Leaderboard

Happy new year everybody. A small update of my coconut palm in Cyprus. It's still alive for another winter. I increased the water in the summer and it started to make a difference in the growth.

Another update on this one, sorry. It caught my eye this morning opening a new frond. It’s been growing great. -dale

My biggest surprise was my two veitchia arecina. They propably becoming my fastest palms. When I put them in the ground last summer they were 2 feet overall height. Now they are about 7 feet with a few rings of trunk. I'm glad they survived in the summer heat. I lost some palms in the heat waves, and some don't happy under the summer sun. I increased the watering for all the palms and it helps a lot.

You guys get a few more points in California for Rhopalostylis, Ceroxylon, Hesyscepe, etc. hah! Here’s my Blue Decipiens. Still a ways off from trunking when they seem to speed up. I’m guessing this one is 8-9 feet tall from ground to tip of newest leaf.

Posting a few photos of my Parajubaea torallyi. I planted this palm about 15 years ago from a 5-gallon pot. It currently has about six feet of clean trunk and it’s about 25+ feet tall. This time of year, I tug on the old leaf sheaths to see if any of them are ready to come off. If they're ready, they pull off easily. However, if they aren't, no amount of pulling will remove them. It’s not unusual to find Arboreal Salamanders (Aneides lugubris) under the old leaf sheaths as shown in the photo below. I'm in the San Francisco bay area.

Sounds like you have done pre winter protection, it’s up to Mother Nature now, welcome to the zone push club where you get to watch palms die and you also get to watch new palms live. See socratea rostrata picture below for a zone push winner!

I love the cocos but I also wanted to give priority to palms that can more easily grow in my climate. Here are some photos. Sorry for the mess. I have a lot of cleaning to do, but I've been very busy lately with work.

A nice summer swim and a walk along a beach, with absolutely no body on the beach for miles, except for a few seeds!

January 2026 update:

Zamia fischeri new leaf!

I don’t know of any tricks , other than thermal protection and hoping for warmer weather. Once the fronds are damaged they have to grow out of it and that will occur as we get closer to Spring, hang in there. Harry

Healthy looking garden . The palms seem very happy there. Harry

I can't imagine a scene with so much snow in my garden, I would lose all the plants😥

Planted a 1 gallon pot from FB in November of 2021. It's growing nicely. BUT this summer all the fronds got fried. Just spotted a new bright red today. Had it under shade cloth at planting Took the shade cloth down in February of '23. Looked ok for a few years. Then this summer I noticed the fronds getting "toasted". But it's still pumping new RED fronds. This summer was VERY DRY. From June to Sept. only had 1.48" of rain. Irrigation twice a week at night for 40 minutes each session. Might have to do some weeding and increase length of watering. But I think it was just TO HOT in the full sun this summer.

As Roy Batty said in the movie: 'I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain...' It is only the knowledge I gain Giuseppe to my own delight, seeing the life cycle of beautiful plants, that are not endemic where I live.

Sure we all believe you on this 😄

I had an interesting looking plant shoot in with a cycad pot I purchased so I let it get planted with the cycad. 4 years later I now saw this from it.

I declared war on snails and conquered the first territories in the garden and here are the first results

At least you have a heated house interior to take cover afterwards. I, instead, was covering plants during 22 at 0 C exposed to 'cow-killing' northern wind during night and house was not heated, meaning I had nowhere to take temporary cover and regain strength. I took an oath never to repeat it, regardless the severity of the cold spell. Enough is enough...

Steve, I've found these to be very tough. My biggest macrocarpa got so burned (down to a spear) years ago, I remember thinking "there's no way it pulls out of this". But it did & is now way overhead. These are also one of the most drought tolerant species from NewCal in my experience. They'll grow slower for sure, but seem to hunker down & wait for better times. And they're way faster in your warmth than around here!

Wait until May. You can also spray the most tender palms with a copper fungicide. If meristem is also affected, it would prevent a fungal or bacterial outbreak. But this works better in case of snow cover.

you will have to put up with some ugliness for a while. Trim off the brown when it turns and let the plant do the rest. I have a beccariophoenix alfredii that was ~90% frost burned as a small 80 cm tall size palm at 28F. I thought it a goner as very little green was left and all the newest leaves were toast. Today its a monster with 30'+ height. Frost burn often doesnt kill unless the bud freezes. Cold tolerance is death not damage to foliage. Do not over water or fertilize yet. Wait till it gets warmer and add some fish emulsion.

I think your third one is going to be fine given the frond damage it has sustained. The damage I can see is just cosmetic to the fronds. I’d start to worry if it gets cold enough that the base of the petioles turn yellow and dry! I’d just keep an eye out for any spear rot. It looks just like 1 of my 2 Robusta looked after last winter’s low of 21 or 22 here in San Antonio. Knock on wood, but I looked at the AccuWeather forecast and so far there is nothing obnoxiously cold on the horizon! I’ll keep my fingers crossed for all our sakes.

One only has a frost problem when one grows frost sensitive plants. 🙋‍♂️

@Than you thought you had a frost problem guess again!

Everyone’s a winner!

I shall see your purchases and raise them with my three scores, right down to my house number ten to the cupboard handle and the antique tea pot stand!

Nice one such a lovely palm well worth growing! A few more years or weeks in Hawaii time and you will have a nice palm.

I keep some palms in pots for a portable garden effect. It is nice to have a few that can be added to an outdoor space like a front porch or under the pergola with the orchids. Change them out occasionally for a fresh look. I keep them under the mature palms in the garden and rotate. Harry

Putting a plate to good use, while the Guardian of the Garden watches in the background.

