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https://www.palmpedia.net/palmsforcal/Presteoa_acuminata_var._acuminata This link shows my previous attempt to grow this palm. Unfortunately the original ones died several years ago. I was fortunate to receive 3 seedlings a few years ago from a Bay Area plantsman, after his return from a visit to Ecuador. I raised them up to 3-gallon citrus pot size and have ground planted two in my garden today. The third one I gave to a fellow palm gardener here in SF. When I receive a gift of special plant material I don't consider it to be truly mine until I can pass some along to a third person. Anyone else growing this in California ? Here is the image of one I planted today !

Check out this amazing recovery of young royals in McAllen Jul 2015 - somewhat newly planted April 2021 ~ 2 months post palmageddon April 2022 ~ 14 months post palmageddon October 2022 ~ 20 months of recovery...decent vertical growth too!

I have never delayed planting relative to the "seasons", which hardly matter here at all. Check out my seasonal temperatures. In the next few weeks or months I will install two Howeas, a Hedyscepe, a Pritchardia, and an Arenga.

Most of the A. mexicana in south Texas came from north of Tampico.

It looks very good if it gets the care it needs. Here's some urban Acrocomia Aculeata's in Merida. The south Mexico form which is a bit dwarf-ish. This is the same type of Acrocomia I recieved.

These Houston queens survived 18F winter storm with ice in 2018. Here they are in Feb 2021 a day or two before the end of the world. They recover quickly when given the chance.

Another variegated mule palm seedling potted up.

The palm was recovering all summer from the previous winter that almost didn't make it. Until January the weather has been very mild and dry. But now in February for the next few days we'll have some cold weather and rains. Not good for the cocos but ofcourse we need the rain here on the island. I try now to keep the roots as dry as possible. I hope it will help. I hope your cocos will be OK in the winter. You might need a bigger pot soon. Will you plant it in the ground in the future?

Does well here and I have just germinated a batch of NZ produced seed. Colour is not quite on a par with a Lipstick palm but fabulous all the same.

Ice is the absolute worst . 👇 25 years ago I went through this 👇 Some places 3” of ice. High tension lines crumbled like slinkies. Folks without power for over a month in January in the north east. 🥶 when weather calls for freezing rain take it seriously, it’s extremely hard to predict much like climate change. 🥳

Croc’s are a whole different ballpark when compared to alligators. To Australians, Florida crocodiles would be like little pussycats. In Australia, and other areas around the world, I would obey the signs!

As we have yet another Polar Vortex in December which has become all too common in the last 13 years, I look out at a garden full of damaged palms. They will survive but be unsightly for a couple of years, AGAIN. They were just growing out of the last damage 2 years earlier. I will have to look at that and pick up endless fronds while cursing them. Take my advice, even though we are classified at Zone 9a plant palms safe for Zone 8a like Mules, Chamaerops, Chamaedorea, etc and save yourself from the ugliness.

I have a 13ft syagrus romanzoffianana and a 6ft one in London and its not babied at all completed unprotected. The only thing it's babied with is lots of fertilizer and water in the summer. Never protected in the winter there is no need to. I think the issue for BC is the winters are too wet and cool. Here's also a better photo of the one from lamorran gardens during the end of the summer. London is also warmer than mild parts of BC through every month of the year. Part of the reason why in central London they would survive compared to there is it's a zone 9b/10a and the fact Tofino has 6.4x more rainfall than here annually.

Adventurous washies in Amsterdam in December

How fast do your robustas grow? From everything I've read and seen so far Washingtonias seem to grow almost as fast for me as they do in the South West of the US. I think this might be true because the biggest variety of palms comes from regions close to the equator BUT about the most commonly planted palms I'm not so sure. Last year I noticed that many of my palms (and even other exotic plants) increased their growth in late summer/early autmn. It looked like they appreciated the somewhat cooler temperatures combined with some rain.

Lampedusa is very windy: perhaps it would be a good place to attempt outdoor Cocos growing, but I think Linosa would be even better.

