Dypsis oropedionis seedlings are a nightmare

[MattyB]

I'm not 100% sure these are D. oropedionis but that's what they were purchased as.  They came to me as 2 leaf seedlings 5-1/2 years ago!  One of the slowest and most problematic palms I've ever grown. I started with 75.  I now am down to about 10.  They just keep dying.  I just can't seem to get them to do well.  Any thoughts?  Anyone else have problems with small D. oropedionis?  Do you think these are D. oropedionis or some other mystery Dypsis?

[DoomsDave]

24 minutes ago, MattyB said:

I'm not 100% sure these are D. oropedionis but that's what they were purchased as.  They came to me as 2 leaf seedlings 5-1/2 years ago!  One of the slowest and most problematic palms I've ever grown. I started with 75.  I now am down to about 10.  They just keep dying.  I just can't seem to get them to do well.  Any thoughts?  Anyone else have problems with small D. oropedionis?  Do you think these are D. oropedionis or some other mystery Dypsis?

All I can say is you're not alone, though I killed my last of about 10 last year.

[Tracy]

1 hour ago, MattyB said:

They came to me as 2 leaf seedlings 5-1/2 years ago!

Sounds like a test of patients.  Based on your yield, if you ever get a couple to planting size they will be worth a lot:  5 years of water, the cost of the 5 seedlings, attention to them over those 5+ years, and wasted space you could have been growing other things!  Pricey!

[richnorm]

I would plant them, even at that size.

[Matt in OC]

Look about as awful as my super slow malcomberi hybrids. 

[gilles06]

For me all dypsis seedlings are difficult...

[mike in kurtistown]

Agree with Richnorm. If you still have a few extra, try planting a couple in the ground, even if small. I have brought some species back from near death that way, but it didn't work with others. And I have a couple species that eventually grew well in pots, but declined in the ground. It's a crapshoot!

[Tyrone]

Agree. I tried once in Perth and got a lot to come up from seed only to slaughter them all during the warmer weather. I think as a mountain species they just hate any heat. Would like to try them again maybe in some sort of cloud forest simulated setting in cooler Albany where I now live.

[Palm Tree Jim]

Matty,

In a greenhouse?

How are you treating them?

[Darold Petty]

MattyB, thanks for showing a real world aspect of palm growing.  I have had a lot of special seedlings die a slow, painful death.  Not a lot of success lately.  Anyway, persistence !  

[Brett in Mission Viejo]

For what it is worth, I planted mine out near a north facing wall (shaded out in the winter) as a 1 gallon 13 years ago and it survived the the infant mortality syndrome this species is known for.  My plant never really looks good though. Holds only 3-4 fronds and only the newest frond looks good progressing to the oldest frond very brown tipped and ugly. Seems to be sensitive to nutrient uptake issues, at least in my growing conditions. It may be a soil PH thing.  Anyone know what the soil PH is like in their native growing area?

[Hillizard]

2 hours ago, Darold Petty said:

MattyB, thanks for showing a real world aspect of palm growing.  I have had a lot of special seedlings die a slow, painful death.  Not a lot of success lately.  Anyway, persistence !  

I feel the collective 'pain' on this forum about the challenges of getting struggling palm seedlings to survive. I've had this sad Ceroxylon amazonicum for a couple of years now, but I won't give up on it. It was outside most of last year, but I brought it into my sunroom a few months ago and that might have given it a new lease on life, more or less. It's got a new spear just starting to show. Guess I'll have to keep it indoors from now on if I expect it to grow, if not thrive. All of my Adonidia merrillii 'yellow form' seedlings died this winter in my unheated sunroom that sometimes dipped into the 40s F. overnight.

[quaman58]

Years ago when they were last available as seedlings from Floribunda, I got a dozen or so. They seemed pretty durable for a number of months, then just started slowly damping off. After a couple years, when I was down to my last one, I asked a friend to greenhouse it for me, which he kindly did. I couldn't believe it was the same plant when I got it back. It's now in the ground & seems fine. Whether it was the year round warmth or his fertilization that did the trick, I have no idea. Tricky little things, as a lot of larger Dypsis are.

[richnorm]

5 hours ago, Brett in Mission Viejo said:

For what it is worth, I planted mine out near a north facing wall (shaded out in the winter) as a 1 gallon 13 years ago and it survived the the infant mortality syndrome this species is known for.  My plant never really looks good though. Holds only 3-4 fronds and only the newest frond looks good progressing to the oldest frond very brown tipped and ugly. Seems to be sensitive to nutrient uptake issues, at least in my growing conditions. It may be a soil PH thing.  Anyone know what the soil PH is like in their native growing area?

Not sure about habitat but I have a trio doing really well on a clay bank with plenty of sun and high rainfall.   They are super dark green yet I never use anything stronger than mulch on them. 

[LJG]

This is a high plateau palm, and what I have found in my DG, those iron rich soils of the high plateau need to be accounted for by adding chelated iron in cultivation. Mine has been in the ground for almost 10 years and always looked terrible. Last year I started iron year round and the last leaf looks heathy and green. Might be worth a try for you. 

