I just purchased this palm and can find very little information on its culture. Can someone offer me some advice on Geonoma pohliana? The only Geonoma in my garden currently is a two year old G. scottiana pictured below.

All in the timing Jim, as I was flicking through the below book by Dr Andrew Henderson I saw yr post, you "should" buy his book, its a Beauty..

As pics and writings show, it has No colour bar green and has many accepted names.   Pete

 

This info could also be useful for the cultivation: It is growing »em solo úmido« (Lorenzi et al. 2004: 166), i.e. »on moist soils« (Henderson et al. 1995: 232).

Beautiful palm, Jim. Seller had one up several weeks ago. I couldn't find anything about it either. But I know of no Geonomas growing in FL so I gave it a pass. It may be more suitable for your No Cal climate.

And many very nice photos taken by @Alberto you can find (of course) on Palmpedia with further infos: http://www.palmpedia.net/wiki/Geonoma_pohliana

Jim:

I received a few Brazilian lowland Geonoma spp. last November on trade, including a G. pohliana. They were all large, multi-leaf seedlings and arrived in good condition. I ignored them for about six months on a back bench and then found to my dismay that they had seized up in their crowns due to a critical micronutrient imbalance. In late June I transplanted all of them to my local growing medium, corrected the deficiency via drench and foliar sprays and freed up the apical growth points with some judicious scalpel work. As of yesterday they have all all pushed deformed "stuck" older leaves but now appear to be OK with normal spears just becoming visible..

My plant is smaller than yours and greenhoused so not comparable yet. Geonomas with localized distributions are, more than any other palms IMO, exigent about soils, temps and RH. I have grown quite a few delicate geonomas over the years and find they really excel in well-drained, rich, acid soils. Chelated iron drenches every six months or so definitely improve vigor. I would definitely keep an eye on yours if you have it outside late in the fall. Depending on the spp and origin, due to their very fine leaf texture they can get cold scorched in a matter of hours.

Good luck,

J

Thanks all for the advice. From what I've recently read, these have some light freeze tolerance since they grow at altitudes as high as 6,000 feet and also can tolerate some heat as long as the nights are cool. Humidity is a plus and dry air a likely big minus so mine will be planted densely with other plants.

I'd be very cautious about assuming cold tolerance in this "species". Henderson lumped a couple other names into this one and described 11 distinct subspecies in his monograph. As he defines it, G. pohliana has a vast distribution from the headwaters of the Upper Amazon in Ecuador (these were formerly G. gastoniana and one source of the 1900 m/6000' records) to coastal forest in SE Brazil. In tropical horticulture, provenance is often key to success with individual plants. If your plant originated from montane cloud forest on the eastern slope of the Andes, probably can take some real cold for brief periods. If from sea level in eastern Brazil, perhaps notsomuch. From another angle, if five years from now another taxonomist elevates all these taxa to species level in a publication, which ones of the ~dozen do we grow?

The Brazilians on the forum should be able to shed quite a bit more light on how temperature tolerant this species is in their hands. FWIW, mine is reportedly a lower elevation Brazilian accession.

J

Well, four years in the garden now and, although it’s grown slowly, it’s never shown any stress whatsoever. Today it opened one of its signature red leaves. It’s a cute little palm that I hope to see some trunk on soon. 

That’s a great looking little eye candy. How many leaves a year are you getting? 

It is a bummer that geonoma doesn't have the fallowing that dypsis does. Everytime I get one for the garden it is so hard to get info on it. I'm just glad that I have people around me that know about this genius 

Nice thread. Thanks for the info.
Any updates on those specimen?

I found that Geonoma bondariana is the same species as Geonoma pohliana subsp. pohliana:
https://powo.science.kew.org/taxon/urn:lsid:ipni.org:names:77105840-1

I got seeds from rps and they just start to germinate (after 4 weeks at around 30 degrees Centigrade).

 

6 hours ago, fotodimatti said:

Nice thread. Thanks for the info.
Any updates on those specimen?

