Cocos nucifera cold damage, Florida

[philinsydney]

[Xenon]

Cold damage in Marathon, Florida? Isn't that Zone 11?

Jonathan

[DavidLee]

Cold damage in Marathon, Florida? Isn't that Zone 11?

Jonathan

My guess is that they experenced a long duration of cold weather not a freeze. The palms shut down to long.

[Walt]

IMO, I believe the damage is more of a factor of the transplanting trauma (he said the trunked coconut palms were transplanted in 2009) and not due so much to the cold per se. He said the "home grown" palms seemed to fare much better from the cold weather than the transplanted palms.

He mentioned that is was June, and that the weather was hot, so he had to be referring to the January 2010 cold weather. In January of 2010 Florida had an 11 day period of abnormally cold weather (Highlands County, Florida, had 11 straight nights below 40F, with five of those nights below 30F).

Further, the coldest night in the upper Keys during January 2010 was in the high 30s F (that's still zone 10B). I think that low was just for one night out of the 11 day period ( I was checking weather stations everyday during that cold spell).

My opinion is the transplanted coconut palms never got fully recovered (primary factor) from the transplanting and the cold (but not freezing) weather induced the bud rot and other diseases because the palms were in a weakened state already. Had these same palms been well established, I don't think the relatively colder weather would have hurt these palms. Surely, not one night in the high 30s F. which would be causing trunk rot.

[Dave-Vero]

Vero Beach lost many established coconuts in the long-duration cold of winter 2010. After the hottest summer on record, freezes of December 2010 did far more damage (26 F at the airport). I think established trees at the beach and some sheltered ones inland will be fine by the end of summer, but some tall ones look, so far, dead.