First of all, I obviously wasn't saying that England in general is subtropical. Far from it. We all know that the UK in general is temperate/oceanic, although there is a clear argument for southeast regions (including London) being borderline Mediterranean nowadays. I was laughed at for saying this 2-3 years ago, then last summer of course had less rain than many parts of California with some places registering 0.0mm for July. Some places only saw about 0.7 inches across all 3 summer months. The climate in southern England is a bit more complex than it just being standard oceanic/temperate across the board. Like there is a clear difference between the far southwest and far southeast of England. Regarding the Isles of Scilly, they technically aren't humid subtropical as they do not meet the definition of having an average summer temperature above 22C / 72F. However it is somewhat misleading as NYC technically meets the subtropical criteria, despite the fact that you cannot even grow a Trachycarpus Fortunei in NYC outside of the immediate coastal area on say Long Beach. Even there they probably won't be long term with freezes wiping them out every 20 years or so. Clearly the Isles of Scilly are more tropical-like than NYC in that they are generally frost-free and can grow wide range of subtropical fauna, despite the lack of proper summer heat. Going by that metric alone, I would say that places like Tresco are 'temperate subtropical', even though that that isn't a technical term. We'll have to agree to disagree on this however. Also I have posted photos of 50+ year old Phoenix Canariensis on the UK mainland before. This one for instance would have survived the brutal freezes of 1963, 1987 and 2010 back when it was much smaller. I certainly wouldn't be making comparisons between Germany and England when it comes to palm growing potential. I don't think there is a single, long-term or mature CIDP anywhere in Germany. You say that it will only take one event to wipe out most of the UK ones, yet this one has clearly survived the test of time. Not to mention this winter we have had 2 very bad freezes with the coldest temperatures in London for 3-4 decades. The mature CIDP at least are pretty much bulletproof in many areas on the mainland now.

I'm sorry but I have to correct this, it all depends on what part of the PNW you are in, its a large area. PNW encompasses some of British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, Idaho and parts of Montana. Much of it is actually cold and dry being composed of grasslands, mountainous regions, high desert and actual desert. It's hard to generalize over such a large area. Only a very small area would be considered similar to the UK. The coastal communities in WA, BC and OR would be the closest to the UK as they have much cooler temps in summer compared to inland areas. However there can be a large differential or multiplier of the amount of sunshine hours per year. And these areas are only a small fraction of what makes up the PNW. There is a common misconception of what it is like here, and I was guilty of that too before I started living here. Summers/Fall are totally different at my location than the UK, what is considered a heat wave in the UK is typical weather here, never mind we get about 2x the annual sunshine hours. Our winters and spring are similar so I would give you about 50% of the year. Just like California, as you move inland the temps rise. San Francisco is often foggy and cool but once you get close to Stockton or Sacramento the temps increase dramatically. The UK around London is considered a humid temperate oceanic climate, which aligns with many of our coastal communities. Once you get inland a bit most of Western Oregon falls under warm-summer mediterranean climate and further down it is hot-summer mediterranean climate. Sorry but I keep seeing the people compare to the two regions and I feel the need to clarify. It's like saying Florida and California are the same because they stay warm in winter.

Not offhand, no. Mine are producing seeds now, so maybe I will get a few seedlings to come up variegated, but I'm not holding my breath.

I also think the strong sun works both ways, during growing season the palm itself is warmer than ambient air temperature. During cold winter periods the palm also warms up more than the air temps. This is significant for the chances of survival in winter and for thriving during growth season. At our latitude a palm is almost never warmer than the ambient winter air temps. Perhaps slightly against a south facing brick wall, but even that works only for a slight distance off the wall. I once planted an archontophoenix cunninghamiana and protected it by an infra red lamp aimed at the trunk, connected to a timer during frosts. It easily surivived the cold frostnights in Amsterdam.

The idea of planting palms seems to conjure notions of tropical climates being hot all the time. But some palms don’t require heat so much as simply not being too cold. That’s why you see palms in Britain which nobody would consider tropical. The temperature swings in the Bay Area are low and much different than ours. Hot for that area is often short lived and not enough to significantly warm the ground. I doubt that it makes much difference for planting. If a palm will be happy in that area, it will probably not mind being planted now.

I second that queens are hardy in the low 20's. I hit 19f last winter & they took some leaf burn ( 50% maybe). This is a picture a few weeks after 22f this winter, still green. Unfortunately we hit 20f last night. I won't be home until tomorrow night but I'm sure queens will still be green since we heated up to 56f today. Seems like it was a brief dip.

The million dollar question. Fantastic job with your coconut @Stelios

Thank you! I think I am going to end up taking this one off his hands 😜

I'm in Fair Oaks Ranch, and this is how it looks here:

Eric @ Leu Gardens said that Saribus really likes the wetter areas at Leu. I found they like part shade, and tend to yellow out in full sun. I moved my two small ones to part shade and they are a lot greener.

D. Marojejyi and A. Vestiaria going to flower this year.

I sold Palmpedia several months ago to someone who has the resources and passion to keep it going. It became too much for me alone to continue and provide the time and expense to do it justice. The new owner is an IPS Member, and a long time lurker on PalmTalk. He is a terrific guy, capable businessman, and a palm/plant lover. I think it is a good fit, and the future of the site is in better hands now that he is involved. Give him time, and I expect many more improvements. Thanks to all those who provided financial and emotional support during its creation and almost 20 year run so far. I too use the site often, and hope to for another 20 years.

