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Coconuts


empireo22

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What a coincidence. We decided to go visit the Kopsick coconuts last night. Arrived at about 9:00 pm. I was surprised that the maturing nuts didn't look ripe yet. I went at the end of August 2013 and it was dropping mature coconuts, so I guess the window of opportunity tends to be late August through October(?). As a side note, the canopy of the Kopsick coconuts looked better (more full, healthier) in 2013. I think the chilly weather last winter had some effect, but they look better than they did in February of this year. Needless to say, I didn't leave with a viable coconut, as intended. All I found was this (pictured below), which is not viable, as I can hear the inner husk rattling inside, instead of coconut water. It is also a tad small compared to a ripe, viable nut. Oh well, I found some other seeds while there, Roystonea, Wodyetia, Bismarckia, Veitchia and Ptychosperma elegans.

Keith, the second photo is of the inner husk of the de-husked Marco Island giant coconut. You can see the sprouting eye on the left side of the nut. No direct sunlight until this one has some foliage.

Thanks for those pics! It seems like the dehusked coconut is pretty large. It's kind of funny, because when I was at Kopsick, I noticed two brown coconuts in the tree, but both seemed relatively shriveled. I threw a baseball at the larger of the two to get it down, but it had no weight to it at all, so I didn't bother with the smaller one, which is the one you posted a picture of! I was planning on coming back in a month to see if any of the larger green coconuts had matured at all, so hopefully I have some luck that trip.

Keith 

Palmetto, Florida (10a) and Tampa, Florida (9b/10a)

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This palm was unfazed by the cold in 09/10 and 11 (I think that's the years) I lost about half my coconuts those years about 20 or so and this one looked perfect. Hard to get a decent picture in the jungle. Also I have never removed a frond, they just fall and leave a perfectly clean base, still my favorite palm.

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Jupiter FL

in the Zone formally known as 10A

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That is one great coconut palm redant! :)

''To try,is to risk failure.......To not try,is to guarantee it''

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  • 4 weeks later...

This coconut is in an empty lot next to my doctors office in Satellite Beach. I get a kick out of it because it has always looked very well with zero care.

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This coconut is in an empty lot next to my doctors office in Satellite Beach. I get a kick out of it because it has always looked very well with zero care.

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Vacant lot coconuts are always neat. Here's one in Sarasota that's always looked pretty good.

https://goo.gl/OVYK1t

Keith 

Palmetto, Florida (10a) and Tampa, Florida (9b/10a)

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How old do you think it is?

I'm not sure. If I had to guess I would say 25 yrs old. The guess is based on the growth rate of some other confirmed 20 year old coconuts I know of.

I was told that this lot and the lot my doctor's office is located on used to be a nursery in the 90's. I forget the name but it was an operation with a main location in S. Florida and they tried to start start an additional operation in Satellite Beach.

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Don't laugh. This is an experiment out in Indio, Ca (Palm Springs area). This coco has been in the backyard since late May. The temps have been +100* in June. July hit 117*, 118*, and 120*. Now a steady 102*-108*.

I sure hope the coco makes it. Love to see it grow up like the pictures above.

What happened to this experiment? Perhaps the answer lies in the following 7 pages of comments, but I'm too lazy to go through all of them :-) Did the tree survive its first winter? Does it still stand?

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IHB1979, those look like coconuts from a dwarf variety rather than a tall. I'm not sure if those pictured are ripe enough to be viable. Might be worth a try though. That coconut you posted a photo of in the vacant lot looks like it could be a tall though, or maybe a Maypan. I doubt a coconut leftover from the site of a nursery with origins in the 1990s would have had tall variety coconuts. Virtually all the commercially available coconuts in FL are Maypans or green/yellow/golden Malayan. It's a good thing some Jamaican talls still exist here and there so those in the know can grow the better looking (and hardier in most ways) tall types.

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Thanks palmsOrl! I'm not sure what they are either. They are very large coconuts, for reference, my shoe in the photo is a size 12. Two of the three have water sloshing around inside so I think there may be a chance. I'll try and get a photo of the mother palm soon.

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Bob,

Make sure you brown up the coconuts in full sun for about 3 to 4 weeks before you plant them. The husks should be brown all the way around. I have done this with a fully developed green coconut before, and it sprouted into a beautiful Green Malayan. But don't plant them green if you want them to sprout. After you brown them up, you might want to soak them in a barrel of clean fresh water for 3 to 5 days, which will often help the nuts to sprout a little sooner.

