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Hello palmtalkers! I've already had some experience of germinating Butia and now I'm starting my second palm from scratch - Washingtonia, possibly a pure filifera. This is a motherpalm, located in Termez, Uzbekistan. This Washy is 13 years old and it's fruiting for the first time this year. At age of 6-7 it managed to survive an extreme cold snap in february 2014, with a low temperature of -22C (-7.6F), the lowest recorded temperatures in the whole region, and continuous 168 hours of subfreezing temperatures, this is what makes this specimen interesting. These seeds arrived to me Cleaned and soaking in the water

In the winter of 2018 that palm received some cold damage when we had two cold events in January. Other than that it has always looked pretty good. It's holding more leaves now than I've ever seen. Beautiful!

My Tifton Hardy has been a real winner here .

Actually planted these this spring. I planted a filabusta but a rabbit or something ate it to the ground. I also planted butia but it drowned in all the rain we got this spring. I’ll try again this upcoming spring. Below is a mule , planted as a two gallon maybe, it took right off without skipping a beat.

Placing a marker here to document this seasons Jubaea germination method. A few hundred seeds mixed with wet Hydroton in a styrofoam cooler. I'm putting the cooler on top of my water heater. My previous method of cracking the seeds open to remove the shell would have been too much work for this many seeds.

Hello all! Just wanted to share an update on my cuban royal palm. I planted this bad boy in the ground in March of 2020. This summer it has skyrocketed! I believe the bigger spacing means it's growing fairly quickly per frond.

Central to Southwest Texas. Kerrville, Vanderpool, Campwood, Uvalde, Bandera, etc.

Finally, someone helping himself to Butia fruit as I post.. Thanks for looking!

Congratulations. I remember well my B.alfredii at this stage. I was so excited that seeds from the highlands of Madagascar germinated for me!. Today :

I was on a walk today and found this gem hiding next to a hotel. Excellent microchip late (canopy, concrete, beach nearby). Gorgeous white crownshaft!

After a busy year, a time of rest in the garden. While most things have finished up for the year, and await the new year to come, the yard is never completely void of any color / flowers. Taking advantage of continued good weather ( so far ) and getting a few things going for the year ahead ..with more on the way. Awaiting a delivery of deep pots / trays and different seeds to play around with, on top of all sorts of other stuff.. anyway.. Yellow Necklacepod, Sophora tomentosa ( seed grown and survived 5 years in the desert, in a pot, so far ) Started a touch earlier than in years past, but full of flowers/ a few developing pods atm. Interestingly, appears these are attractive to the neighborhood hummingbirds as well. Saffron Plum, Sideroxylon celastrinum, Tough, extremely fragrant and dependable winter flower-er, just starting it's cycle. Unlike past years, 2nd of the two plants i have is finally old enough to start flowering.. Hopefully this will increase the chances of fruit since both are loaded w/ buds, top to bottom.. One of two things guaranteed to draw in Queens ( butterflies ) this time of year, Gregg's / Palm leaf Mistflower, Conoclinium greggii.. Found nice plants at a nursery for installing later. As mentioned elsewhere, Queen, Danaus glippus go nuts over these in the summer. Other plant, Sometimes referred to as Fragrant Mist Flower is more of a bush than a low growing Perennial. Other than that, flowers look almost exactly the same / are a similar shade of bluish lavender ..and attract Queens ( and Monarchs ) by the dozens. Unlike Gregg's Mistflower, Chromolaena odorata can be a bit of an aggressive seeder in some areas. In Australia, it is considered a noxious ( and much despised ) Weed. Early start seedlings.. Muhly sp. collected at Oak Flat. Mexican Hat Cone Flower, Ratibida columnifera, Picked up seed of a couple other Coneflower sp to trial here this coming year. That NOID bushy thing from Boyce.. after surfing through every Genus in the Rose family, think i may have found out what it is, though the Blue colored fruit is throwing me off.. ( everything else matches though ) Anyway, appears to be a species of Osteomeles, " Hawaiian Rose / U' uhlei " being the most well known sp. Other 2 < or 3? > sp. appear to originate in East Asia and apparently are cherished as Bonsai subjects. 5 seedlings up as of today, so far.. 1st of the Agave chrysantha seed collected at Oak Flat starting to sprout.. We'll see how soon others start popping. Other stuff down, but not sprouting, fully sprouted just yet ** no picts **: * Southwestern Pipevine, Aristolochia watsonii * Sandpaper Tree / Anacua, Erhita anacua.. Reading thru some research papers, appears seed on these has to go through a process of weathering before germinating.. Supposedly, 6-8 month old seed will germinate better than freshly collected / sown seed. We'll see what happens. * Eve's Necklace, another great small tree from Texas, from fresh seed.. Next up, once the deep pots arrive, 4 sp. of Milkweed, among other things, inc. a plant that many horticultural " experts " religiously assumed was extinct, ..and sterile....

Hey all, Its a blustery late fall day today and I’m doing some much needed maintenance on the garden. Here are a few things that caught my eye as I did some cleanup. Some Dypsis thingee, possible hybrid:

My friend @shminbabe has a c. Macrocarpa that she is worried about. per her words; the newest growth has “gone limp” It’s been cool in Atlantic Beach but certainly nowhere near frost or freeze territory. She has an amazing microclimate. does the palm look okay?