[MattyB]

Thanks for the input guys.  

Palm Tree Jim, yeah they're in a greenhouse, but it's open once the weather is decent, so basically a shade house.  That said, I do get very warm here inland and they do not like that.  I'm gonna try to plant one out in filtered light and see if I can at least save one.

Thanks,

Matt

[Darold Petty]

MattyB,  If this palm resents warmth, then you should send them to me at the 'Coldest Frost Free' microclimate in California !!     

[Palm Tree Jim]

2 hours ago, MattyB said:

Thanks for the input guys.  

Palm Tree Jim, yeah they're in a greenhouse, but it's open once the weather is decent, so basically a shade house.  That said, I do get very warm here inland and they do not like that.  I'm gonna try to plant one out in filtered light and see if I can at least save one.

Thanks,

Matt

OK.

Keep us updated on how the one in the ground does for you.

Perhaps, they are a difficult grow for us here in Southern California at this seedling stage.

Good luck!

[ellidro]

Any luck with these Matty? I think you should give a few to me to grow on the coast. Maybe the cooler weather will help. 

[MattyB]

Nick, these continue to die in the shade house. I’m down to 3. I planted two in the shade and they’re doing fine. One even got pretty gnarled by a rabbit and it pushed a new leaf. I think in the ground in a cool spot is the trick. 

[GeneAZ]

This is not precisely on point, but here goes.

I mostly grow Encephalartos (cycads) and have noticed that cultivation in pots requires careful attention to soil pH.  Not much of a problem though when planted out into open ground.  My tap water is pH 8.0 to 8.5 in summer, and 7.5 to 8.0 in winter.  Before I ever used an acidifying liquid fert, there was stalling and death of some young cycads in pots.  Checking the drainwater of the pots and the soil pH will reveal if it's problematic.  I've found that pH 8.0 and up really blocks a lot of essential elements and trace elements and plants go into almost a coma.

So I do catch rainwater now  for use throughout the year on these few container plants that seem to have a narrow tolerance for water and soil pH.  If I run out, I buy distilled and there's no complaints.

Rarely, I do all of the above and still have failure to thrive.  I've had some success with bare-rooting these small plants and repotting in pure red lava of 1/4-1/8 inch size and then use the above water and fert strategy.  Usually works.

When these plants get past the juvenile stage, their tolerance for higher pH broadens and my life gets easier.  A little food for thought.

 

 

[Dypsisdean]

10 minutes ago, GeneAZ said:

This is not precisely on point, but here goes.

I mostly grow Encephalartos (cycads) and have noticed that cultivation in pots requires careful attention to soil pH.  Not much of a problem though when planted out into open ground.  My tap water is pH 8.0 to 8.5 in summer, and 7.5 to 8.0 in winter.  Before I ever used an acidifying liquid fert, there was stalling and death of some young cycads in pots.  Checking the drainwater of the pots and the soil pH will reveal if it's problematic.  I've found that pH 8.0 and up really blocks a lot of essential elements and trace elements and plants go into almost a coma.

So I do catch rainwater now  for use throughout the year on these few container plants that seem to have a narrow tolerance for water and soil pH.  If I run out, I buy distilled and there's no complaints.

Rarely, I do all of the above and still have failure to thrive.  I've had some success with bare-rooting these small plants and repotting in pure red lava of 1/4-1/8 inch size and then use the above water and fert strategy.  Usually works.

When these plants get past the juvenile stage, their tolerance for higher pH broadens and my life gets easier.  A little food for thought.

 

 

After learning how much pH affects the availability of various nutrients to plants (and it is a lot), I became a big believer in its importance. I have also learned that most people don't have a clue what their pH is.

But I never considered the pH of potted plants - perhaps because I mostly used premium, or at least very good soil - or what I thought was. However, because of the low volume, the water and fertilizer you use in small pots could greatly affect the pH and subsequent nutrient uptake.

As Len mentioned above, some Madagascar palms seem to respond favorably to making iron more available. And it just so happens that higher pH (a problem in SoCal due to the water and low organics) makes iron less available. I would be curious to know what Matty's pH is in those pots.

The moral of my story is that you can use all the fancy fertilizer you want, but if your pH is out of whack the plant won't be able to use it.

[Pal Meir]

I had similar problems with my first Lytocaryum insigne seedlings (*2011), which all died one after the other. In 2014 I received another batch from RPS, but this time I had studied the environmental conditions of that species. When I treated the first batch in the same way as I had done with Lytocaryum weddellianum seedlings, I tried this time in 2014 a complete different extremely fast draining soil mix & daily watering with soft water (pH 6). Maybe the thread on L insigne could be of interest to you:

https://www.palmtalk.org/forum/index.php?/topic/47545-lytocaryum-syagrus-insignis-vs-s-weddellianum/&tab=comments#comment-729419