potato chip palms

[sur4z]

Does anybody have any information on the chamaedorea tuerckheimii (potato chip palm)? I know it is from Guatemala and is suppose to grow in California, Hawaii and Florida. I would love to add a couple specimens to my collection.

[Breadfruit Bill]

Hey Peter, welcome to Palmtalk!  I don't have any of these, but you may wanna check the Palm Beach County Palm and Cycad Society's Sale in Boynton this weekend...

Advertisement for the sale!

[metalfan]

Good luck, good luck, you're going to need good luck...

Very hard to locate, costs and arm and a leg, plus the sacrifice of a gallon of blood and firstborn child....

[XYZ]

Quite so, G...rare, coveted & pricy.

These pics are several months old...these babies are a bit N and Mg deficient but, still...

SJ

[madagascarbob]

Potatoe  chips burn to a crisp in California due to lack of humidity ,Thats my experience .

[aussiearoids]

do a search and you will find lots of great info here about this palm

hint *** search back in Stone Jaguars posts ..

[Jeff Searle]

I can give you some really good.......and cheap advice. Your in Florida? Good luck, cus your gonna need it.

Jeff

[el-blanco]

I have a friend in Dana Point a few blocks over who has one of these and it looks great.  He looks weird without the right arm he used to pay for it.

Jeff

[fiji jim]

Here is the only one we have. Grew it from seed a couple of years back and it has lived in shade with constant moisture in a mix of peat and soil. Seems happy.

[kylecawazafla]

Wow great palm! Are you sue it's not Drymophloeus? It looks like it's in perfect condition.

[galveston1602]

Wow, now thats a great palm pic!!

[madagascarbob]

(fiji jim @ Oct. 10 2007,23:23)

QUOTE

Here is the only one we have. Grew it from seed a couple of years back and it has lived in shade with constant moisture in a mix of peat and soil. Seems happy.

Thats a walichi but it's just as rare .

[palmmermaid]

This is on my list of "Don't even bother" palms!  I already gave away my first born to her husband and I think he would object if I tried to give her away again!

[Jeff Searle]

Fiji Jim,

    Good try... , but it's a Drymophloeus species.

Jeff

[Jeff Searle]

Fiji Jim,

    Good try... , but it's a Drymophloeus species.

Jeff

[metalfan]

Jeff speaks...in stereo!

[MattyB]

They often look anemic here in SoCal.  I think good shade and watering with water that's low in pH & TDS's are some of the advice I've heard.  Colin (palmsforpleasure) has some that are flawless.  His water is great and he dosen't get too hot.  Maybe he can shed some light on how to get these babies to flurish.

[sur4z]

Thanks for the feed back! I understand that these little guys

are rare and expensive BUT that aside, do you think

they could grow in South Florida if placed in a shady place?

[XYZ]

Yes, if you use RO, rain or distilled water and fertilize very carefully..SoFlo water appears to be unbelievably bad for delicate cloud forest palms. Must make an effort to site it in cool, shady spot and keep an eye on spider mite infestations.

Garbage water in SoCal, coupled with wild-collected material, mated with Sta Anas have combined to give very bad rap. Not easy, but not brain surgery, either.

SJ

[fiji jim]

Thanks for correcting my mistake guys.

I am not even sure where the seed came from but now I see the difference.

What Drymophloeus do you think it is? It does not have stilt roots like others in that species.

We already have a few D.litigiosus so I can see it is not one of them. It is also much slower growing than the litigiosus.

What say ?

[Jeff Searle]

(sur4z @ Oct. 11 2007,15:03)

QUOTE

Thanks for the feed back! I understand that these little guys

are rare and expensive BUT that aside, do you think

they could grow in South Florida if placed in a shady place?

No, no and no. Well, let me back up. Yes, it is possible to keep these alive longer than a month, 6 months or even a year. Thats growing them in your typical little shadehouse or underneath other palms for shade.

