Palm Maintenance Work.Yr_2009

[Kris]

Dear Friends

This year again i have tried to plant a California Fan Palm - Washingtonia filifera.Even this baby was raised from the seeds purchased from This Site !

And Brother M@x had sent me lot of germinated saplings of the washy filifera's but they are bit young compared to the specimen that we tried here..And iam really not sure of the fate of this washy that we planted now ? But we have created few ground work before planting this baby in our garden area.

And dear crystal,pivi,gilbert,tom & fastfeat wish me good luck...

And like always my thanks to my assistants without who's help i would not have accomplised this job to my emmense satisfication..

And friends your comments & suggestions are always welcome...we hope you enjoyed seeing this planting work as much we did doing it here !

Thanks & Love,

Kris

[Kris]

First of all lets see the raw materials purschased for this operation codenamed _ 'Ding Dong'

6 Bags of washed river sand 'Coarse Grade'

one and half inches railyway track grade granite rocks

this one is 3/4 (i.e three fourth) granite rocks

this is crushed rock chips..usually this is the material that i fill in lower region of my pots !

Here is that old cement ring which has 3 feet inner dia and one & half feet hight,once used during the time of drought inside our well This had been a home to few local cactus,which has been relocated to a another area.

This is the area we have planned to plant this ice ice babee... And there you can see a small but old Jasmine plant,which was removed & planted in a plastic barrel,once our operation was over ! And the beauty of this perticular place is that it gets sunlight throughout the day and this place is bit higher in elevation compared to the other areas of our garden... Rain water has never stagnated in this spot.

Now the work commenced on carefully removing this jasmine plant

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[Kris]

Now the digging & leveling of this area begins !

Around half a feet we dug up the clayee soil of this marked area..

Now we gently rolled this cement ring and brought this item to the newly dug-up area and we gently placed this ring inside the dug up pit !

Now we started filling the outer sides of the cement ring with clayee soil that was initially removed from this pit..

Now we punched holes into the inner region of this cement ring..

Here you can see we started to fill the base bottom of this ring with coarse grade sandy soil..

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[Kris]

About 2 to 3 bags of sandy soil was poured into this ring and we leveled this surface,to make it appear flat without any undulation.

Now lets see the washy babee that we are going to plant ?

All we did was to water this palm an hour ago and then we tilted this cement pot and gently pulled this baby out of its temperary home

And here is the palm..

A still of the palm root ball !

Now we covered the sandy soil area inside the ring with the railway track rocks,and the next layer with slightly smaller rocks,then finally the top most area was covered with granite chips(blue metal chips) ! Now watch the visuals..

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[Kris]

This is how it looks after the granite rock fill-up !

A close-up still

Now we commenced the watering operation,just to see if the soil or the rocks cave in...but everything remained as it is We even watered the outer walls of this cement ring to assist the clayee soil in the outer border to settle down !

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[Kris]

Here are few stills taken after a week of this planting work And by the way we are heading towards terrible hot summers !

You can see some white powder on top of the rocks..they are perlite and Anti-Ant powder,since we have here some bull ants in our garden soil !

Hope you all enjoyed the visuals...

Thanks & Love,

Kris

[buffy]

Kris: I humbly note that I'm a bit concerned that burying the concrete cylinder in the impermeable clay soil and filling it with free draining material will eventually promote the creation of a pool of water underneath your W. filifera. There's nothing wrong with roots growing into clay. You just don't want them sitting in water. Building a 2 foot raised planter above the flat clay soil, without any amendments to the clay soil would probably be ideal. In humid, wet East Texas, landscapers consistently fail with plant material when they dig a big hole in clay soil and then install the plant with good soil in the hole. Water simply has no where to go. Best results occur when they simply dig a hole the exact same size as the plant material and plant it a little high. Just something to consider.

[Kris]

Dear Buffy

Thanks for all the explaination & your time,but iam doing research here.since last year i planted a washy filifera directly into our clayee garden soil,wrongly assuming that its a fool proof & bullet proof palm.but it surrendered meekly to our climate.in less than 3 to 4 months it die.

And we have ammended clayee soil,but i have kept it as the last resort.and here clayee soil strata remains up to 9 feet from the soil top region.

I think you must visit my clayee soil ammendment thread_'How Far Can You Go'!

but you can see there some were very critical in their observation that even that want work.

Here are few maps of my region and chennai area get around 160 to 200 centimeters of annual rainfall !

Soil types

Annual temperature chart

thanks & love,

Kris

[Exotic Life]

Looking Great Kris, and now let's pray this one will survive your hot tropical climate...

Robbin

[iamjv]

That is quite the operation Kris... I hope the palm grows well for you and your efforts. Best of luck. Jv

[Kris]

Thanks a lot Dear Jv Hope this work yields some positive results for us..And iam keeping my fingers crossed till next summer season !

Love,

Kris

[Kris]

An Update !

And a strange thing that i noticed is that this palm has seen our hot summer season now,And we have not watered this palm much.Its feet is in rock chips... But not a single frond has browned or dried ! Now i understand very clearly as to what is a 'desert palm' actually means.It is behaving more like a cactus than a tropical plant.

Thanks & Love,

Kris

[Kris]

And here's a update and i must say we are now in our wet winters,up to early january'10 So help me God !

Its soil & root region..

Love,

kris

[Exotic Life]

Looking good Kris. Washingtonia filifera is a slow grower here compared to the robusta and filibusta, somehow filifera needs more heat to get started in spring.

