This article is about 5 years old. But I just seen it and find it very interesting. Has it been discussed here before? I always felt genetic research could help so much with taxonomy, especially with dypsis. But it is so neat that this genetics study can tell us so much about human history as well.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110624142037.htm

 

Interesting article...thanks for sharing. Nui Kafa to you too.

Great article, 

Thanks for posting this article. 

As a newcomer to palmtalk, I'm especially grateful for information about the coconut palm, which has been a kind of ideal image of another world since I was a little kid in cold New England.

I'm very interested in the what I suppose is dynamic topic of the range of the coconut in Florida. 

In reading a number of the old forum entries, I've been interested to learn that trees -- even fruiting trees -- grow as far north as they do. I remember when I first visited Florida in in Tampa area back in 1959; I was very disappointed to learn that "they don't grow around here. It's too cold." Yet I read of thriving trees in places like Clearwater now.

Thanks for reading this sort of fan letter. Cheers.

 

Terry in Pompano Beach

 

PS--Moved here from NYC 2 years ago. Not enough coconut palms in this community to suit me!

2 hours ago, PompanoBeach said:

Thanks for posting this article. 

As a newcomer to palmtalk, I'm especially grateful for information about the coconut palm, which has been a kind of ideal image of another world since I was a little kid in cold New England.

I'm very interested in the what I suppose is dynamic topic of the range of the coconut in Florida. 

In reading a number of the old forum entries, I've been interested to learn that trees -- even fruiting trees -- grow as far north as they do. I remember when I first visited Florida in in Tampa area back in 1959; I was very disappointed to learn that "they don't grow around here. It's too cold." Yet I read of thriving trees in places like Clearwater now.

Thanks for reading this sort of fan letter. Cheers.

 

Terry in Pompano Beach

 

PS--Moved here from NYC 2 years ago. Not enough coconut palms in this community to suit me!

Hi Terry,

Welcome to Palmtalk.  It's always nice to have another Coconut Palm lover on here.  Some of us are really NUTS for coconuts, LOL!  I fell in love with them during my first trip from Texas to the Florida Keys in the summer of 1983, and have been growing them ever since.  I actually lived in Coral Springs for a couple of years in 2000 and 2001 and loved seeing all the Jamaican Talls and many Malayan Dwarfs there.  As far as growing them in Florida is concerned, I have seen the biggest and most beautiful robust Jamaican Talls in the rich soil 10B borderline 11A microclimate communities on the south side of Lake Okeechobee back in 2000 and 2001.  I have read that they have been grown very close to the Gulf as far north as Tarpon Springs on the Gulf Coast (Jamaican Talls) with nice looking Dwarfs growing as far north as St. Petersburg.  I have seen nice looking 30 to 35ft. tall (overall height) fruiting Jamaican Talls as far north as Clearwater Beach.  On the Atlantic side, there used to be a Coconut Palm growing in St. Augustine near the water that I think was a Green Malayan Dwarf, which is surprising since the Jamaican Tall is more cold hardy.  As I recall, it had about 3 ft. of woody trunk, but was apparently killed by the 2010 winter there. I have read here on Palmtalk of fruiting Coconut Palms as far north as Daytona Beach and New Smyrna Beach near the water, probably Jamaican Talls, with fruiting Dwarfs as far north as the Merritt Island/Cape Canaveral area.  There is a guy on here growing several different varieties outdoor in his yard in Orlando with some success, and I think at least one or two of his is fruiting age.