Rhapidophyllum hystrix ‘moonshine’

The Florida syagrus romanzoffianana growth in summer is definitely something I'm jealous of, though it's not as slow here from my experience as some have suggested! Might also be interested in seeing an archontophoenix cunninghamiana in London, this photo was taken in early fall and since over the winter the new frond you see in that photo has fully grown and it's started pushing out a new frond. Archontophoenix cunninghamiana continue growing during the winter here whilst syagrus go dormant.

In my opinion, growing Syagrus has nothing to do with mediterranean climates. Mine is temperate /oceanic. Lately Syagrus are being grown way up in Britanny (French Bretagne) which is at 48ºN, even cooler and more oceanic than here.

I wanted to say that. Europe isn't the US. People here aren't so adventurous and curious to try new things. The US also has a larger palm growing culture than Europe in general. Even in the best of climates around the Mediterranean Sea you only see few people trying things that are uncommon. Even Queens are not that common in the South of Europe at least if you compare it to other parts of the world. Europeans also tend to try things just once MAYBE twice and if it failed they say "Ok. It's impossible". Not going much further into why something failed. It's a generalsation but it is what it is...

Here's a photo of how the lammoran gardens queen palm is doing it's on a very steep garden sort of on a cliff next to the sea and I imagine can definitely get winy there, even though there's lots of plants that would reduce the winds. This is a screenshot from a post from 4 days ago and it looks completely fine. When I visited in the summer the queen palm looked like it was planted in well draining soil which is probably why it's doing well. I have mine against a wall but I'm not sure why theirs is only growing 1 or 2 fronds per year maybe it isn't watered enough or fertilized. Being in central London also means much warmer summer nights than the outskirts so that could also be a factor.

I have 2 syagrus romanzoffianana in ground a 13ft one and a smaller 6ft one. Both regular queen's not hybrids or Santa Catarina varieties. I definitely agree that queen's haven't been tried in many places and that's part of the problem and I also have a theory on why some queen's that have been tried by some people died in the winter. @Axel Amsterdam Do you have a link to the one tried in Portsmouth? Personally my theory to why some people have failed is to do with drainage. Queen palms HATE wet cold soil. If you have clay soil in the UK unless you massively amend the soil I wouldn't bother with queen's they do well in mild areas with chalky or sandy soil though. The most dangerous thing to queen palms in the UKs mildest spots is root rot in the winter the cold won't bother them in 9b+ areas.

Can I get the current height on your Areca? And do you think it will grow much taller over the years, or stay relatively short? I recently planted one of these in a HIGHLY protected spot (near the house, with option to cover during a freeze). I'm curious how tall it might get in my area. There's a patio cover well above it, but am thinking it *probably* won't ever get that tall here in SoCal... but would love to confirm. * Your plant is what inspired me to give it a try 🥰

That is a good map

I believe this is what causes differences between filifera and robusta. Likely same species but through migration and adaptive radiation, different phenotypes thrive in different environments.

@Tomas thanks for the info I realize plants are a lot tougher than think otherwise I wouldn’t be able to grow most of the stuff I grow!!!

I used to live in Germany 51°N now I live in Texas 29°N ,1500 miles south from my previous location. On a sunny day even when the air temperature is mild the sun feels so much warmer and aggressive due to the closer distance to the sun I haven't felt this in Germany and England won't be different. South England might get less freezes than us but after each winter storm temperatures go up significantly here in the south of the U.S. ,enough for a palm tree to start its recovering process. England is cool and mild for the most part of the year with only brief summers with occasional heat waves kind of the same climate as the PNW. Lots of gloomy rainy days. You do find some cold hardy palms at certain locations in England just like in the PNW. They don't grow as fast as they would do in the south. You can't have great success growing a Queen in such climates . People forget it's not all about the Cold Hardiness it's about the Heat Zone as well and that's where we benefit from it the most. Washies and Queens thrive in temperatures anywhere from 85F and up . They love our strong sun with 6 to 8 hrs of sunshine a day. Here in Texas we only get 2 to 3 months of roller-coaster weather with temps mostly in the 50s and 60s sometimes even in the 70s for days in the row with less than 10 days of usually light freezes over night. We do get our winter storms that can get pretty cold down to the teens in some northern TX locations but not ever year. Our cold snaps are short . 9 to 10 months of the year it's warm , hot and very hot with plenty of sunshine. There isn't such a climate in England so no wonder his Queen looks like crap for the most part of it. That's like me trying to grow a cherry tree in my yard . Wrong climate.

