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The Lonicera sp. looks like Lonicera x heckrottii.

Everyone should understand that Spanish colonists also brought date palms to America. Spanish culture received them from the Phoenicians (Canaanites) in antiquity, and later from the Arabs and Jews. The date palm itself was already depicted in the great Temple of King Solomon when European civilization did not yet exist. Later, these Spaniards, dominating the West and discovering America, also discovered a paradise full of palm trees that you marvel at and which you also managed to conquer.

I sent a pm.l too JO. 916-798-9225. Tks

Just one Sabal (burmudana) in my garden of well over 100 different palm species but I love it. The photo doesn’t show how massive it actually is very well.

Not really this was a "stoaway" on an AirForce plane.

While anything " cold " is rare up here, specimens growing at the pictured Oasis in Tucson ( Agua Caliente Park, Tanque Verde area well east of downtown Tucson ) can see winter time lows in the lower 20s / high teens F, ..and anywhere from a dusting to a couple inches of snow once or twice during one of our ..increasingly rarer.. colder winters. While true that those conditions don't occur every year ...or for an entire winter season, both factors don't seem to bother even the specimens whose trunks are dunked in water at that time.

Final roll call as the days spring walkabout reaches the end.. White Rhatany, Krameria bicolor.. Flowers look like an Orchid but the genus lies within the same plant order ( Zygophyllales ) as Creosote, Guaiacum, and Kallstroemia < ....And Tribulus ..the Bleepin' Goat's head weed that wreaks bike tires ...and bare feet > Genus is also semi- parasitic, often growing near other stuff which it derives some of it's nutrients from. Tough as nails regardless and a ..somewhat twiggy / spiny < -ish > gem of a smaller bush if you can get it to grow in a garden. Erythrostemon palmeri, bloomin, and full of seed ..but not completely awake yet. Western Soapberry grove.. Unusual, South American Jatropha sp. with Pseudobombax - like leaves ( ..on others i have seen ), and Bursera - like bark.. Nice to see what the flowers look like before i pick up a couple.. Cottonwood gallery along Queen creek. Perlite / Apache Tears mine area in view in the distance.. The world famous, Ayer Lake Apache leap, and Boyce Thompson's House ..AKA: the house with the best view in the area.. Some scenes from the Picket Post Mtn Trail Access point nearby while checking in on some stuff there on the way back down the hill... Picket Post = One massive pile of Pumice and Tufa.. Superstition Wilderness in the distance Weaver's Needle.. ..Can't remember the name given to this particular formation.. Alamo Wash.. Dry, crunchy n' dusty, and not much going on out there now.. Hopefully not for long though. Despite that, quite a lot of Butterfly activity already. While some of them are gearing up down in the valley, no signs of budding on the Saguaro up here just yet.. Majority of Palo Verde are past peak bloom. Aristolochia watsonii ..Same specimen i've been tracking since 2021. ..Is also where seed for my plants / all seed sent to others from my specimens originated.. Dried up ( for now ) remnants of those infamous " Devilish Blondes " ( Proboscidea althaeifolia ).. Since it has been a few years, checking on the colonies growing out here to be sure they're still around / see if any are pushing early growth.. Appears this particular specimen got knocked around at some point over the last couple years and a section of it's tap root was partially unearthed and then damaged.. Will survive but, interesting being able to see ..easily, without needing to do much digging, just how thick the tap roots are on these. Signs of continued persistence in another colony growing in a different area ( Up on a hillside rather than on a gravel bar near / within a wash ). Fingers crossed, things look much different when i return in a couple months.. Looking west towards the table tops in the San Tans from Gonzales Pass.. Look closely enough and you can see distant buildings that represent the eastern edge < ..for now.. > of Queen Creek and San Tan Valley.. How long that edge holds will depend on how quickly the rest of Hwy 24 is built. Will connect the 202 in Gilbert, to Hwy 60 / 79 near Gold Canyon once that section is built. Will make the trips out here a bit faster too. Straight shot from the house, vs added drive time having to loop up and around Apache Junction / Gold Canyon currently.

I agree but in this circumstance I was talking about running bamboo. Clumping bamboo is awesome! you don't have to worry about it being invasive or Absolutely taking over your yard! I've seen some really nice ones around here.

I guess all depends on how intense is the cold and damp situation.

Oh wow! I wasn't expecting to hear that... It must be frustrating, although ultimately we try to grow palm trees in climates that aren't their ideal habitats. At least for me, that's the charm and excitement of having them, as proof that perhaps we can succeed, with the added satisfaction that comes with it. I don't have the space to plant them in the ground... I hope mine will withstand the climate, watering, and fertilizer I'll be giving them. How long did they last in the pots?

Extraordinary information and data. Southeastern Crete is definitely very different from rest of the island in terms of climate and this data shows why. If investigated more it might be second desert area in Europe! This is amazing indeed.

Don Hodel in his three articles had highlighted several times the frequent potassium deficiency of Sabal specimens growing in CA.