Finally got a bloom, overeating lookin inflorescence. Tim

I only grow species that survive at -3 degrees Celsius, and there are many to grow.

Still holding up, a little concerned about the future of the third one. I believe we have only seen 22 degrees so far.

Looking very healthy indeed. With the extreme heat, the hail storms and wind, my place is looking very tattered and torn. I am in the process of removing the hedges on the side fences.....what a chore and what a mess ! Also building an aviary so my birdies are in cages all over the patio and the plants piled up on one side. I have given up trying to find a reliable lawn mowing service after 12 months so I bought a small cordless mower and doing the job myself. Once the hedge is completely gone they can stick the so called 'garden services' up their lazy greedy bums. Battered, bruised, scratched and spiked What's left of Peachy

My husband figured it out usps.com. If you put in last year's date, like 12/30/25. It works!

Bump! Looks like nobody ever answered @Marius question, but I'm keen to find out, as I was recently gifted some seeds...thanks @palmtreesforpleasure! Palmpedia says 9b, which works for me, but is that a Florida 9b with heats of heat and the occasional big freeze, or is anybody growing it in San Francisco or similar climates?? Cheers.

That is looking great! Careful of the teeth. Harry

For sale in 1 lot. Includes postage in Australia ONLY. Paypal, buyer to pay any fees. $95.00

We had a set of palm plates and a palm themed display rack for them . We donated them when we remodeled . Loved them for years but the wall they hung on was taken down . Still have this card/photo holder though! Harry oh , and this little cup found at a thrift store.

Hi Tracy! Yes that is Ravenea Julietiaes, or at least purchased as that from Floribunda. A slow grower here (not any faster than California from my experience there as well) but always looks good. Nice to have a palm that is a slower grower here as most are too fast! Here’s a zoomed in photo of it from the opposite angle:

And here are some year end updated photos of the garden. I’m not going to list out IDs for all of these but am happy to give IDs if interested, just ask. I’m also happy to post photo updates if there’s something you don’t see in this batch of photos. Just ask. Thanks for looking and happy new year.

Alex, Nice to hear from you again - and your coconuts! Happy New Year to everyone! Lars

The year is still new -- Happy New Year!

@happypalms I'd just call yours a "Multifrondis," sort of a generic catch-all term for the hybrid swarm with indeterminate parentage. Yours could easily be a Deb x Micholitzii, Multipinnata x Bifida, pretty much any conceivable cross between several individual species...or a hybrid of hybrids! In reality, anyone selling anything with the word "Debaoensis" in it is probably, most likely, most definitely, nearly certainly wrong. There's no way to know if any given plant is 100%, 50%, 25%, 12.5%, or 0% actual Deb. At this point you can only go by morphology. You can rule out pure Deb and Multipinnata easily by just checking for real triple dichotomous fronds. If the side branches don't have side branches, then it can't be Deb or Multip. If it does, then you have to look at leaf shape, size and leaflet shape. And then you can post photos in the FB Cycads group and get as close to a positive ID as possible.

The game plan is to sell the pups! I'm gonna throw most of them in the yard come spring. I've been fertilizing them a lot and they get tons of light and aside from the Ensete they're happy. I'm getting at least a new leaf a week from all of them. Yes they do! I've been rotating between a 4-4-4, Dr Earth's Organic Tropical and Palm fertilizer, and a sample pack of Wellspring Gardens water soluble Banana Fuel at 1/2 strength and they're happy. I keep forgetting I've still got some old fish emulsion and liquid kelp, and some Osmocote too. They're absolute water and fertilizer hogs, I'm feeding them their old leaves as they fall off. They're my babies and they know it. I'm spoiling them rotten. I've got a tissue culture banana on order (variegated golden yellow) and if that goes well, I'll try some more of those. I'm loving them right now since I can watch them grow almost hourly while I wait for the palms to do something. It's such a contrast in growth.

Trachycarpus Ravenii from 2025

Raise the humidity they dislike humidity and wet conditions. The grow environment is to dry, mites build up resistance to most chemicals, so you have to rotate your chemicals or whatever you use. Or get ladybugs 🐞 predator bugs for control. Warm dry conditions mites love that. You could get predator mites as well online!

Well, here’s an update on mine. The good news, it’s still growing very nicely. The bad news, as if it didn’t have enough room already, we installed rain gutters a couple years back, which extended the eaves of the house out another 8 inches. So, it’s doing its best to bend like a pretzel and conform. Nonetheless, it seems to be healthy and has been flowering for a number of years, even producing a few seeds that are in the process of ripening. I would attempt to dig it up, but I’m wagering that I would kill it if I tried it. So there’s a choice between almost definitely killing it or letting it live a reasonably good life as best it can. Been a great grower for me though…

Yes these need to be stratified. I prepared them like you have outlined and put them in the fridge for a couple months. Before my spinning gum gets removed I plan on harvesting a few hundred seed pods for distribution as well. Everything I read says to not stake but I've had the same issue. I did stake to try and keep them straight but make sure they can move around to develop a good root system. My other bit of advice would be to trim it in late spring to encourage bushiness, once it gets bigger. These tend to what to grow straight up, from my understanding "debeuzevillei" is more likely to form a multibranch tree than "niphophila" These are the hardiest Eucs, our winters will never bother them. You can look up on One Green World's website for the varieties they have. They do have neglecta, I saw them when I was last there. Tempting to buy another one as they are my favorite, but I don't have the room. That big snow gum is on the corner of Ankeny and 8th, you can see it on google street view, last image 2019.