Here along the South Texas Coast we have some of them.  I have 3 in my yard right now.  I just planted them about 2 weeks ago since we are having a VERY mild winter (normally we are a low end 10A climate where I live, but this winter we have been high end 10B).  They are a 3ft. tall Jamaican Tall and a 3.5ft. tall Maypan, and a 2ft. tall Yellow Malayan Dwarf.  I have plans over the next month or so of planting my Panama Tall, Mexican Tall, and Maymex hybrid in my backyard.  We get thousands of coconuts from Mexico and Cuba washing up on our beaches from the spring to the fall when the currents come up this way from Tampico and Veracruz, Mexico before the current switch in October or November and come from the Louisiana Coast southward.  I have a Palm Society of South Texas friend who helps me collect hundreds of them each year along Padre Island and then we sprout as many as we can.  Most of the ones that sprout are Maymex hybrids between the Malayans and Mexican Talls, but we get some pure Malayan sprouts, and a few pure Mexican Tall sprouts.  the Mexican Talls from the Gulf Coast of Mexico are the most cold hardy variety in the Western Hemisphere, hardy to about 26F when they are established and have some size to them.  I live at the northernmost limit of where you can try them in Texas, and we lost all of the ones here in the 2011 freeze, except one that I have posted a photo of on another thread here that is growing on the south side of a two story house on the east end of Ocean Dr. that backs right up to Corpus Christi Bay.  It was totally defoliated in the freeze in which temps dropped down to the mid to upper 20's and stayed below freezing for over 24 straight hours, but it started growing again the following summer and is now about 21ft. tall in overall height, with about 10 to 11ft. of woody trunk.  It occasionally has a few small coconuts on it until they cut them off.  Before the 2011 freeze, there was a 20ft. tall producing Coconut Palm here in Flour Bluff where I live and one about 25ft. tall on North Padre Island that had medium large sized nuts on it.  There are more and larger Coconut Palms in the Rio Grande Valley about 125 miles south of me, where they do a lot better and fruit more often if they are adequately watered in the hot dry summers there.  There are some pure Mexican Talls in Brownsville that are about 45ft. tall in overall height, with about 25ft. of woody trunk on them, and some producing Malayan Dwarfs that are about 20 to 25ft. tall with nuts on them.  There is a Coconut Palm on South Padre Island that is about 30 to 35ft. tall that I have personally counted 47 coconuts on and the lady who owns the home told me one year she had 93 nuts on her palm!  Anyway, if you ever want to know anything else about them, just let me know.

John

John, 

Thanks so much for this valuable data. I'm surprised that the palms grow so far north, especially on the west coast of Florida vs 1959, but even more surprised that they are able to grow so well in South Texas. 

I'm still a real newbie when it comes to tropical/subtropical vegetation, so I can't distinguish (much) among the different varieties of coconut palms. I'm learning, though. I'll have to post some pictures of the ones in my neighborhood in hopes of getting expert opinion on the varieties. If this lousy rain ever stops. Some dry season we're having.

I do have one further question. Are coconut palms able to survive in California at all? I get the feeling that the coastal areas might be too cold in summer, mild as the winters may be out there. 

Thanks again.

Terry

 

 

2 minutes ago, PompanoBeach said:

John, 

Thanks so much for this valuable data. I'm surprised that the palms grow so far north, especially on the west coast of Florida vs 1959, but even more surprised that they are able to grow so well in South Texas. 

I'm still a real newbie when it comes to tropical/subtropical vegetation, so I can't distinguish (much) among the different varieties of coconut palms. I'm learning, though. I'll have to post some pictures of the ones in my neighborhood in hopes of getting expert opinion on the varieties. If this lousy rain ever stops. Some dry season we're having.

I do have one further question. Are coconut palms able to survive in California at all? I get the feeling that the coastal areas might be too cold in summer, mild as the winters may be out there. 

Thanks again.

Terry

 

 

Terry,

They are very marginal where I live and may only last for about 7 to 10 years at a time.  It is similar any growing around Tarpon Springs and Daytona Beach, but just about 50 miles south of these locations they do fine, at least the tall varieties, which are a little more cold hardy than the dwarfs.  When you take some photos of the ones in your area, be sure to get good photos of the crown of leaves and of the base of the trunk.  Talls, usually have less but longer more robust leaves than dwarfs, and talls usually have a large swollen base to the trunk and often a curved trunk, whereas the dwarfs usually have little or no swelling at the base and much straighter trunks.

There are only a VERY FEW people who have successfully grown them in Southern California due to the lack of heat in the summer that you mentioned and due to the chilly damp winters they have there.  Whereas your South Florida winters are usually mild to warm and relatively dry and mine are usually cool to mild and dry, theirs are usually chilly and damp, since that is their wet season.  Coconut Palms need a minimum winter time soil temp of at least 60F about 90 to 95% of the time in the winter.  My January soil temps average about 57F to 58F, but theirs in S. Cali average around 54F to about 56F I think, which puts them too chilly for successful coconut growth.   The rare exceptions are the famous Newport Beach coconut palm that lasted about 30 years being planted by a lot of concrete and asphalt near a building, that actually produced a decent amount of trunk, but no nuts before it finally succumbed to the chill, and some that have been grown around San Diego, one that I read about on here that actually grew pretty good planted by the Filipino neighbor of someone until his wife demanded it be chopped down (ought to be a crime to chop down a living Coconut Palm, LOL!), and there are some fruiting mature ones that have been successfully grown around the Salton Sea, where they get some wintertime warmth.  The same problem exists with trying to grow them in Galveston (I know, I have tried).  Even though Galveston has a 10A Climate like, much of S. Cali, it is just too cool for about 2 straight months for them there.  Galveston, as I recall averages 60F/48F for their high/low in January, but they rarely freeze there, just like S. Cali.  Coconut Palms can actually take a light freeze down to 29F or 30F occasionally better than they can take a month or two straight of chilly damp weather.