Yes I know Scott grows them as well and if I knew previously, I would have purchased through him. Mine is planted between two homes on the eastern side. It gets sun until about 3pm in the summer. It's not ideal, but so far so good. Oh and I give it a lot of water otherwise it won't look right.

Big double trachy

Trachy

A minor actually planted two of them

Sabal causiarum as a large liner, growing very quickly for a sabal

Washingtonia seeds germinate easily, I germinated over 100 this year 1. Soaked them in water for 4-5 days 2. Sowed in a mix of perlite and miracle gro palm and cactus soil 3. Set container on top of TV box and within 5 days they were starting to germinate, with all germinating within 10 days

Great find! Perhaps bodes well for @shminbabe in her microclimate just up the road. She’s growing spindles too.

That is actually fenestralis.. I planted it in 2003 as a 5 gallon plant. Is a bit “weepier” than alfredii.

Aechmea gamosepala aka Matchstick1 on a chinese fan palm in my lil rainforest

On 1st St N left of the Best Western and right of the PPR office.

A beautiful Acanthophoenix rouselii and a recently trimmed “California coconut”

Hopefully I get this in the correct order: Dypsis manajarensis crown and Rhopalostylis cheesemanii trying to break through neighbors canopy:

Yes it’s a Brahea Brandegeei. I’ve spoken personally to Keith (Owners Son), and he told me it’s a BBrandegeei. I actually purchased my Brandegeei there from him. Treeland has a bunch of different palms in the back of the nursery that aren’t for sale to the public. If you find Keith and make conversation and start a relationship with him, he’ll take you back there and purchase directly through him. heres my Brandegeei from treeland.

A short visit to Villa Thuret in Antibes (INRAE). It's a garden where many species of plants are acclimatized, including palms. Here is Chamaedorea radicalis arborescent form.

Here is an update on the Lemurophoenix halleuxii growing at Leu Gardens in Orlando, Florida (zone 9b/10a). Both were acquired from Floribunda. Thie first one was planted in June 2014. The winter of 2014-15 was fairly mild. The lowest we had was around 34-35F one night in Feb. 2015. There were several other nights in the upper 30sF. It idid not suffer any damage. It is growing in a bright, filtered light location. It gets shaded by a tall old Quercus virginiana and a Delonix regia. The soil is well drained and sandy but has organic matter from the trees shedding. It gets good irrigation here in dry periods. The second specimen was planted in March 2015. It is growing in heavier soil that drains but stays constantly moist to wet from a nearby seepage spring. It also grows in filtered light but can get some direct sun a certain times in the day.

This Dypsis onilahensis is growing at my mom's house in Orlando, FL, about a mile from downtown. I planted it about 12 years ago as a 1 gal. size plant. It has grown single stemmed, no offshoots. I noticed yesterday it is flowering for the first time.

@Coasta ah okay, and I do believe he will be getting a new shipment in 2022. Definitely have to grab a couple next year if he brings in new inventory. @aztropic has some beautiful specimens as well. How much sun does yours see?

Love this palm! Have 2 on my property now! They grow fast! 3 to 4 fronds a year for me!

This post is simply a suggestion for the site. I am an amateur (home grower) that monitors the for sale/trade category, and one of the things I find annoying is that someone selling a palm will specify local pickup only. Of course, that's quite reasonable from their perspective, but not really an option for me unless that person is located in northern california (unfortunately for me, 99.8% of these posts are in any one of a number of southern california communities, any one of a number of florida communities or texas) - as a practical matter, these communities are not accessible to each other as well - the problem then gets exacerbated when a grower (typically commercial grower) uses the forum as a product list with one entry for each type of their 47 palm species for sale (i.e., all for local pickup). The effect from my perspective when there are a sufficient number of these posts is that it converts the category into a regional topic only, with subject matter unavailable to me (and others). My suggestion is simply that under the topic for sale/trade that there be separated categories for local pickup only (perhaps for tags by region) and for sale via mail.

This frost took out pretty much all the perennials in my yard except the area in between my house and my neighbors which has pine tree canopy. A banana plant up against my house looks like nothing happened while an elephant ear about 10' away is fried

Slowly pushing roots. Keeping them between 50F and 60F for the most part. The majority of the germination was 70F night, 85F day. A half dozen seeds rotted so I pulled the whole container out of the incubator and just sat them in an unheated room in my basement. They started germinating within a week of cooler temperatures. Opposite of what I have read.

Temps as of 6:20 am. Pine Island definitely wins the west-coast microclimate award for tonight’s chilly weather, Pinellas was also relatively warm. The East-coast was super remarkably interesting, some fleeting clouds and a NNE wind made the microclimates along the barrier islands from Jupiter northward far warmer than the interior and even Miami.

Beautiful desert landscape!

November:

Happy new year all! Came across this P. canariensis near Fair Park in Dallas. It is located near an abandoned warehouse and appears neglected. Seems to be very healthy! An interesting find...

