It seems there have been a number of spear pull topics recently, regretfully, I'm adding my own.

I've had my needle palm inside all winter, it's been a long winter and there is not enough light inside where I had it and it was struggling. Now that the worst of winter is over I was eager to get it back outside, one night got much colder than forecast and it got down to 16 F. This temp is not concerning for a needle but this is in a pot and was not acclimated to those temps. Anyway whatever combination of stresses resulted in all of my spears pulling today, I've already dowsed in hydrogen peroxide, hope it pulls through

I've had this palm a long time and have carried it to multiple states, I'd hate to lose it now. Also, I had put some heavy-duty ant bait in the pot since it was full of ants when I brought it in for the winter, I have wondered it the initial decline started from the ant bait or the low light conditions.

Any input is welcome, other than the pulled spears, it actually looks great, it's just thinner than it was, I cut out all the fronds that had gone brown.

Edited March 27, 201412 yr by Xerarch

Well, join the club of the spear pulls. Not a nice club to be in, but hydrogen peroxide is all you can do.

These palms naturally grow under dense canopy, so I can't imagine that having it indoors was the issue. Sounds like the 16F might have affected the roots.

I guess almost regardless of the cause, the solution going forward is the same, try to make sure it stays in favorable conditions and continue hydrogen peroxide treatment until it either recovers or croaks.

Any suggestions on how often to apply the hydrogen peroxide?

3% every few day

I guess almost regardless of the cause, the solution going forward is the same, try to make sure it stays in favorable conditions and continue hydrogen peroxide treatment until it either recovers or croaks.

Any suggestions on how often to apply the hydrogen peroxide?

Your spear pull probably came from the roots getting shocked. A needle bud can handle 16F no problem. So not sure continuous application of H2O2 is going to help much until the roots rebound and push new growth. I would recommend applying some vitamin B solution to the roots. I use that on large transplants and it seems to work well. My big Pritchardia I got from DoomsDave got a dousing of that stuff, it worked like a charm when we moved it, no spear loss at all, even got very little K deficiency symptoms. These are usually more pronounced.

I guess almost regardless of the cause, the solution going forward is the same, try to make sure it stays in favorable conditions and continue hydrogen peroxide treatment until it either recovers or croaks.

Any suggestions on how often to apply the hydrogen peroxide?

Your spear pull probably came from the roots getting shocked. A needle bud can handle 16F no problem. So not sure continuous application of H2O2 is going to help much until the roots rebound and push new growth. I would recommend applying some vitamin B solution to the roots. I use that on large transplants and it seems to work well. My big Pritchardia I got from DoomsDave got a dousing of that stuff, it worked like a charm when we moved it, no spear loss at all, even got very little K deficiency symptoms. These are usually more pronounced.

B1 for the roots yes AX but Ammon show the pics please.

its roots shock or Fungus?

I definitely would not apply hydrogen peroxide every few days. In fact I don't use it at all when the spear has pulled, and I have had multiple palms come back after the winter from spear pull. Here is why I don't use it-when the spear has pulled , there is heavy rot going on down there and pouring the hydrogen p. down there is just adding more moisture-which encourages more rot. The quickest way to get rid of rot is to dry out the area, clean out the rot and then keep it dry. Hydrogen p. may sound good-but it doesn't scoop out the rotted material, and in fact encourages more rot by adding more moisture that just sits there until it eventually drains away (maybe). I just pull the spear and any leaves that come out and walk away and hope that it comes back. If there is trunk, I may cut away everything until I get to the clean part (not rotted). But if the palm is going to grow another spear-my bet is that it will do it whether you add the hydrogen p. or not. The only time it would help is if you can dry it all out after treatment.

Ok, here are some photos, as you can see, nothing looks damaged other than the spear pulls, interestingly, in the close up shot you can see a smaller spear that does not pull, my biggest spear pulled out of that location but this smaller one is quite firm.

Edited March 29, 201412 yr by Xerarch

My approach is this...if a palm spear pulls, and I have to work to keep the plant alive, it doesn't belong in my garden.

Coincidentally to Xerarch's post here, while applying fertilizer to my Parajubaea torallyi yesterday afternoon, which I planted in the fall out of a 5 gallon container, I noticed that the spear was flopped over. When I tried to straighten it back up, it just fell off into my hand.

Apparently this palm can take the cold in the north bay, but doesn't like the winter moisture. I'd rather learn this while the plant can be removed with a shovel rather than a crane.

The good news is if the mother palm dies from crown rot you can still allow the suckers to grow and keep the palm.

Update.....

I've had good growing temps for a while now and still no sign of growth, and that last small spear that I said was firm in my last post ended up pulling about a week later. I've been wondering if I have some major rot going on inside the crowns but I haven't been willing to remove green fronds just to check. Today I said heck with it and decided to cut into the smallest offshoot to see what's going on inside. It doesn't look to me to be rotten, there was a little bit nearer the top but looked like it was pretty well contained and not spreading. What do you think?

I think the 16 degree night froze the tender young cells down in the bud. Needle Palms are kind of bad about that. I'm not sure its always lethal, but it does seem to kill that particular growing point a high percentage of the time, which is rather odd, actually, considering the cold hardiness of the species. In contrast, Trachycarpus typically just push out a new leaf when they get whacked, as do many other palms. I seriously doubt your palm has died, however. It will probably push out new growth from different growing points even if the two you mentioned are dead. Its a nice looking specimen, by the way. Are you going to remain in WV permanently? If so, plant it in the ground. Be prepared to protect it for a while, but they can take zone 7 temps reliably once established. My parents have one in Smithton IL, just southeast of St Louis that endured a zone 5 winter, though it looks rough at the moment! Its already recovering.

Ironic I know, most cold hardy palm ever and every one of my growing points croaks at 16 degrees? I really hope this recovers, I bought it in Utah probably around a decade ago, it moved to Arizona with me and came with me West Virginia even when just about everything else I had got abandoned.

I am not staying in WV so I don't want to plant it, after I finish school (again) we'll move back somewhere warm. My wife is from this part of the country but prefers to be somewhere warmer, which suits me just fine. Hopefully I can find somewhere where I can stay put and I'll plant it.

My first possible sign of life, you can see from the last photo that the cut that I did on that small offshoot is flush, here is a photo from today, you can see that the center has pushed out just a bit. There is even just a hint of green, not sure if that shows up much in the photo. Hope the others are doing the same thing inside!

Edited June 15, 201412 yr by Xerarch

You can all stop holding your breath now about this palm. I cut one head back as shown above and it started growing back immediately, no growth was seen on any other head so I cut another one back and it started growing immediately. I left the rest alone to see if they would recover on their own, eventually all of them started pushing new growth (fronds stunted due to rot at the tips but fine beneath that) except for one, the largest central one. I hated to cut that one back since it is the biggest and has the most fronds. I continued to leave it alone with no sign of budging, finally the frond that was the youngest started to wilt as if drought stressed. I took this as a sure sign that all was not well in the crown, so I cut it back. The next day it already had 1/4 in. of growth. So now that's all of them! All happily growing again.

Good....sometimes an operation is necessary.