We closed on a little home in Indialantic, Florida :-) I'll be flying out with my family to get everyone settled, and then they'll stay there, and I'll (sob) fly back to CA to continue working for the next two months. I'd really like to get some things put in the yard ASAP during the week I'll be there (roughly June 5-12). We'll have our pickup truck with us, so I'll be able to transport stuff to and from my new house. After I finish teaching for the summer semester, I'll move out to FL permanently (or at least for the next year). I know some of you suggested places where I could acquire some of the palms I want (all FL natives + FL naturalized coconut), but I'd appreciate a summary of nurseries or individuals who might have such plants in stock who are within 150 miles of Melbourne, FL.

Many thanks :-)

What made you decide to move to Florida? I just took a trip to check things out over there. Overall, it seemed pretty nice. Met some good people.

Congrats and welcome to the Space Coast!

I live in Indian Harbour Beach, which is a couple minutes north of Indialantic.

As Dave-Vero said, GTC Palms (Okie LoPresti with Neil Yorio) will have everything you need. Charlene is also a great source too.

I hereby Second the Okie with GTC suggestion. Here is a link to a price list from an old sale he had months back. This will give you an idea of what he will probably have in stock most of the time. Scroll down to find the list. http://www.2ndlight.com/fusetalk/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=8&threadid=161868

Personally I have purchased 2 kentiopsis oliviformis, 1 Burettiokentia hapala, a dypsis pembana, and a big 25 gallon chambeyronia off of him. All of the plants are doing well and all went right into full sun with only the pembana suffering any negative effects.

Many thanks for the suggestions

In regards to why: My fascination with palms has grown out of fascination with Florida. My father's father's father crossed into Florida from just over the Alabama border 110-125 years ago as a turpentiner. (And I've been told that his father, who fought for the Confederacy in an Alabama regiment, might have been sent to Florida for training in the 1860s, though I'm not sure that's true.) I've literally got kin in every corner of the state.

My first Florida ancestor had 11 children, and he and his wife died when four of them were still minors. The oldest boys were already grown by then, and at least two of them had pioneered the Everglades as part of the first generation of white farmers to come after the initial dike on Okeechobee. The four orphans were sent to be raised by the older siblings in the Everglades, and one of these orphans was my granddaddy. I think he was somewhere between 10-14 at the time.

Anyway, they got down there and then survived the hurricane of '28, which was the worst natural disaster in Florida history (the dike failed and thousands were drowned). Our family (there were several of our kin down there by that time) was one of the few to survive the storm with no casualties. My Great-uncle "Orb" (a.k.a. Aubrey), who would later be the first mayor of South Bay, got the family on a barge and weathered the storm in that way; the family thereby avoided the drownings that would otherwise have befallen everyone.

Whole towns were destroyed in the 1928 storm, and they say some families were wiped out root and stem. After the floodwaters subsided, there were bloated bodies, all of which has been stripped naked by wind and water, floating in miles and miles of sawgrass. The survivors had to collect the dead to the best of their ability, and I've read that they had to pile corpses up to burn them in the end. My granddaddy would plow up skulls and bones and bits of clothing each farming season after the storm for many years. I've been told that after this tragedy, there was a dichotomy in the 'Glades: those who'd settled before the hurricaine of '28 were considered pioneers; those who came after were newcomers who hadn't paid their dues (at least not in the same way).

My father was born into the same Everglades town just after WWII, and I was born in the adjacent town 30 years later. My mother, however, was a Californian, and my family uprooted and moved us out to CA when I was young. I'd go back to visit my aunts and uncles regularly over the decades. I learned to drive at age 12 in a truck on my uncle's cattle ranch (it was honestly named Cracker Haven), and I remember seeing cabbage palms silhouetted against the sunset as my uncle would drive me up to the ranch or back down toward the sugarcane fields he managed. I've always pined away for Florida.

I guess I just love Florida in a way that few people I've met understand. I love the family history. I love the (now vestigial) Southern culture mingled with near-tropical weather. I love the lizards, gators, birds, bugs, humidity, rain--I like the whole package! I recently scored a one-year funding gig to do some scholarly work, which I can do from any part of the world, and so my family has decided to give it a go in Florida.