Thanks everyone for your informative posts and photos. Just Wow! Having lived on island for close to fifteen years now, watching the dissolution, evolution, and creation of new gardens is so gratifying. I have to take a step back and admire the individuality, creativity, preference, and passion that each brings to the culture. I’d like to think that my garden falls into that category and that I’m fortunate to be able to share with others. Tim

Thanks Dean for your dedication and time invested in the evolution of Palmpedia. Being the ‘go to’ online palm reference for many of us is a testament of that dedication. I hope that this will allow you more, well deserved time off. Joao, your thoughtful and articulate response pertaining to the transition and future of Palmpedia is much appreciated and reassuring for those of us that use the resource on a daily basis. A BIG Mahalo! Tim Brian

Oh i see this palm has been ID’t before, sorry. Thanks for the confirmation it’s palmetto. It is very rarely we can see a sabal in this part of the world, the fact that it is one of the very few palms planted in Paris makes it even more unique.

The Big Island has 14 of the world's 17 climate zones. I happen to live in a zone that has temperature ranges reminiscent of Central California and lots of fog and low cloud style overcast. Our main difference is the mild zone (12a/11b on record cold years) and regular rainfall (150-180 inches) spread throughout the year, which is different from California. So it's essentially a cloud forest. My zone is a Koeppen Cfb, so oceanic temperate (f for year round rainfall like England), compared to Koeppen Csb for California (s is for Mediterranean rainfall pattern). Our USDA heat zone is the same as Alaska, heat zone 1, zero days above 30C/86F. My farm has hundreds of California coast redwoods, some are big. So if the coast redwoods are happy here, one would think that anything that likes California might do ok here. There are also lots of Monterey pines and Lawson cypress growing here, all are super happy here. I basically live in the part of Hawaii that is ideally suited for albinos. For what it's worth, I have a large collection of brahea palms at mid elevation in East Hawaii (lower Hamakua Coast, up Mauna Kea above Hilo) growing in 150-200 inches of annual rainfall, they happily flourish next to all the tropical dypsis and marojejya darianii and other rainforest palms. Brahea is not a common palm but there's a scattering of them around and they seem long lived. I have armata, clara, decumbens, edulis and starting with a few others. I can share pics if people are interested. My theory is that brahea are relics from times when it was plenty wet in Mexico, and adapted to dry but never lost the genes for the wet adaptation. This is very similar to many dryland cypress species, all are related to swamp loving cypress from the miocene era. Those grow well here too. There are howeas all over the Big Island, even the Hilton Waikoloa where it's hot has some healthy specimens in the ground. There are also a scattering of trachycarpus, The few Rhopalostylis palms I have seen look terrible, so perhaps that's a good candidate for a no-go in Hawaii. But I want to give it a shot here. I have also not seen any jubaea chilensis anywhere. I tried and failed. Parajubaea is difficult on the wet side, but can be done on the dry side. I have a parajubaea sunkha I had to beg Jeff to let me buy quite a few years ago, it is healthy but every Summer it throws some fronds that look rot damaged, so it only grows well for me during the cooler part of the season when my temps look more like Summer Coastal Central California (50-70F) and it resents the 4-6 weeks of real tropical weather I get around September at the peak of hurricane season. I think Kamuela (dry side of Waimea) around 3,000 feet should be ideal for jubaea and Rhopies. One last note is soil, here along the Hamakua coast we have real soil, not lava rock, but pH is low, so some things from California adapted to high pH might hate it here, but palms are fine.

Same on Maui. We had friends that lived up country above Makawao on Maui off Olinda Road 30 years ago. On one side of the house and garden it was more windward looking down the hill at Paia and Haiku exposed to the Trade winds and would be raining at times. We could walk around to the other side of the house and garden to look down at Kihei and be completely out of the rain, because they were right along the edge of the transition where the Trade winds brought in the clouds. I will never forget being surprised that they had a downed comforter on our bed during summer when we stayed with them the first time. Forum members from the other islands can share similar diverse microclimate stories I'm sure.

Burretiokentia koghiensis and Cyphophoenix elegans (in the background) opening up new fronds after one of the wettest winters we’ve seen in forever and a couple nights with temps into the high 30’s.

This is not my palm but it’s one of my favorites! This beauty is looking really good for growing in the harsh Arizona su

I now have two of these but this one is nicer than the other. More variegation and all leaves have it!

Ben, I saw this on Facebook yesterday! Superb find. I have a huge collection of variegated palms and tropicals. Best wagi I've seen. Great job!!! Here is a pic of a Trachy I have. This particular one is a 'fade' type, so the new leaf emerges green, then the variegation fades in over time.

This one is a Copernicia alba-- kind of difficult to see because the leaves are silvery blue