Not Hollywood, but the "Traveler Visitor Magazine of Charleston"!

Today in Daytona Beach Shores lol

Hi all, following is a seed i tried to germinate unsuccessfully in the past using regular methods like community pots, baggie method with peat moss or coco or vermiculite. All the seeds i had tried rotted before even germinating. 14. Howea forsteriana Couple of years ago i was visiting a friend's house here in Cyprus and to my surprise i saw in his garden a line of Howea forsterianas flowering. i quickly jumped on the opportunity and climbed up to see that there were receptive female flowers. Fortunately at the same time there were open male flowers, so i collected them and by squeezing and shaking them i extracted some pollen. I then sprinkled the pollen on the female flowers and left happy i had this opportunity. You see here in Cyprus, Kentia Palm is only sold as an indoor palm in pots and usually dies off after a few years. It is extremely rare to see a Kentia in a garden and especially a healthy one, the size of those i was looking at. One may say that there was no need to manually pollinate the seeds, but given the fact the the guy told me that he saw them flowering before but had never set seed, as well as the long maturity time these seeds exhibit i thought to NOT let nature take its course . 2 years later the seeds i had pollinated were finally ripe and here is the first ever domestic production seed batch of Kentia in Cyprus (to my knowledge of course). Firstly, there is no significant flesh/fruit (exocarp) on this species. The seed is contained in a hard shell (mesocarp) the likes of which you are seeing below and it cracks easily with a hammer in half. The second observation is that the seed seems to be feeding from the vascular system inside the shell, much like a placenta. (see the veins carved inside the shell and the corresponding marks on the seed itself with blue colour). I then sacrificed to science a couple of seeds to learn first hand what's the deal with the species (easy to do when you have not paid for them ). The seed will germinate from the top of the seed right beside the attachment point. The critical observation here is that the embryo is located deep inside the seed and even if you delid the seed you still cannot see it easily. It takes 3-4 days of soaking for it to swell and reach the surface. Check the split seed and how the embryo is about to emerge after 4 days of soaking it. The initial location of the embryo was exactly where the green arrow points. After 8 days of soaking in 3% solution of Hydrogen Peroxide the "delidded" seeds are as shown below and are now ready to be potted and proceed to the seedling stage. Since it took so many days to get to this point, H2O2 is a must and it has been observed that this particular seed embryo is not affected even if it stayed for so many days in the solution. Other species tend to burn the embryo tip if they stay submerged for to long in hydrogen peroxide. That's the story of the Kentia Palm seed here in Cyprus. Feel free to share any experience you had with this species.

I think the keys west of Key West would only be marginally warmer, probably not enough to make any meaningful difference. I say this as Havana, Cuba, is only slightly warmer than Key West (during the coldest weather events), and Havana is farther west than Key west and 90 miles farther south, with the entire Gulf of Mexico above it to moderate plunging cold air from the N.W. and due North. Still, logically, I would think, the farther west the Keys, the warmer it would be. I know the upper keys get colder than the lower keys. I remember back in 2010 some of the upper keys were in the mid to high 30s, while Key West was in the mid 40s, and Havana was nearly the same. (There was a YouTube video of some guy showing cold damaged coconut palms, as a result of the 2010 cold weather.) My last navy duty station was in Key West (June 1970 to July 19, 1971). The coldest I saw in Key West was 47 degrees, one night in January of 1971. It was a windy night. Me and two buddies were camping on Bahia Honda Key that night, and we had a fire going. I remember looking up at the swaying coconut palms and thinking, how can it be this cold here. While in Key West, my ship made a quick day trip to the Dry Tortugas. Just west of Fort Jefferson Dry Tortugas is Loggerhead Key (below Google screen save). If there was a temperature recording station there, it would be interesting to compare the readings to Key West.

This Saturday was wet and cold, but that didn't stop The Original PRA Team from braving the elements in search of a mythical west coast Corypha. I'm not sure if he's a member here on Palmtalk, but Ken Blackford brought this palm to our attention on facebook. Thanks Ken! So, we headed out to investigate this fresh lead on a palm not known to grow in our area. What will we find? Will it turn out to really just be a green Bizzie? Perhaps just a large Sabal? Let's go and find out! ERRRRRRRRRRTTTTTT! Pump the brakes!!!! Some Spring Valley Phoenix need some pics too!

There's a very odd Sabal that I've seen a million times in Bradenton but I've never stopped to check it out up close. From the road it almost looks like a Borassus because the leaves are much stiffer and less filamentous than normal Sabals. I've promised myself that next time it seeds I'll collect some to sprout. Here's the google maps as well as some screenshots to show which one I'm talking about. There's a regular S. palmetto growing right next to this palm, so it gives you some idea of how different it is. https://www.google.com/maps/@27.495234,-82.563912,3a,75y,45.56h,98.41t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sP0p5FVVSFJbN7IBe_DcjEg!2e0

no no no no no no...really?

matt begins to "bungle in the jungle" uncontrollably. waiting for the crabbin boat to leave we had some time to check out thye ken johnson estate in the morning light. it was 5:30 or so local time but still 3 hours earlier for us. "mmmm palmy." awesomely bulbous kentiopsis crown.