Have you ever been attacked by a palm?

[Breadfruit Bill]

As I'm sitting here pulling Aiphanes artillery out of my hands and forearm, I thought we should have a new poll... How many of you have had spines and sharp palm parts lodged in your bodies? I'm bleeding profusely and it's getting on my keyboard... This is embarrassing. Bye.

[John in Andalucia]

Ha ha!! That is so funny! Sorry, Bill. I was only just cracking Jubaeas an hour ago with a pair of mole grips when a shell exploded, and a piece of shrapnel grazed across my neck, narrowly missing a main artery. No, I haven't been attacked by a palm tree per se. Stabbed up the bottom by an Agave americana, but no palm injuries as such. What an interesting topic!

[BobbyinNY]

I've been attacked by my P. Roebellenii - Those spines can do some SERIOUS damage....... I've learned to wear gloves when dealing with any Phoenix species..

[Gbarce]

No.

All my palms like me.

What did you do to provoke it?? --hehe

[Gbarce]

Oh wait a coconut almost landed on me in the beach once-- does that count or do you just consider that an attempted attack that failed

[Breadfruit Bill]

That would be a direct miss... Gene 1, Cocos 0

[Kailua_Krish]

Canariensis stabbed me in my forehead once, hitting a blood vessel, had enough blood running down my face that I couldnt see:-D

[Breadfruit Bill]

Awww yeah, That's what I'm talking about! NICE ONE KRISHNA!

[Palm Hound]

Anyone who has tried to stick their bare-hand in a Phoenix crown has had another thing coming. Anyone, like me, who has done it more than once has serious issues to work out.

[Rusty on Pine Is.]

Bill, Livistona saribus....the dang things are in 15 gal pots, and ya cant pick em up, ya cant slide em, and they shred me like an amphetamine piranha.....and this last re-pot was the LAST time!!!!!!!!

Ouch.........

Rusty

[sonoranfans]

Yes in my own stupidity I pushed a few of my brahea armata fans aside as I was planting a small chamaerops cerifera underneath it and was raked on the wrist by the teeth on the petiole. Duh, thats why they call it "armata", it is defnintely armed. Its safe to say that will never happen again. I give my phoenix a wide berth, the spines look very threatening, never had to prove it to myself.

[osideterry]

Livistona decora. While trying to rake back mulch and lay down fert, a bottom petiole grabbed my forearm. As I reeled back, the sound the shark-like teeth popping through skin. I just throw fertilizer at the thing now.

[MattyB]

I rolled a Phoenix dactylifera down my hill. I just looked at it because I knew there was nothing I could do to stop it without impaling myself. It finally stopped after squishing a Coral tree. That Coral tree bounced back though. It was rubbery.

[freakypalmguy]

P. reclinata stabbed me in the knuckle of my ring finger. Almost had to have it cut off, but my wife insisted on cutting my flesh remove it instead to save the ring. (J/K soap and water finally did the trick). I had to have my ring resized for my finger though.

Brahea clara armament hooked the top ridge of my eat lobe and split it. I looked like Dr. Spock for a while.

[Kailua_Krish]

Since it only hit a couple of inches above my eye I have taken to wearing safety goggles when I work with the phoenixes. Didnt really want to loose an eye for plam trees, Im not that dedicated yet:-D

[Breadfruit Bill]

wimp... ARRRRR!

Ok.... calm down Bill. Get back to work.

[freakypalmguy]

to you Will.

[Gaston in Argentina]

More then one time I have been attacked by Trithrinax campestris leaves when harvesting their fruits.-

Yet, i preffer this 1000 time better then be attacked by a woman wich i have not married :-)))

cheers.

Gaston Torres Vera

Cordoba, Argentina

[Wai`anae Steve]

I think I've told this before.

Years ago while using a shovel to knock coconuts off a tree, one rolled right down the handle and konked me on the head.

That was at my old house and before I was a "Palm Nut". I cut that coconut tree down so it would never happen again.

[MattyB]

Stupid gravity!

