t pull out of the container then generally they are good to repot. As for drainage holes or lack of just use a pair of secautears or whatever you have to cut some drainage holes or drill some new holes. If you can’t repot them drill some holes in the bottom of the container. It’s all about roots for transplant or repotting, and soil medium, get it right and palm growing is easy, get it wrong and you start to have trouble growing them. Repotting germinated seedlings is a little different you generally go by the type of palm you have to the container that suits it. May I suggest my posts, On the potting bench, it’s got a lot of repotting pictures and information. Good luck

Borassodendron borneense not to happy in the cold weather, another strike for old man winter, he won this push. Cold and wet I suspect! And my Calyptrocalyx micholitzii is not happy either in the cold weather.

They are rocket ships once established. I have two of them to a friend 5 years ago they are now 8 to 10 feet tall crown included. And in some very high sun positions. They take it well iam now planting a few in my garden in more exposed sites and they love it. You won’t regret planting them in your garden, the only drawback is that they get so tall so fast you lose them in the mid canopy. I suggest planting them at the bottom of steep slopes this way in the years to come you have a nice crown of leaves at least in sight. Richard

The server was being silly and I couldn’t post the male and female, which one is male and female. Male inflorescence female inflorescence

The seed market is very volatile in the fact that you are dealing with a living cell, this makes it difficult for the sellers to guarantee viability and germination rates. As we know some seeds germinate a long time after we have said they are no good. The big difference is when we get fresh seeds the difference is amazing in germinating rates.

Well I guess I jinxed myself. 1/2” in the last 18 days and 100 degrees and sunny every day for quite a while now. Things are looking rough, I’m watering every night. Can’t keep up really. At least the palms are drought tolerant. I have a lot of Texas natives planted and to be honest, half of them just plain suck. They’re struggling too and many only look good for spring and the first half of summer.

As juveniles they appear to be a little more robust looking. But as germinated seedlings they are pretty hard to tell apart, perakensis are a little more skinneri looking as seedlings. But if you were to mix them up they would just look like a bunch of joeys to the untrained eye. I haven’t seen many advanced magnifica but from what I have seen there appears to be slight differences, more robust looking.

Wallichia densifolia git my attention today.

This Encephalartos Arenarius x Horridus had… you guessed it yellow leaves. Hit it with the chelated iron and almost overnight they greened up and a couple weeks later it started to flush! If you guys have any problem yellow plants give it a try and it should work for you. And thanks again Gene at Az!!!!🤙

This Dwarf Horridus was a wreck! While the leaves are still trying to turn blue it flushed almost immediantly main caudex and pup. While only one leaf flushes you can see from the pic how blue they are! I forgot to mention that the chelated iron will stain the surface of the soil nothing to worry about. I just sprinkle a little around and I believe it leaches down to the root zone each time I water.

Encephalartos Trispinosus was looking bad! It has since greened up and getting hints of its former blue self again. It also has sterted to flush. The exciting thing us for several years the flushes have came out yellow or orange. This flush is coming out normal so should turn blue again.

It’s been crazy hot and sunny here, but the atmosphere has finally gotten unstable enough, with late afternoon clouding up, hyperlocal showers. A few miles being the difference between a sprinkle, or brief torrential downpour, depending on where you are. Been lucky at the house the past week. Kind of a classic wet-season pattern finally emerging the last week in July. The lawn and palms perked up right away. The next two months are the wettest of the year normally. June is always a disappointment and July is oddly dry most years. Typical afternoon rains, plus the arriving tropical systems, normally drive up the precipitation totals. At least buckets o’ bromeliads are easy to keep happy.

This Horwood x Arewood “bride of frankenstein” was starting to yellow out so I dosed it with the chelated iron and not only did it green up but it is flushing for the 3rd time this year!

So I had a handfull of other yellow Cycads to experiment with and even faster results! As an added bonus most if these Cycads flushed again even if they had already flushed this year. I wish I had taken before and after picks of these Cycads but you will just have to take my word for it. This Lehmannii was very yellow and looked like it might not make it. The yellow leaves turned blue and I noticed today when I was watering its starting to flush!

And here is a pic of it today! While not as green as my others yet it is getting greener by the day!

YES!!!! First if all I have to thank Gene at Az.! I had a handfull of Cycads that had yellowed out and I threw everything and the kitchen sink at them to no avail. I posted a pick of one of my favorite plants an Encephalartos “trappes valley” Latifrons that was stubbornly yellow and looking worse by the day! As I said I had tried every fertilizer chemical and organic you could think of except chelated iron. When Gene recommended I try it I was thinking what do I have to lose so I picked some up and gave it a try. WOW😳This stuff is unreal! Here is a pic of said E. Latifrons before chelated iron. It had looked like this for a couple years.

Tim, One defining feature between the two in my observation, is that hillibrandii has the green leaf undersides, while arecina has more gold, similar to martii and viscosa. Tracy, i’ve got a hillibrandii coming into flower for the first time, I’ll see how those develop! Bret

So I’m trying to transplant my palms from the nursery pots I purchased them in to containers that have a drainage grill at the bottom but no drainage hole. Any suggestions?

Anyone out there have one for sale? Thanks, Aaron

What is the tree in the center of the photo? I think I planted this White Sapote in the spring of 2025, at about 8’ tall - it’s probably double that, now. I get little black speckles on the back of the leaves, that are wash off. I haven’t fertilized it. Any thoughts on that? I’m over in City Heights. Steve

This is the only Chamaedorea in my garden that is growing faster than my Tree Form Radicalis. I got one from @DoomsDave a couple years ago. It had one frond and was nice and green . It is now almost 6’ tall! I wish I had more . Harry Adoption day about two years ago , soaking my new palms after a long trip home! This afternoon , the tip of the last frond almost even with a 6’ fence with a few “rings”. I could easily squeeze on or two more next to it . I will if I run across any small ones.

They will work if you are brave!