John

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I just order four nice healthy Hawaiian talls which I have planted in a row as part of my ever-increasing coconut plantation. They each came bagged just like I remember from the one sold in Hawaii at the airports and other places as souvenirs.

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As you can see in the first photo, the actual nuts are quite large. Sorry about the photo of the row planting, the lighting isn't great and you can barely see the fourth coconut seedling (it's near the white New Guinea impatiens in the photo).

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My next mass planting will be more progeny of the Kopsick coconuts, if I can actually get my hands on some!

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Well, summer is over, so I bought myself a new Kindergarten with Cocos nucifera. I have four of these little babies. Though having nice golden yellow petioles, they should be Philipine Green. Wait and see how long they will last in a house here in Holland.

Wim.

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William,

In that first photo you posted of the Hawaiian Talls, it looks like a Hawaiian Tall (Green), as opposed to the Hawaiian Tall (Golden), which is good for you in Orlando. I think it was Keith in Palmetto a while back that told me that the Hawaiian Tall Greens are more cool weather hardy than the Tall Goldens, which would be good for you in Orlando and for me in Corpus Christi. The Hawaiian Talls I have always gotten shipped to me in the past were the Goldens, which I like because of the strikingly beautiful orange golden colored petiole, but if like he says the Tall Greens are more cold hardy and especially able to take chilly damp winters better, then I will try to get those from now on. I am convinced that the Malayans I have been trying just aren't sufficiently hardy north of Harlingen in the Rio Grande Valley, but various tall varieties have been grown to maturity and even produced nuts here in Corpus Christi in the past, so from now on I am going to concentrate on planting the talls, especially the Mexican Tall from the Gulf Coast of Mexico south of Matamoros and the Jamaican Tall from Central Florida.

John

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here is a real winner, I guess it is not the first multi headed coconut but it sure is a head turner. a former student of mine from Tuvalu took this pic on his home island. enjoy

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This palm was unfazed by the cold in 09/10 and 11 (I think that's the years) I lost about half my coconuts those years about 20 or so and this one looked perfect. Hard to get a decent picture in the jungle. Also I have never removed a frond, they just fall and leave a perfectly clean base, still my favorite palm.

I love it! Thanks for sharing. I would love to see more of your place. Looks fun. Looks like a jungle.

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here is a real winner, I guess it is not the first multi headed coconut but it sure is a head turner. a former student of mine from Tuvalu took this pic on his home island. enjoy

That's super cute!

Lol

That thing is a monster coco tree!

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here is a real winner, I guess it is not the first multi headed coconut but it sure is a head turner. a former student of mine from Tuvalu took this pic on his home island. enjoy

Whoa I never would have thought that was possible! That is so cool looking!

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I have not seen a multiple myself, but I am sure they are out there. the coconuts are so small on that tree i guess the juices of the palm are being taxed in supporting the growth of the whole palm. Tuvalu is quite a small chain of low lying islands near the equator in the south pacific. glad you all liked the pic.

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Don't laugh. This is an experiment out in Indio, Ca (Palm Springs area). This coco has been in the backyard since late May. The temps have been +100* in June. July hit 117*, 118*, and 120*. Now a steady 102*-108*.

I sure hope the coco makes it. Love to see it grow up like the pictures above.

What happened to this experiment? Perhaps the answer lies in the following 7 pages of comments, but I'm too lazy to go through all of them :-) Did the tree survive its first winter? Does it still stand?

Yunder, it did not survive. I repotted to a 15gal two weeks after I took the picture. I recently picked up three more. Two are in the ground, and the other is still in the pot. I think the mistake with the first one (8/2013) was not planting it in the ground. Crossing my fingers for the new ones.

Golfing by day and palm stalking at night

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Hey Pedro,

Unfortunately, I lost my last Green Malayan that I had in the ground, the one that was recovering from the winter, then all of a sudden died. I think from now on, I will concentrate on planting Talls, like the Mexican Tall, Jamaican Tall, Panama Tall and Green form of the Hawaiian Tall, along with hybrids like the Maypan, Maymex, and Mayjam. I think the talls and the hybrids will be a little more cold hardy and start growing out of any cold damage quicker in the spring than Malayans, but I may still try a Malayan or two just for the fun of it. I really like the look of the Golden Malayan.