[PalmGuyWC]

If you grow palm trees long enough, you will be stabbed, pricked, and bloody. Chamaerops is the main culprit around my neck of the woods. I've had my arms and ears cut, and broken off thorns in my scalp that I only discovered days later. Apparently there are not a lot of nerves in the scalp. I've also been stabbed by various Phoenix, and I've had needles of Rhapidophyllum under the finger nails. I had a bad cut in my arm as a falling Washingtonia frond grazed it.

The most lethal of all is Trithrinax campestris. The tips of the fonds are like needles and if one sticks in you, it stings like an insect bite. I once jammed one in my elbo, and my arm instantly went into spasam and went limp. I jamed it in real deep and my arm was weak for months and I couldn't even hold a cup of coffee for a couple of weeks.

Just last week a phoenix frond smacked me in the face and scratched the cornea of my eye. My eye ached for a week, but healed without a Dr.

Patrick Schafer who works with my palms hybridizing, almost never leaves here without blood dripping somewhere from Butia thorns. If he has a tight place to work in, he cuts the thorns off the the petioles, but somehow one always reaches out and grabs him.

I just got a call from TikiRick in Ft. Lauderdale, and another "palm accident." He has a squirrel that made a nest in his coconut palm and he doesn't want the squirrel there which makes a mess on his pool deck with cut off palm blades. He was shooting at the squirrel with a B B gun, and the squirrel was taunting him. Rick backed up to far and fell in the pool, B B gun too! LOL!! Squirrel = 1, Rick + 0.

Dick

[DGP]

Yes - raked across the forehead by Livistona Australis. I'm ashamed to say the palm lost several fronds in the immediate retaliation The red mist came down!

[Walter John]

Been scratched and stabbed and a friend of mine actually lost sight of one eye when he leaned over and a young archo spear poked and busted his eye, very sad.

[aussiearoids]

Had a finger cut very deeply by the razor edge on Borassodendron machadonis ,, wicked feature that can catch you unawares .

[LJG]

No, because I am currently a brown belt in Gracie Palm Jiu-Jitsu. Any attack is quickly thwarted by a viscous ground and pound. My palms fear me.

[_Keith]

I've been attacked by my P. Roebellenii - Those spines can do some SERIOUS damage....... I've learned to wear gloves when dealing with any Phoenix species..

I can identify with that. I went the other direction and custom engineered a set of pruners with super long handles. Not sticking my hand up in there any more. Comes out like an inverted Porcupine.

[AggiePalms]

Actually, I was viciously and savagely attacked by noneother than my first Zyagrus. Not a thorn attack at all, of course. This is a weird tale of my male dumbness in the late 1990's. I was drooling in a nursery in South Florida, looking for a palm that might feel at home in my very temperate garden, and I saw this lovely little five foot one cutie, so I bent over to touch it and introduce myself. OUCH! I bent over directly above the still stiff emerging leaf shaft, which went straight under my glasses and lodged itself in my eye, without bending at all. I thought it hurt badly, but OK. So, instead of going for help, I bought the little thing, loaded it in our car, and my eye started throbbing, as if part of a leaf was under my eyelid. No problem, I'll let my eye water till it comes out. Hey, I'm a tough guy, and this is just a baby palm. Not even difficult to grow, at least south of here. Who is going to win this fight? Easy.

Well, after braving it through a nice dinner at a great restuarant (no palm will get me down), two hours later my wife drove me to the emergency room, gritting my teeth, where they said that instead of something being lodged under the eyelid, actually my cornea had been largely scraped off, but I would heal. Great, just what I needed while judging the Florida Barbecue Championship. So I got some antibiotics from the doc and went back to our motel room, about 10 PM. Of course I didn't sleep, but kept rolling like crazy from the now unbearable pain.