  I had some many years ago that I kept alive for a few years. But, one by one they died off. And, they never seemed to look that good, or healthy. You can give them all the shade in the world, but thats not the solution. These palms come from elevation, meaning cooler temp.'s in the morning and evening. In South Florida, were at sea level. It's hot and only seasonal rains throughout the year.( Good luck and I wish you all the best in growing one)

I have my old saying........if you don't see the palm growing here, there's usually a reason why.

  Jeff

[faith bishock]

Fiji Jim has a lovely juvinile Drymophloeus Oliviformis -  that's exacctly what my babies look like.

[fiji jim]

Thanks wife of budrot.

giggle :laugh:

[Kamipalms]

Heres some help for those of us who live no where near the perfect Central American habit.

As advised by the all mighty Jaguar I use nothing but collected rain water in a controlled environment and they are very touch and go....well from a young age any way.

This little fella is almost 12 months old ( post germination) and has suffered a little within its short life. Some idiot didn't realize the potting medium below the surface became a little too dry but.... luckily managed to prevent disaster by administering a little TLC.

If you can avoid heat, cold, low humidity, large temp changes and bad water you'll be fine!!! ???

[palmtreesforpleasure]

Hi Matt

THe Variety i have is different to the ones pictured

It grows in the shade in a cool area of the garden in a pot with a free draining mix with pumice stone in it. tremperature range is 5- 28c but mostly the maximum is cooler, the hardness of our water is 100 parts per million, naturally soft from the town supply. Unfortunately only have males, if any one has some seed it would be most helpful, maybe a trade

regards

colin

[Kamipalms]

nice pair of Mexicans there Colin....

For all those who are considering these little monsters, the Mexican form is said to be easier or less demanding to grow .

If someone is willing to hand me the 2 different forms I'll gladly grow them in my garden side by side and I'd be more than happy to report on the progress when ever required

[palmtreesforpleasure]

Hi Jason,

Mexican form seems to  be a lot easier to grow, compared to the other form which has only a few leaves and is not as lush in the foliage

here is a picture if the male flower

regards

colin

[metalfan]

So you are saying that the perfect conditions for Potato Chip palms (and also for the similar C. sullivaniorum) would be:

shade

humidity

soft water

temps 40-75 F

This sounds like it could be achieved by growing the plants as houseplants, with 2-3x a day misting, true, false?

[Jeff Searle]

Gina,

   It's killing you, I can tell.  Well, your on the right track. Let us all know in 6 months.

Jeff

[XYZ]

Jeff and others:

Clearly you know your stuff and I don't want to seem patronizing, but I would like to point out that:

- in all honesty, what you folks have had to play with in the past has been pretty much substandard stuff. You are also correct in emphasizing that they will not be easy for most growers on the U.S. mainland. After growing and propagating "a few" more of these than anyone else here, I can assure you that...

- ...wild-collected plants of any of these dwarf cloud forest Chams or Geonomas are a DEAD LOSS (pardon the pun). They are maladaptive to the nth degree. I am not aware of anyone who has really done well with any significant numbers of them. Besides the ethical and legal issues relating to wild-collection of these plants, past experience in the 'States shows that it's largely a waste of buyer's time and money.

- there are several ecotypes of tuercks from Guatemala, México and Honduras, at least two of which come from low elevations and truly tropical conditions. The Catemaco form appears to be what Colin has.

- sorry, there is no truth to the statement that the Veracruz form holds more leaves than the blues when both are well-cultivated. Have seen plenty of mediocre examples of both with 16-18 leaves each. Good ones >20. The difference is that most of the Veracruz plants have been grown from seed, while the Guatemalan plants were wild-collected.

- everyone parrots this rule when this sp. is under discussion, but few appear to actually follow it - excellent water is an essential. Municipal water supplies with >100 ppm TDS will do these little fellows in in slow motion. There is also some evidence that many quirky cloud forest orks and so forth are severely challenged by fluorides in municipal water and react to them by - ahem - handing in their lunch pails. Just a hunch, but these palms may also find this substance (and aluminum sulfate) very toxic. One more time, folks; rain, RO or distilled water and very free-draining media.