John

John,

You really ought to write a book! The information is fantastic. 

I live in a place where coconuts grow very well, as you know. But the HOA and the city of Pompano Beach have sort of an anti-palm policy, except for those lousy sabals, demanding that only shade trees like maples (!), oaks and the dread gumbo-limbo are planted. I'd love to grow a coconut palm or two of my own, but there's nowhere to do it. I hasten to add that I understand why the city and HOA are so keen on such trees, what with the increasing heat and the great amount of rain we get. No denial here.

Time to eat. Ciao.

 

Terry

56 minutes ago, PompanoBeach said:

John,

You really ought to write a book! The information is fantastic. 

I live in a place where coconuts grow very well, as you know. But the HOA and the city of Pompano Beach have sort of an anti-palm policy, except for those lousy sabals, demanding that only shade trees like maples (!), oaks and the dread gumbo-limbo are planted. I'd love to grow a coconut palm or two of my own, but there's nowhere to do it. I hasten to add that I understand why the city and HOA are so keen on such trees, what with the increasing heat and the great amount of rain we get. No denial here.

Time to eat. Ciao.

 

Terry

Hey Terry,

I would like to write a book on Coconut Palms someday, and I actually have had written a 110 page manuscript on landscaping with palms in Texas that I never got published.   I don't understand what the reasoning is with the city there and the HOA.  Why don't they want Coconut Palms planted?  they are the epitome of tropical climates and the Chamber of Commerce ought to really push planting them throughout South Florida and Coastal Central Florida.  The strict HOA gestapo is one reason I am glad I left South Florida, even though I didn't own any property when I lived there.  I couldn't handle being told what I could and couldn't plant.  If I ever moved back there, I would probably try to buy a few acres around Clewiston or South Bay, where Jamaican Tall Coconut Palms and Florida Royal Palms are HUGE and very healthy and robust, and where I could have a few acres around my house and have an all organic palm and tropical plant nursery.  Or maybe I would buy a place around Bradenton on the Gulf side with a few acres so I could do the same thing.

John

John, there are plenty of them at the beach but no one does much with them a bit inland except in neighborhoods where there a lot of West Indians. They want to se they do soak up standing water and lower the temps with the shade, laudable and all, but where they do plant palms it's usually sabals, queens and royals. To be fair, the area around our pool has, as far as I can tell, 6-7 types of palms, including coconuts. 

But here's a problem: residents' attitudes. A friend of mine frets over the coconuts that grow just outside the pool fence and project over the enclosed area. "They should trim those coconuts, they are dangerous," even though there aren't any chairs there. My answer isn't too helpful: "Stay away from there. Problem solved."

 

3 hours ago, PompanoBeach said:

John, there are plenty of them at the beach but no one does much with them a bit inland except in neighborhoods where there a lot of West Indians. They want to se they do soak up standing water and lower the temps with the shade, laudable and all, but where they do plant palms it's usually sabals, queens and royals. To be fair, the area around our pool has, as far as I can tell, 6-7 types of palms, including coconuts. 

But here's a problem: residents' attitudes. A friend of mine frets over the coconuts that grow just outside the pool fence and project over the enclosed area. "They should trim those coconuts, they are dangerous," even though there aren't any chairs there. My answer isn't too helpful: "Stay away from there. Problem solved."

 

I like your answer.  I just can't fathom the thought of trimming (BUTCHERING) my favorite tree just because a coconut "might" occasionally fall on someone.  I was reading an account somewhere about a year of so ago (I can't remember where) that stated that there has NEVER been a verifiable case anywhere worldwide of a falling coconut actually killing someone!  If that is true then all the hysteria and BUTCHERING is for nothing!  They look so majestic and graceful when they have their full crowns and lots of nuts on them, but they look horrible when BUTCHERED, like a South Texas Royal Palm that never receives enough water.

I love the mature Jamaican Talls along the beach at Pompano and down to Ft. Lauderdale Beach.  I remember some Jamaican Talls there that must have been 70 to 75ft. tall in overall height.  Fortunately, the ones at the beach as I recall were not trimmed and thus looked their best.  The only currently producing coconut palm here in Corpus Christi that I know of is on the south side of a two story house that backs right up to Corpus Christi Bay on the east end of Ocean Dr.  It is about 21ft. tall in overall height with about 11ft. of woody trunk, but as soon as the nuts are about baseball size, they trim them off.  The house is now up for sale, so someone probably a real estate agent convinced the owners to over trim the palm, and now it looks horrible.  Here is a recent photo of it that I took last Sunday.