Edited November 10, 2009 by Exotic Life

[buffy]

I love that I'm wrong so far on my concerns. Where does the water drain to Kris? It doesn't look like it can go anywhere in a heavy rain once the concrete column fills up?

[BS Man about Palms]

Go Kris, Go!!

[Kris]

Dear Robbin

Thanks for the suggestion that our palm needs more sunlight to pick up speed,if you see some of our threads we are working slowly but steadily to reach that stage.Yes, iam making way for the sunlight to reach the clayee soil & the palms planted in it.

I love that I'm wrong so far on my concerns. Where does the water drain to Kris ? It doesn't look like it can go anywhere in a heavy rain once the concrete column fills up?

Dear Buffy

You are right,even iam surprised by the fact that no water accumulates in that concretised ring ? May be its simple physics that is working_'Ground water table' Since this cement ring is placed high above the garden soil or floor level,water does not seem to rise up to the trunk(base)region.But the worse is yet to come in respect to our rains.I will update you with the latest visuals in the month of january 2010.And wish me good look !

Dear Bill

Thanks very much for your encouragement like always !

Lots of love to you all,

kris

[Tassie_Troy1971]

I am so happy Chris that this one is growing so well for you . i know its a FAVORITE of yours and your soil improvements are perfect .

[Kris]

Dear Buffy

This update goes out specially for you... Enjoy ! This still was taken a month a go..This palm now has grown even bigger.More of that in days to come ! And by the way our wet winters are over and are heading to very hot summers now..

Dear Bill(BS Man)

your idea has worked magic for me,So a special thanks to you for the help ! I hope from now on this palm will start to naturalise & acclamatize to this new climate zone & our house..

Lots of love,

kris

[buffy]

Dear Buffy This update goes out specially for you... Enjoy ! This still was taken a month a go..This palm now has grown even bigger.More of that in days to come ! And by the way our wet winters are over and are heading to very hot summers now..

This is great to see. I'm so happy you've found success. Now what will you do when the trunk ends up being bigger than the concrete ring?

[Kris]

This is great to see. I'm so happy you've found success. Now what will you do when the trunk ends up being bigger than the concrete ring?

Dear Buffy

You never fail to amaze me... I like it ! I was told by forum regulars that in wet humid climates the Washy filifera,B.Armeda,Cidp does not put out massive(Jamboo)trunks.But just because iam a Washy fili fan and if it rewards my love & reverence with stout trunk,we will break the concreate ring and replace it with a new brick structure of a bigger dimension...

Lots of love,

kris

[Kris]

Here's a still taken just 2 days ago,and i feel that this baby has started to grow like crazy...And summer season has just began,this season lasts till early November !

Love,

kris

[Kris]

And here's an Update !

. . .

. . .

Love,

kris

[BS Man about Palms]

Very good Kris! I suspect another year or two and that palm will almost be bulletproof where you are.

PS< I suspect that trunk will grow right up to that ring, but it probably won't mind it at all....

[Kris]

Dear Bill

Thanks for the encouragement ! And nowadays iam not that scared that it will rot anymore....

Love,

kris

[Kris]

Hai, Here's a video update !

Love,

kris.

[BS Man about Palms]

Thats great Kris!!!

I Like the narration!!

[sonoranfans]

Congratulations Kris, great job. You have triumphed against the odds, enjoy your little baby for many years to come!

[Kris]

Here's an update of this palm,and i must say that this year we did not receive the usual monsoon rains,So our garden looks dry & lifeless.But the desert varities are all growing just fine.

And i have a question to palm experts on this washy palm,is my palm a hybrid or is it robusta.Since the much desired trunk size is not visible in our palm ? or is it because the desert palm is growing in hot wet tropical climate or does this palm has a heavy appetite for palm fertilizer than normal palms & plants ?

Mod Edit: Video is a few posts down.

Dear Bill, Buffy & Sonoranfans how is this palm doing ?

 

Thanks & Love,

kris.

[buffy]

Is there an attached photo?

[Kris]

Hi good to hear from you,No i do not have a photo of it.I just take palm videos these days.

Love,

kris.

[buffy]

OK. I see it now. My phone couldn't handle the video. It looks like pure filifera based on the coloration and armament. I guess the humidity does make a difference. I'm sure parentage will have some factor to it, but that is robusta like thiness. I have a filifera I've grown from seed that is 3 years now. The parents were definitely big trunkers. My humidity is somewhere between a desert and your climate. We'll see if mine show the big truck. It's definitely still expanding.

[Kris]

Thank you very much for the analysis,Since iam always a fan of the heavy trunking palm varieties ! And also glad this one survived...

Lots of love,

kris.

[Kris]

our server has picked up a different video from youtube...i dont know the reason why.but this is what was there

initially ! i.e (Posted 29 Mar 2013) .

 

[Kris]

Now coming to the present updated !

.

[LJG]

Had a feeling this update wold show this type of growth. These palms are rediculously fast. 

Thanks for updates Kris. 

[Danilopez89]

Geat job Kris 

[Josh-O]

Thanks for the updat Kris. That's explosive growth for sure. 

Im wondering you you planted it in the pot?

[Kris]

Dear Friends,

Glad you liked it.

Love,

Kris.

BTW Josh its not a pot since its open to the garden soil,but is little higher than ground level.

[ChrisA]

Wow! Great job Kris.  I love seeing them trunk.  Look forward to further updates!