- Have seen a number of these palms trialed here under warm tropical conditions down on the coast under deep shade with good water and they look fine. This is Cyrtostachys renda country.

- G: I agree with Jeff on this point - don't waste your time with this sp. as a houseplant - the mites will make it look vile in 6 months. Sullis, frondosas and some of the others are a very different proposition.

- the plants in my old pic above are in soilless media (50:50 Latvian peat and styromull) that was not pH adjusted when I did this batch, so I'm suffering the consequences of having to see-saw back and forth between not enough N and Mg and too much. Once transplanted into Cal-mag ammended soil, the new leaves immediately flush deep blue.

Please note that Jason is in Western Australia. Hotter than blazes in the summer...drier than a kangaroo's jockstrap pretty much all year round...brighter than a Supernova from dawn to dusk...grower valiently admits to having dropped the ball, and...

...the plants are still alive and recovering.

As to cloud forest plants not doing well there...several SoFlo Nepenthes growers have, over the past decade, slowly learned how to grow "highland" Neps there by improving their plant sources, tweaking their culture regimens and watching their water quality. A decade ago, the rule in the U.S. CP community was that none of these cool tropical carnivorous plants could be grown in your region.

Bottom line here is that Jeff is quite correct in emphasizing that this species is never going to be a palm suitable for the conditions of some of its many fans. Hey, it may not even be a good species for palm growers, but rather, orchidiots and so forth who can dedicate the attention it needs to survive and look good. if you want to grow these palmlets like Chamaedorea cataractarum, understory Dypsis or licualas, yes, they'll be toast in short order. If you want to learn how to work with artificially-propagated cloud forest plants in cultivation than, IMO, they're not that difficult.

Jay

[metalfan]

On the subject of WATER...how about WELL WATER?

That is what we have.

Our water is fairly high in Calcium, and fairly high in Iron. It has no added Fluoride, no chlorine, chloramine etc.

It comes from a well 186 ft deep and has been filtered down through limestone like all the well water in FL.

The water to our house is treated (softened).

Is this okay, or should I just buy a jug of distilled water at Publix grocery store?

[fastfeat]

(metalfan @ Oct. 12 2007,13:13)

QUOTE

On the subject of WATER...how about WELL WATER?

That is what we have.

Our water is fairly high in Calcium, and fairly high in Iron. It has no added Fluoride, no chlorine, chloramine etc.

It comes from a well 186 ft deep and has been filtered down through limestone like all the well water in FL.

The water to our house is treated (softened).

Is this okay, or should I just buy a jug of distilled water at Publix grocery store?

Gina--

I'm no expert on this palm, but I'd suggest going with bottled water (distilled or reverse osmosis) if I had one. Anything filtered through limestone is likely to be high in Ca, which, while not as bad as sodium (Na),  it probably can't take.

BTW, I assume you water the rest of your plants with water before the water softening system, right?

[Jeff Searle]

Jay,

   Thanks for all the good information. And by you growing these and seeing their natural habitat range, you would know first hand on what they like. It's then, trying to duplicate this enviroment in cultivation is when we struggle.

   Many years ago, a very well known palm collector/nurserman here in the Miami area, brought in hundreds of C. tuercks. and C. sull. from Central America. Bare root, I remember very clearly to this day, seeing them sitting in 5gallon pails of water waiting to be sold here locally or sent out to California collectors. I agree these would be a weaker plant to try and re-establish back in cultivation. I also agree, imo plants that are grown from seed from these wild populations that are found near the coast  or low elevations, might and and should have a better chance of growing for us here. I think plants from the higher elevations might struggle more, but who knows for sure.

   I'm still not convinced entirely that with shade and clean water will do the trick. I believe these plants need some cool temp.'s during their life. But again, the populations you have found to be growing down low, would be the ones to try . Maybe you could sell us( well at least me... )some seed to try for an experiment.