John

P.S. For Madeira, if you can get a couple of them, I would try the Green form of the Hawaiian Tall, since I think it was Keith in Palmetto, FL who told me a while back that they do pretty good with chilly winters and come out of them better and quicker than other varieties. I think he has one that experienced 27F without much problem, and it wasn't even mature!

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John, I think you are correct about the green Hawaiian/Pacific tall being a good choice for marginal areas like ours. I anticipate that they will perform at least as well as the Jamaican/Atlantic tall here. I would still like to order a couple yellow or golden petiole Pacific talls for my collection, but I think the row of the green Pacific talls is about as safe a bet here as it gets (they will still be protected just like the others until trunking). I plan to stick with all tall varieties of Cocos from here forward, though I wouldn't mind a couple special dwarf varieties in the mix either. My Malayan dwarfs are looking excellent after the long hot summer, and even my largest golden Malayan seems particularly robust, so it will be going into the unfavorable season in very good shape. The next coconuts on my acquisition list are at least 3-5 more Kopsick coconuts, 1-2 Nawassi talls and a couple Creole talls from the Dominican Republic, in addition to the "choice, meaning extra large coconuts" golden petiole talls from Hawaii.

That multi-headed specimen from Tuvalu is amazing!

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Hey William,

You have quite a collection, especially for a marginal climate, but I think your marginal climate is a little more favorable to coconut palms than mine is. As I recall, your normal high and low in Jan. are 71F and 49F, whereas where I live it is 65F and 50/51F. So that puts you right at the magic number for winter soil temps at 60F, whereas for me it is about 57.5F to 58F, and I might be able to push that a degree by adding a lot of organic matter like compost and mulch to the soil. The increase in biological activity in an organic soil apparently heats up the soil some. It is amazing to see the mature coconut palms (talls to 45 to 50ft. in overall height and Malayans to 20 to 25ft. in overall height in the Rio Grande Valley, just 125 to 150 miles south of me, but here they are very marginal). We did have a couple of mature fruiting coconut palms here in Corpus Christi before the 2011 freeze. There was one near where I live in Flour Bluff near the Laguna Madre that was about 20Ft. tall in overall height with some nuts on it, and one on North Padre Island that was about 25ft. tall that had some medium sized nuts on it, but the 2011 freeze killed both of them. There is one however on the south side of a two story house on the bay front of Ocean Dr. near Ennis Joslin that survived the freeze, but lost all its leaves. Fortunately they didn't chop it down, and by the following summer, it started growing again. Now it is about 21 or 22ft. tall in overall height, and even has a few small clusters of nuts on it occasionally until they cut them off. It is in a perfect microclimate though with the two story house up against the north side of the palm, the bay right behind the house, and being planted between some mature queen palms. Also, the curved driveway goes right up in front of it, so it gets a little radiational heat at night from the driveway too.

I really like the Golden form of the Hawaiian Tall, because it has such strikingly beautiful petioles and nuts like a Golden Malayan, but the growth characteristics of a tall. Too bad it's not more cold hardy though, since it is one of my favorites. We both need to avoid the Fiji Dwarf though, since from what I have been told, it is probably the least cold hardy, being only hardy to about 31F. I know a lady who had a couple of them in the ground in Bayview, a solid high end 10A climate just east of Brownsville, and she lost both of them, while her Green Malayans have done fine there. So apparently, normal Rio Grande Valley winters and Central Florida winters are just too chilly for them, whereas other varieties can do fine there in normal winters. Your very robust Golden Malayan, has it produced any viable nuts yet? If it ever does, I would like to get a few nuts from you, or even a few sprouts, since I love the Golden Malayan, and if you have gotten one to grow to maturity, the nuts it produces should be more cold hardy than other Malayans.

Thanks,

John

P.S. For that matter, I would be interested in any viable nuts you get from any of your palms, since they should have a good degree of cold hardiness making it through Orlando winters.

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Thank you for the recommendations John, at the moment is hard for me to even get a coconut how can I even choose its variety:). Though if you followed up my thread lately apparently there are public fruiting coconuts on the island after all(2nd time I confirm small coconuts growing, the first time was from the Dwarf), however I caught them removing them as they were about tennis ball size early August:(. I have also found out a coconut at a higher altitude, just over 200 m (656 feet), which is amazing and will talk about it!

