Phoenix sylvestris Deficiency?

[ahosey01]

What’s this spotting from?  It’s planted in terrible soil but gets plenty of water.

 

 

None of my other Phoenix have this same issue.  I have an acaulis nearby in the same soil with no problems.

[Merlyn]

10 hours ago, ahosey01 said:

What’s this spotting from?

I'd guess potassium deficiency, I think that's the normal cause of spotting like that.  Here's my cheat sheet on deficiencies:

• Nitrogen: Older fronds turn light green uniformly, new fronds remain dark green until deficiency is really severe
• Potassium: Older fronds get translucent yellow/orange or dead spots on leaves, especially at the tips. Sometimes tips are curled or frizzled. Always starts at tips of oldest leaves, moving inwards
• Magnesium: Yellow linear bands on leaves but generally transitions to solid green at the base of each leaf. Never causes leaf tip necrosis
• Iron: Many times caused by overly mucky soil and root rot. Starts with new spear leaves with yellow-green or even white, possibly with spots of green.
• Manganese: Lengthwise necrotic streaks in leaves with dead and curled leaf tips. Similar to bands showing Magnesium deficiency
• Boron: Bent or necrotic or distorted leaf tips, distorted or bent spear, bands of dead spots on new fans, spears that won't fully open
• Water: Underwatering brown at the edges first, later followed by yellowing of the whole leaf. Overwatering can be drooping fronds turning yellowish and losing color

 

[iDesign]

Nice clear descriptions! Copying into my deficiency notes (along with some leaf example photos from another post).

[ahosey01]

Sounds reasonable.

@sonoranfans is there any merit to applying a fertilizer to fix the deficiency now, or just wait til spring?

[sonoranfans]

5 hours ago, ahosey01 said:

Sounds reasonable.

@sonoranfans is there any merit to applying a fertilizer to fix the deficiency now, or just wait til spring?

I would add a little now and an also in spring.  I know you can have warm days there even in winter.

[ahosey01]

On 12/26/2021 at 1:33 PM, sonoranfans said:

I would add a little now and an also in spring.  I know you can have warm days there even in winter.

After fertilizing with some MiracleGro Plant Food, it now looks worse.  I followed all the instructions and only applied about half the amount it suggested for a single plant.

New look:

What am I missing?

[Looking Glass]

That’s a tough one, and it looks much worse now.  The first photo doesn’t fit Potassium deficiency perfectly, as the new leaves seem effected, and the old leaves seem not too bad.  K should really toast the old leaves before it hits the new growth, and you should see a lot of leaf tip necrosis and orange-yellowing, I would think, in the old stuff before the new growth is hit.  

I assume you hit it with Miracle Gro Palm specific fertilizer, and not just the high N-K stuff.  You can use the high nitrogen stuff during prime growth conditions like a steroid shot, but it can throw everything else out of whack quickly.    

I don’t think the palm in the 1st post fits anything perfectly, but I’d guess Mn?   K and Mg deficiency manifest almost textbook-like in date palms, and often concomitantly.    
https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/EP269

I’d also venture that the follow up post looks so bad that perhaps it isn’t nutritional at all.  Perhaps something in the soil, like a herbicide, salt, other chemical, or very severe pH problem.

I’ve got a single Coccothrinax miriguama that has had problems with necrotic streaking not fitting classic nutritional deficiency patterns.   Crushed shell mulching and Mn application, seems to have helped somewhat, but I haven’t exactly pinpointed the issue yet.  

If you figure it out, post the solution.  

Perhaps a soil test for that spot is in order, to rule out the straightforward stuff?  

Here’s my favorite common nutritional deficiency guide….

https://www.palmbeachpalmcycadsociety.com/documents/PalmNutritionalDeficiencyCorrectionAndAntagonisticNutritionalRelationships.pdf

 

 

 

 

 

[sonoranfans]

13 hours ago, ahosey01 said:

After fertilizing with some MiracleGro Plant Food, it now looks worse.  I followed all the instructions and only applied about half the amount it suggested for a single plant.

New look:

What am I missing?

wow that was way too fast to be lack of water, its a goner.  I would dig it out and check the roots for white mold.  In my time in arizona I watered every 2-3 weeks in winter in ammended clay soil.  (If the temps dont rise to 70, 3 weeks)

[Merlyn]

I'd agree with Tom, that decline is way too fast to be anything like a basic nutritional deficiency or lack of water.  Something else is going on, like root rot, TPPD/LB, or maybe some other fungal thing is going on.  If it were just a simple potassium or Mn/Mg deficiency it would just keep on looking somewhat unhappy until the next fronds grow out clean.