Jeff

[edbrown_III]

I have experience with about 6 of them up here in Jax.  I gave 2 to ex wife, kept 4

I have 2 left ... I got these from the f ellow in Miami about 10 years ago. I love the plants but they need kid loves high humidity rain forest like environment. I would still have 4 but green house misters hada blind spot and missed a few waterings on 2 of the plants.

Good luck,

Ed

[XYZ]

G:

Pay note to Ken's query for sure!!! I've seen pics of your plants, so I know you can't be watering with straight sodium-softened water, but still...frankly, with all of the goodies that you have that would benefit from RO water (all of your lycopodia, some of your aroids, many ferns and lots of your smaller Malesian palms) I'd invest in an inexpensive R0 unit and forget about bottled water from Publix. You can use the "waste water" byproduct from the process on your lawn or whatever. Check out the smaller, easy to install units that marine aquarists use...less than two hundred bucks plus spare filters. Given that you pre-soften your water, your filters should last quite some time and the yield of good to waste should be cool. BTW: this stuff is great to drink if you add a tiny pinch of table salt to a jugful to revive the "flat" taste.

Jeff:

Thanks for resisting the impulse to beat me about the head and shoulders for disagreeing with you

One of the things that I have learned while working with all these things is that they almost certainly develop a micorrhizal relationship in the wild once the germinate...this makes them very, very difficult to transplant. I have some very nice little wild-collected tenerrima seedlings at home from 2004 as controls for my artificially-propagated seed and, in spite of being grown under "perfect" conditions they add about one leaf every year...I kid you not these things are dogs! The AP seed that I put down when I transplanted these, germinated and has grown under "hard" greenhouse conditions to >18" tall and adds like a leaf every three months. I think the very best example of the complexity of all of this is the recent experiences growing and propagating C. frondosa published by Hodel in the SoCal Journal last year, and Jason Cox's amazing results with F2 seedlings of this sp. over on his end. As you know, frondosa is very closely-related to sulli and somewhat so to tuercks...it's high up on Cusuco in misty cloud forest...the fact that Jason does so well with them under the most challenging conditions is both a tribute to his skill as a grower and the fact that the palmlet is way more adaptable than originally suspected.

I agree completely with you that blue tuerck will always be somewhat of a bad boy in cultivation, even to those of us who grow it under natural conditions in range states. Producing seed is a major challenge to anyone with less than several dozen founders and perfect eye-hand coordination. Personally, I relish the challenge and am trying to work out a doable protocol to make them easier for amateur growers. I also believe that sullivaniorum, amabilis, castillo-montii, stenocarpa and a few other showy dwarfs (incl. Geonoma epetiolata) that have equally received a bad rap for being well-nigh impossible to grow as wildings, are a very different kettle of fish from artificially-propagated seed. I am sure that you will certainly experience thsi first-hand quite soon.

And don't worry - got your back on the plants....

BRgds,

SJ

[metalfan]

The water that goes to the yard and greenhouse comes directly from the well and by-passes the softener. Only the water that is used inside the house is softened.

We do have a small RO unit under the sink, I think it has about a 15 gal/day capacity (it may not be that much). I can certainly spare water to water one small palm, LOL

[ron@springhammock]

Jason, congrats on your palm!  I remember you wanting one way back when.

I bought several years back.  I suspect it’s from the same source that Jeff and Ed referred to…Miami, bare rooted.  I was expecting seedlings, but was surprised to receive mature plants.  This makes me suspect they were harvested from the wild.  So Jeff, if you know otherwise, please let me know!  It sours my enjoyment feeling that these may have been collected from the wild.

I’m somewhat perplexed that the experts consider these a difficult grow.  Mine appear to be in fairly good shape, surviving on neglect.  My talent at growing palms lies squarely in the “Death Camp” side of the fence.  I pretty much pot them or plant them and forget about them.  If they’re around at the end of the year, good; if not, I’ve got plenty of other seedlings looking for a home.  As for the chips, I keep them under the eave in a dark and dank area.  I water them from the tap, though it’s only a handful of times since the splash back off of the roof appears to keep the soil damp enough.  I fertilize them occasionally with a couple of Nutricote pellets and have only repotted them once.  From my very limited exposure, I’d recommend avoiding Licualas, Pinangas, and even a lot of the Dypsis before C. tuerckheimii.  It’s probably dumb luck, but that’s my experience.