It's a genus that I have had no luck with. I had a large container grown alexandrae and a couple of smaller tuckeri, and all are no longer with us.

I've only given my Alexandra palm the first application so far. I'll try it out this season; a friend who has very large and healthy palms here on the Mediterranean coast recommended it. I previously used a more basic liquid, and I think this one will work well, but of course, you always want the best, and you have to learn and experiment. My Alexandra palm grew four new leaves last season, which I think is good considering it's in a pot.

Now now let’s be more specific. There’s a running bamboo and clumping bamboo. Clumping bamboo is not a bad dog.

My little eriospatha growing among the lavender has been in the ground for 13 years! But it only started to motor once the the big Canary date next to it was taken out 3 or 4 years ago.

Happy Birthday IPS!

Good to see you again!

Johannesteijsmannia altifrons The seeds have a thin hard outer shell, some cracked easily by giving them a gentle loving tap with your tool of choice, I cracked a couple in a vice but you have to be careful as one seed almost split in half. Once you get a little crack you can leverage a flat tool too pick off more, do not apply more pressure. If we describe the seeds as having a flat or slightly concave bottom and a flattish round top connected by a rounded circular side, the embryo could be located anywhere along the side. The seed shell above the embryo comes off easier than the rest. Anytime the shell came off really easily, it always revealed a bad embryo. Had a few bad embryos, some looked fine but ended up recessing into the seed and a couple looked kinda bad but seem to be germinating nontheless. Germination began almost instantly once delidded. A tentative 4 out of 10 germinated seeds. Kerriodoxa elegans These seeds were not listed as new in RPS but I decided to take my chance, sadly most were rotten or the embryo had shrunk or recessed, 3 seeds appeared to have healthy embryos but only one pushed out and expanded, sadly it too doesn't look healthy. This method is great but can't save what's already lost. The embryo is located on the flat or "bottom" side, sometimes it's clear where it is as it will be marked by a lighter or reddish seed coat, sometimes not so much. The embryo is very close to the surface and the seed coat is relatively soft so care should be taken when removing the seed coat. The one seed that has made some movement began almost immediately. We'll call it 1 out of 10 for now Butia(grus) Two species here, b.lallemantii and butiagrus nabonnandii (b.odorata) but the process is the same, lallemantii seeds were not new and had been listed for sometime, two mule seeds had germinated naturally before I got impatient. Shells were cracked in a vice, with the pointy ends in contact with the ends of the vice, pressure is applied slowly and the seed should be wrapped with some cloth or held between fingers if space permits, otherwise things may end up getting scattered. Cracking revealed up to two seeds per nut for lallemantii and up to three for the mules, technically they should germinate easy from here but if you're skipping the queue you might as well go to the front of the line. Cracking the nut is worth doing for old seeds as sometimes rotten seeds were next to healthy ones which may have ended up infecting them. The embryo location is obvious, it's the pointy part of the seed which would have corresponded to the germination pore, the embryo sits deeper in the seed than you would think but slowly removing slices from the pointy end will reveal it. Can be done with a sharp blade but I did a couple with just my thumbnail. A few seeds seem to have missing embryos all together and a few didn't germinate, with embryos recessing into the seed instead. The healthy ones pushed a button out within 24 hours. First photo is butiagrus, then butiagrus(left) and lallemantii(right)

Since there are a lot of pics from the Jacksonville area, I thought I would throw in a few pics of some larger Butia I saw last summer at Naval Air Station Jacksonville:

LOL, Yepp, ..believe it or not, i've heard people whine about the rain / humidity during Monsoon season ..Longer -term " Desert Rats " too ..which i found quite odd.. ...About as bad as people who move here ..and then complain about a lot of the plants being spiny.. ..Like going to the beach and complaining about sand. I'll take the wettest / most humid summer possible ...repeated ..at least.. every other year, over any of the mind - altering -ly long, hot and dull summers we've had.

Not true of either Washingtonia sp. ...locally at least. Pretty sure there are plenty of " water side " W. filifera growing around both natural and man made Oasis in CA < and Baja > as well. ...More examples.... Tempe... Tucson...

Banyons are most appropriately planted in large public parks or on properties that have several acres to use as a canvas. I don't have any photos of the biggest one here in San Diego, which I believe is the one in Balboa Park. That said, there are photos of the Balboa Park Banyon available all over the internet. They are spectacular! I don't recall the species, but recall some gigantic specimens when I used to travel to Samoa. I would have to dig through prints and slides to find my photos of those trips and some of the specimens I saw. That is a project for another day though.

Richard, how would you rate their growth-rate where you are? And in particular, against other Licuala species?

"Also, ..for those who really < ..really? > want one of those brutally hot n' dry summers?" People actually want that in the desert? That being said, there are always people on the fringe who enjoy strange things. I like very warm, even hot, weather, but I still have my limits. Summer in the desert southwest is quite the experience.