I found that Geonoma bondariana is the same species as Geonoma pohliana subsp. pohliana:
https://powo.science.kew.org/taxon/urn:lsid:ipni.org:names:77105840-1

I got seeds from rps and they just start to germinate (after 4 weeks at around 30 degrees Centigrade).

 

Several years in the ground and mine is healthy but exceptionally slow in growth. It has a small offset starting finally. I only notice growth when temperatures are reliably in the 80s F. New leaves are very red. 

I managed to germinate a few bondariana type G pohliana subsp pohliana from RPS but unfortunately all but one were eaten by rodents. I’ll nurse my remaining one carefully, would love to grow it here but I suspect it will be challenging. 

PHotos please, gentlemen!!
Thanks a lot

Matti

5 hours ago, fotodimatti said:

PHotos please, gentlemen!!
Thanks a lot

Matti

Matti, This isn’t the best time to photograph mine, coming out of winter but here she is today. A new spear will open into a vibrant red frond in the summer for sure.  
 

2 hours ago, Jim in Los Altos said:

Matti, This isn’t the best time to photograph mine, coming out of winter but here she is today. A new spear will open into a vibrant red frond in the summer for sure.  
 

Still looks pretty good Jim. Do you trim brown tips? I assume this species doesn’t typically have blunt leaflet tips. 

20 minutes ago, tim_brissy_13 said:

Still looks pretty good Jim. Do you trim brown tips? I assume this species doesn’t typically have blunt leaflet tips. 

Yes, after every winter, the palm has some brown tipping that I trim off. 

Photos from today with new leaf.  

Beautiful! How many species of Geonoma do you have? It's amazing how many Geonoma you see in the highlands of Colombia. It's a shame they aren't more common in coastal California. 

6 minutes ago, kylecawazafla said:

Beautiful! How many species of Geonoma do you have? It's amazing how many Geonoma you see in the highlands of Colombia. It's a shame they aren't more common in coastal California. 

Kyle, I have G. schottiana, undata, and pholiana. All are doing pretty well.  G. schottiana is growing fast. Photo below. 
 

That's so beautiful. I have been starting a palm garden at my parent's house in Corte Madera, CA, however their microclimate is abysmally worse than yours, and the property is directly on a saltwater waterway, so the soil is compressed land fill, so is also very bad. I would love to try a Geonoma at one point, however. Do your Pritchardias ever show damage? They have four at their property still with strap leaves, and they survived last winter, however all with significant leaf damage. I hope they get better as they get older. 

2 hours ago, kylecawazafla said:

That's so beautiful. I have been starting a palm garden at my parent's house in Corte Madera, CA, however their microclimate is abysmally worse than yours, and the property is directly on a saltwater waterway, so the soil is compressed land fill, so is also very bad. I would love to try a Geonoma at one point, however. Do your Pritchardias ever show damage? They have four at their property still with strap leaves, and they survived last winter, however all with significant leaf damage. I hope they get better as they get older. 

The four species of Pritchardia I have in the garden (hillebrandii, minor, schattaueri, and beccariana) have never been damaged in the winter. Temps have stayed above freezing since 2007 however. 

On 5/30/2024 at 12:06 PM, tim_brissy_13 said:

I managed to germinate a few bondariana type G pohliana subsp pohliana from RPS but unfortunately all but one were eaten by rodents. I’ll nurse my remaining one carefully, would love to grow it here but I suspect it will be challenging. 

If your that worried about it tim I’ll take it of your little cultivation fingers 🤣

1 hour ago, happypalms said:

If your that worried about it tim I’ll take it of your little cultivation fingers 🤣

I know you already have at least one Richard! Leave some palms for the rest of us!

Just quietly - I may be working on some Geonoma undata. I’ll hopefully have some to spare but still a long road ahead. 

9 hours ago, tim_brissy_13 said:

I know you already have at least one Richard! Leave some palms for the rest of us!

Just quietly - I may be working on some Geonoma undata. I’ll hopefully have some to spare but still a long road ahead. 

There was a song by the Cure never enough!! keep us posted on the geonoma they do ok in my area.