I've got relatives who live in Satellite Beach, Indialantic, Palm Bay, and (seasonally) in Cocoa Beach, so I think this place should be good spot for my wife (a CA girl) to ease into Florida living with plenty of supportive kin nearby. And, of course, I can't wait to amass a Florida palm collection

Edited May 30, 201511 yr by Yunder Wækraus

Many thanks for the suggestions

In regards to why: My fascination with palms has grown out of fascination with Florida. My father's father's father crossed into Florida from just over the Alabama border 110-125 years ago as a turpentiner. (And I've been told that his father, who fought for the Confederacy in an Alabama regiment, might have been sent to Florida for training in the 1860s, though I'm not sure that's true.) I've literally got kin in every corner of the state.

My first Florida ancestor had 11 children, and he and his wife died when four of them were still minors. The oldest boys were already grown by then, and at least two of them had pioneered the Everglades as part of the first generation of white farmers to come after the initial dike on Okeechobee. The four orphans were sent to be raised by the older siblings in the Everglades, and one of these orphans was my granddaddy. I think he was somewhere between 10-14 at the time.

Anyway, they got down there and then survived the hurricane of '28, which was the worst natural disaster in Florida history (the dike failed and thousands were drowned). Our family (there were several of our kin down there by that time) was one of the few to survive the storm with no casualties. My Great-uncle "Orb" (a.k.a. Aubrey), who would later be the first mayor of South Bay, got the family on a barge and weathered the storm in that way; the family thereby avoided the drownings that would otherwise have befallen everyone.

Whole towns were destroyed in the 1928 storm, and they say some families were wiped out root and stem. After the floodwaters subsided, there were bloated bodies, all of which has been stripped naked by wind and water, floating in miles and miles of sawgrass. The survivors had to collect the dead to the best of their ability, and I've read that they had to pile corpses up to burn them in the end. My granddaddy would plow up skulls and bones and bits of clothing each farming season after the storm for many years. I've been told that after this tragedy, there was a dichotomy in the 'Glades: those who'd settled before the hurricaine of '28 were considered pioneers; those who came after were newcomers who hadn't paid their dues (at least not in the same way).

My father was born into the same Everglades town just after WWII, and I was born in the adjacent town 30 years later. My mother, however, was a Californian, and my family uprooted and moved us out to CA when I was young. I'd go back to visit my aunts and uncles regularly over the decades. I learned to drive at age 12 in a truck on my uncle's cattle ranch (it was honestly named Cracker Haven), and I remember seeing cabbage palms silhouetted against the sunset as my uncle would drive me up to the ranch or back down toward the sugarcane fields he managed. I've always pined away for Florida.

I guess I just love Florida in a way that few people I've met understand. I love the family history. I love the (now vestigial) Southern culture mingled with near-tropical weather. I love the lizards, gators, birds, bugs, humidity, rain--I like the whole package! I recently scored a one-year funding gig to do some scholarly work, which I can do from any part of the world, and so my family has decided to give it a go in Florida.

I've got relatives who live in Satellite Beach, Indialantic, Palm Bay, and (seasonally) in Cocoa Beach, so I think this place should be good spot for my wife (a CA girl) to ease into Florida living with plenty of supportive kin nearby. And, of course, I can't wait to amass a Florida palm collection

Wow, what a cool narrative!!!!!!

I have been in love with the lower third of the state since i was a little kid, and finally moved here (SW FL) 10 years ago full time and never looked back...and have been planting palms ever since.

Btw, given your Florida history, you might enjoy reading Peter Matthiesen's 'Watson Family Trilogy'....whether fact or 'historical fiction' you might find it a good read............

It's a bit further the GTC, but you might want to consider visiting Botanics Wholesale in Stuart, Fl. It's about 80 miles each way.