I started with three plants, and potted them up in one pot.  One died immediately and the others did well for several years.  Of the remaining two, one eventually developed some sort of stem rot where it touched the rim of the pot.  When the leaves started to rapidly decline, I cut it above the rot and stuck it deeply into the pot, leaving the remaining stem as not to disturb the roots of the other palm.  It’s been slow to recover, but has grown several new, though smaller leaves.  The stems seem to want to crawl along the ground, which makes them difficult to keep in the pot.  I don’t know if this is their normal habit, but sure would love to read Jay’s observation on this.

[Kamipalms]

(stone jaguar @ Oct. 13 2007,01:13)

QUOTE

Please note that Jason is in Western Australia. Hotter than blazes in the summer...drier than a kangaroo's jockstrap pretty much all year round...brighter than a Supernova from dawn to dusk...grower valiently admits to having dropped the ball, and...

...the plants are still alive and recovering.

To give an idea of climate extremes - our swimming pool has a surface area of 35 square meters ( 376 sq ft). An average sunny day of around 30C (86F) drops the water level 100mm ( 4")  thats 3500 litres ( 925 gal) of evaporation!

Summer temps often exceed 40C which is enough to allow you to use your tin roof as a BBQ.

I remember last summer at work using a digital temp meter on a piece of 10mm ( 3/8") steel plate stored out side in a rack. Mid afternoon the steel plate registered  90C ( 194F) ..... need I say any more

Back to the topic at hand,

These Chammies have been quite a challenge to find the right conditions and for me, keeping them cool enough has been the most difficult. Humidity can be easily corrected along with watering and feeding.

Temp changes also seems to play a major role. From what I've found dramatic day to night changes also has a lot to do with success.....or failure .

As for a few other spp like sullivaniorum and frondosa , they are a lot easier to grow - possibly comparable to deckeriana.

[palmtreesforpleasure]

Hi Jay

Thank you for letting me know which form i have. The Catemaco form has beautiful mottled leaves, do you grow them as well and do you have any pictures, By the way i collect rain water and i do flush the pot with rain water regularly when it has not rained to avoid salt build up

regards

colin

[XYZ]

Colin:

No, I don't grow the green forms, but my friend Juan José Castillo did...the green forms from eastern Guatemala come from 800 m elevation and sometimes have small "tails" on the apex of their leaves. I haven't seen live material from western Honduras but would assume, due to proximity and elevation, that they'll look identical to ours.

Personally I find this type of exchange quite valuable, since it stimulates me to figure out what are "key" components that make for successful cultivation of tricky plants. I suppose that, distilled to essence, the reality here is that tuercks fail in captivity when challenged on a variety of fronts (substandard plant material, low humidity, constant high temps, lousy water, too much N, poorly-draining substrate), but that they can probably accept some errors by growers if most of their criteria for living are met. What I do find interesting is that old wildings that I've seen grown in peasant gardens up in their native area often hang on for years, even when planted in red clay and getting a LOT of sun...

Last night when I was examining a plant at the house from the batch pictured above, I realized that it had flushed 1.5 leaves since being transplanted on July 27th...plant is flawless and new growth deep blue...and this with post-filtered municipal water! S'pose that since it's cool, shaded and in a very humid environment, the water issue is not stressing it (yet). Personally, I am convinced that if Jason had not had his "accident" and provided his plants with a bit more rainwater & shade, he'd be doing better with them than he has thus far; I am, however, also convinced that he will ultimately succeed with them. I completely agree with him that seed-grown blue sullis are easy and are a GREAT happy medium for people who can't devote the time and effort to blue tuercks...I'm incredibly pleased with the performance of mine and believe that they have a huge potential as an indoor plant once we get the price down to something more reasonable than it has to be now.

Will post some pics to illustrate all of all these notes on Monday.

BRgds,

SJ