So, about 4 AM my wife had finally had enough of me and the cutie queen, so she insisted that I go back to the emergency room. Of course I wanted to tough it out, but she insisted, right? The only time I have ever been to the emergency room twice in one night. Finally I agreed to take some heavy duty prescription pain killers, which wiped me out all the next day. I had to wear blackout sunglasses to avoid the sunlight. We decided that, even though of course I"m always tough and No Palm Will Beat Me, my wife would drive me and the cutie queen back home to Georgia.

Now the queen is about 18 ft tall, has survived 14 degrees, and I've got some babies growing from it. It may be all grown up, but for the limits due to being in zone 8, it is still a very cute little queen!

[JimR]

How come a P. canariensis thorn can get you even when you are looking at the thorn trying to avoid it. I swear they stab on their own.

[Gtlevine]

Stabbed on several occasions from Canary Island Date Palms. The most memorable attack was getting speared in the kneecap, the spine went in three inches and I have permanent scar tissue.

Also had major damage from Accrocomia Acculeata. I got sick of that tree and cut it down, it was just too dangerous.

Gary

Edited June 5, 2008 by Gtlevine

[Alan_Tampa]

Got poked in the ear, spared the eardrum, some kind of Phoenix. Cut my finger pretty bad on a Bismarck, yes the base of the petiole is armed, and they break off. There is a little fuzz or scurf over them, but they are there, and sharp, too.

Alan

[MattyB]

Gary, if it went in three inches it would be stiking out the back of your leg.

[_Keith]

Gary, if it went in three inches it would be stiking out the back of your leg.

Oh now, that's cold. I like it.

[doubravsky]

My 16 yr. old son was sliding down an outside stairwell, fell off, and landed on a 4' tall Washingtonia. He ended up with scratches all over his arms and stomach.

[Darold Petty]

One of our Northern Calif members, (now deceased) either backed up or tripped into a young adult Phoenix canariensis. One of the basal spines penetrated completely through one cheek of his buttocks, in one side and back out the middle. I use gloves designed for rose gardeners now when pruning my Chamerops. This glove style, called 'gauntlet gloves' has heavy leather cuffs nearly up to one's elbows.

[freakypalmguy]

Brahea clara armament hooked the top ridge of my eat lobe and split it. I looked like Dr. Spock for a while.

What a looser, can't even spell ear lobe. Nice work dummy, an "eat lobe" sounds like a lip. Sheesh, this guy should just stop posting.

[BS Man about Palms]

No, because I am currently a brown belt in Gracie Palm Jiu-Jitsu. Any attacked is quickly thwarted but a viscous ground and pound. My palms fear me.

But I hear you get caught up in little belt loops?....

[BS Man about Palms]

Now that I think about it, I got stabbed in the head while weeding my Phoenix rec/roeby cross and couldn't figure out why I sweating on a cool night at dusk.... then I wiped my eyes and forehead and noted my sweat was red!

Maybe thats why this place looks like it does.

[gsn]

Now that I think about it, I got stabbed in the head while weeding my Phoenix rec/roeby cross and couldn't figure out why I sweating on a cool night at dusk.... then I wiped my eyes and forehead and noted my sweat was red!

Maybe thats why this place looks like it does.

While I have absolutely NO doubt your forehead was injured as described,the problem I have is how it supposedly happened WEEDING!

Are you sure you weren't just rearranging the container ranch orlooking for a LOST palm?

[BS Man about Palms]

Now that I think about it, I got stabbed in the head while weeding my Phoenix rec/roeby cross and couldn't figure out why I sweating on a cool night at dusk.... then I wiped my eyes and forehead and noted my sweat was red!

Maybe thats why this place looks like it does.

While I have absolutely NO doubt your forehead was injured as described,the problem I have is how it supposedly happened WEEDING!

Are you sure you weren't just rearranging the container ranch orlooking for a LOST palm?

I forgot to mention this happened a couple years back......... NOW does it make sense? Its been a long slow spiral. . . . . .

[Breadfruit Bill]

I needed a good laugh today guys... This was just what the Dr. ordered...

I think Rick's swim over Foamy the Squirrel takes the cake...

How was that swim Tiki?