Yunder, As far as books and the Glades, anything by Lawrence Will. I believe I even remember a reference in a book by him on the 28 Hurrcan regarding a family who made it out alive on a barge. My Grandfather had it relatively easy in the Palm Beach area, where it hit as the sun went down on a Sunday evening in mid-September. Complete absolute destruction. Most of the casualties in this area occurred during the pass of the eye wall, when uninitiated people strayed out falsely believing the storm had passed. They should've known better according to my grandfather, whose ears were popping because of the extreme low pressure. He was sick as a dog waiting for the real fun to start when the fierce backside of the eyewall hit bringing the full Monty. All of this while the first three hours of the Cat 5 softened up the soon to be debris from the front side.

The highest recorded wind in Palm Beach County is technically listed as 153 MPH during the 1947 or 1949 storm as recorded at the Jupiter Lighthouse. During the 28 storm, the wind anemometer blew away and the brick and mortar structure of the Jupiter lighthouse was moved 11 inches off its foundation. A safe guess would be that the winds during the 28 storm were greater. As if it couldn't get any better, all this was happening in the middle of the night.

Contrary to later books written by parties without actual knowledge like Will, whose intentions were solely to politicize the event(catastrophe?), all people who could still walk and breathe jumped onto the back of trucks and headed for the Glades, where they had already heard that the real massacre had occurred. When they arrived, they did all they could and were lucky to rescue as many as possible but for the most part it was simply a salvage operation. My grandfather talked about his experiences in the Pacific theater during World War II before he uttered a peep about the 28 storm.

Thanks. Check out Lawrence E. Will's "A Cracker History of Okeechobee" (my father grew up with the author's grandson and says that Mr. Will was actually a Yankee, but the book is still full of great stories about the pioneers of the Glades, and it even mentions my great uncle's name)

Thanks, Bubba, our comments crossed :-) I actually knew my great uncle O'Neil, who lived through the '28 storm as one of the orphaned children I mentioned. He was on the beach on D-Day, but outside of WWII, he never lived anywhere but South Bay. Yeah, my understanding is that the survivors had PTSD from that storm. There's an old family story that one of the men on the barge with my then-child granddaddy and his older brothers refused to help heaving buckets of water overboard to keep the barge from sinking. I was told that the men held a kangaroo court (either in the midst of the storm or right after) and condemned him to death. However, after the sentence was passed, someone (likely one who really didn't want to murder the guy) asked who would feed and clothe the man's wife and children, and then the "court" decided to remove the death sentence and take an oath that no one would utter the name of the man they'd intended to murder. My father was told the name by a great aunt, whose husband had been part of the kangaroo court, but he cannot remember it. There's so much lore to be mined in Cracker history. I'm really intersted in learning more about the relationship between Crackers and palms. I remember a great aunt randomly telling me about swamp cabbage and the relationship between palmettos and rattlesnakes when I was about 12, but I can't say I've heard a lot of palm lore beyond that. I'm going to meet up with old folks and ask a lot of questions once I get out there later this summer.

II have a bunch of freebies I give away, feel free to get in touch when you get to FL.

http://www.palmtalk.org/forum/index.php?/topic/37882-many-freebies/

The list of free stuff varies

Thanks!

Likewise here. Some stuff is lurking in the yard.

It seems the state's population has doubled since 1990. We're probably hitting 20 million right now, a bit more than half a California.

It's amazing to me that Florida has any open land left. The house we bought is over 40 years old, so no one can blame increased sprawl on us ☺

Indialantic and Satellite Beach have plenty of older houses, some with neat terrazzo floors. The main concern will be to ensure that the roof is securely attached to walls, and that the windows have adequate hurricane shutters. There's also standards for doors. Thanks to the broad Indian River, the winter climate is much less freeze-prone than the mainland.

Yeah, we bought one with terrazzo floors in their original condition :-)

Yunder, hate to see you go!

But, Florida's a great place full of great people. The best palm culture of all, even better than California's in some ways.

(If you can, get out here for a PSSC meeting . . . )

Maybe share pics of your new place, interior and exterior? (Never seen terrazzo in a house.)

Will do once I get the chance

Yunder, hate to see you go!

But, Florida's a great place full of great people. The best palm culture of all, even better than California's in some ways.

(If you can, get out here for a PSSC meeting . . . )

Maybe share pics of your new place, interior and exterior? (Never seen terrazzo in a house.)

Here you go: