Trachycarpus Wagnerianus (Waggie)

[Stator]

Hi guys,

I'm new here so take it easy on me

I have a 5' tall Fortunei, and a bunch of Musa Basjoo bananas planted up here (in the ground) in southern Ontario, Canada, 2 hours south of Toronto.

I also have a smaller non-hybrid waggie palm in a pot. My question is, I noticed the new leave thats opening looks bleached or almost transparent. I did recently over fertilize it with a liquid based fertilizer (by mistake) I use miracle grow palm slow relese fertilizer since I can't get any of the higher quailty palm fertilizers up here. Is this somthing I should be worried about, will it flush out over time.?

Also does this look like a pure wagerianus palm?

[Cedric]

<br />Trachycarpus are a bit confusing as there are I personally find huge variations in populations of the same species and also in the trade sometimes intentional sometimes not. But soil depth, water, micro climates etc can mean a lot. So who knows. Seedling or juvenile trachycarpus palms are very difficult quite often they all look the same small stiff slightly grey undersides to the leaves. There are fortuneis that look like latisectus and wagnerianus that look like fortuneis etc. I think unless seed comes direct from wild populations and grown well labelled from start it's unclear what you've got, where and how was it sold? I think yours looks like the form "wagnerianus" at this stage in its life anyway.<br /><br />The only ones I can definitely say are such and such are T.oreophilus from Thailandbecause of the attractive neat hair fibre on the trunk and princeps from Yunnan in China both which I've both seen in the wild and have bought.<br /><br />Im particularly fond of most trachycarpus I must say, I think they are extremely elegant wonderful palms. Coming from a gardeners point of view rather than a collectors one I find the very skinny dark trunks curving upwards with the extremely thin petioles seemingly holding afloat the large heads of largepalmate leaves (preferably horizontally) all very attractive.<br /><br />Here in Hong Kong they are not widely grown at all in fact extremely rare. We are "monsoonal subtropics" which means our summer rains are like South East Asia's proper deluge (where they come from) real tropics but winters are like winter in Palm Springs, dry. Trachy's are the easiest and most versatile of the "marginals" here at least responding very well to some very basic well thought out planting preconditions. Dappled shade, drainage, sun, wind etc.