Overall it seems Madeira is much more tropical than I thought, if you are at sea level altitudes (which I am not, unfortunately our house is around 460 feet, though only half a mile from the sea) on the southwest coast you can probably get a tropical climate in terms of temperatures (the coldest tropical climate:) ).

As for cold hardiness, I think the temperature depends on how long it stays cool and wind speed as well, I doubt any coconut variety will last much taking 32 f for many hours straight with some wind if it does not warm up soon enough, even the Hawaii variety will probably succumb. It is probably worse to have 7 hours at 32 f than one hour at 30f. I think this is why sometimes we see coconuts dying above freezing temperatures! If the coconut is mature it will probably endure more as discussed. Nonetheless I am sure the Hawaii has a slight edge over the Malayans so it is worth a try!

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  • 4 months later...

The best coconuts I've seen hands down in person was at Honolulu especially near the beach. Flawless. Seemed like that was the best growing conditions for them.

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On July 22, 2015 at 9:46:16 AM, IHB1979 said:

At 2 years my coconuts were just transitioning from strap leaves to pinnate. I find them extremely slow from germination to about the 3 year mark. From 3 years on, mine have been explosive. Photos below show one of mine I documented. Notice the golden petiole that has turned mostly green as the palm has developed. Maybe that can help with the ID.

 

The coconut seed was collected July 2011, germinated November 2011. Planted out 2012.

 

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2013

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2014

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2015

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Here's an end of year photo of the coconut.

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It sure did explode with growth! :greenthumb:

Very cool. Thanks for the cool update pics. Is this normal growth for these coconuts?

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21 hours ago, Danilopez89 said:

It sure did explode with growth! :greenthumb:

Very cool. Thanks for the cool update pics. Is this normal growth for these coconuts?

Thanks! I'm not sure what the average growth is but I imagine that it will continue it's current speed until it begins flowering. Then I imagine the energy will go to nut production rather than growth.

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25 minutes ago, IHB1979 said:

Thanks! I'm not sure what the average growth is but I imagine that it will continue it's current speed until it begins flowering. Then I imagine the energy will go to nut production rather than growth.

The tall types have a growth spurt once they start trunking until they've got about 20 feet of trunk or so. Expect it to grow even faster once it's done forming that big fat bole and starts growing upwards. 

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Keith 

Palmetto, Florida (10a) and Tampa, Florida (9b/10a)

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On September 8, 2015 at 11:03:41 PM, palmsOrl said:

John, I think you are correct about the green Hawaiian/Pacific tall being a good choice for marginal areas like ours. I anticipate that they will perform at least as well as the Jamaican/Atlantic tall here. I would still like to order a couple yellow or golden petiole Pacific talls for my collection, but I think the row of the green Pacific talls is about as safe a bet here as it gets (they will still be protected just like the others until trunking). I plan to stick with all tall varieties of Cocos from here forward, though I wouldn't mind a couple special dwarf varieties in the mix either. My Malayan dwarfs are looking excellent after the long hot summer, and even my largest golden Malayan seems particularly robust, so it will be going into the unfavorable season in very good shape. The next coconuts on my acquisition list are at least 3-5 more Kopsick coconuts, 1-2 Nawassi talls and a couple Creole talls from the Dominican Republic, in addition to the "choice, meaning extra large coconuts" golden petiole talls from Hawaii.

 

That multi-headed specimen from Tuvalu is amazing!

Are Pacific Talls and Panama Talls different or synonymous?

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10 minutes ago, Cocoa Beach Jason said:

Are Pacific Talls and Panama Talls different or synonymous?

Pacific tall generally refers to the Niu Vai type coconuts, whereas Panama tall is a specific variety of Niu Vai coconut. 

Keith 

Palmetto, Florida (10a) and Tampa, Florida (9b/10a)

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4 minutes ago, Zeeth said:

Pacific tall generally refers to the Niu Vai type coconuts, whereas Panama tall is a specific variety of Niu Vai coconut. 

So Panama Tall os a subtype of Pacific Tall. Great. Thanks.

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Coconut palm at my relative's place in Homestead, FL. There used to be at least 4 or 5 others. I was told that some of the parentage was from lethal yellowing resistant trees, but not strictly. I think this was sometime in the 80's. Some did get lethal yellowing and died, but the remaining one proves to be hardy and vigorous and bears well. 

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