On 7/27/2025 at 1:19 AM, donalt said:

took this pic from a boat in Newport California.....when they are in their element, they can become exquisite palms!

Wow, they are indeed among the most beautiful palms.. their elegance is surreal. I bet these specimens are more than 50 years old. 

Also, I thought they don't like full sun, but I guess that's only true when they are young? I have mine under 40% shade cloth and yet many leaves have been scorched

30 minutes ago, Than said:

Wow, they are indeed among the most beautiful palms.. their elegance is surreal. I bet these specimens are more than 50 years old. 

Also, I thought they don't like full sun, but I guess that's only true when they are young? I have mine under 40% shade cloth and yet many leaves have been scorched

For Howea sp 70 percent shade cloth is best, 40 percent is just to bright for most palms.

though they are in full sun, the air is quite pleasantly cool. this photo was taken mid summer afternoon and the temperatures were only in the 60sF (about 19C).....

5 hours ago, Than said:

Wow, they are indeed among the most beautiful palms.. their elegance is surreal. I bet these specimens are more than 50 years old. 

Also, I thought they don't like full sun, but I guess that's only true when they are young? I have mine under 40% shade cloth and yet many leaves have been scorched

Shade is always a good bet, but Howea forsteriana are full sun palms in coastal California and there are many growing in exposed positions. Newport is a beach town, so there's plenty of maritime influence. 

I would've planted mine in more shade if I had it, but my yard is sunny. I only got started in 2020 and I wasn't interested in establishing a whole canopy first for shade palms to grow under. I'm by the ocean in San Francisco, so the air is generally cool and humid.

Shade: 

Part sun:

Full sun:

Can still get a little cooked under open sky, but it just shows a bit of stress on leaf tips. Not burning up leaves or anything. I planted this one out too hastily three years ago and really burned it the first year by placing it here before it was ready for such an exposed spot. It's settled and growing well now, and each leaf shows less stress. Needs a couple years still to show its best self. 

@Rivera the million dollar question is: how do their growth rates compare?

@happypalms I put an 80% cloth on top of it first but then I thought I should slowly acclimatize it to the sun, so I replaced it with a 40% one. Cos, one day, in 20 years, if everything goes well, it will reach the full sun anyway, right? 

Also I have read that they grow faster when they get some sun.

22 minutes ago, Than said:

how do their growth rates compare?

I planted them at different sizes at different times (and got them from different sources), so I can't make a meaningful comparison. 

The largest in full sun is easily the fastest. It's gaining stem girth at a respectable pace and giving me two to three leaves a year since its first year of settling into (and sulking in) it's new sunny position. 

This one gets lots of afternoon sun and has endured some pretty nasty heat waves over the years (100°F plus) with little stress. It started out in bright but full shade and grew into the open sky. Howea forsteriana are pretty durable with time. This one’s approximately 25 years old. 
 

On the subject of Howea in the sun, this little juvenile transitions to greater exposure under a quick and dirty shade structure extended from the fence. It's an open weave, maybe 30%. This palm is already acclimated to some direct sun, so my wish is to give it just enough coverage to adjust without trauma. 

(@Darold Petty This is one of the Millbrae courtyard seedlings. It got "musical chaired" around a bit and was living in a container before landing in this spot after your last visit.) 

Buried in wire. I avoid leaving anything precious for the pocket gophers to decide. Wire everywhere. 

My wife may have cast a sidelong glance at some plants that have appeared in the garden, but never at a kentia. 

8 hours ago, Than said:

@Rivera the million dollar question is: how do their growth rates compare?

@happypalms I put an 80% cloth on top of it first but then I thought I should slowly acclimatize it to the sun, so I replaced it with a 40% one. Cos, one day, in 20 years, if everything goes well, it will reach the full sun anyway, right? 

Also I have read that they grow faster when they get some sun.

They are an age thing in growth,sun or shade dappled light. It doesn’t matter they are slow regardless. They will burn if the humidity is low in full, the higher the humidity the more sun a palm will tolerate!

6 hours ago, Jim in Los Altos said:

This one gets lots of afternoon sun and has endured some pretty nasty heat waves over the years (100°F plus) with little stress. It started out in bright but full shade and grew into the open sky. Howea forsteriana are pretty durable with time. This one’s approximately 25 years old. 
 

That’s about the time it takes for them to set seeds 25 years or more, height doesn’t determine when they become fully mature.  I have seen 8 feet of trunk and seeds setting, there the easy ones to collect! 

2 hours ago, Rivera said:

On the subject of Howea in the sun, this little juvenile transitions to greater exposure under a quick and dirty shade structure extended from the fence. It's an open weave, maybe 30%. This palm is already acclimated to some direct sun, so my wish is to give it just enough coverage to adjust without trauma. 

(@Darold Petty This is one of the Millbrae courtyard seedlings. It got "musical chaired" around a bit and was living in a container before landing in this spot after your last visit.) 

Buried in wire. I avoid leaving anything precious for the pocket gophers to decide. Wire everywhere. 

My wife may have cast a sidelong glance at some plants that have appeared in the garden, but never at a kentia. 

They really only burn in extreme dry hot  heat and if newly planted from the greenhouse. Your one should be fine. 

3 hours ago, happypalms said:

That’s about the time it takes for them to set seeds 25 years or more, height doesn’t determine when they become fully mature.  I have seen 8 feet of trunk and seeds setting, there the easy ones to collect! 

This one set first set seeds seven years ago and the other one I posted the green trunk of started flowering at twelve years from planting out of a 2 liter pot. When they’re happy, they can start flowering long before reaching 25.  

11 hours ago, Jim in Los Altos said:

This one gets lots of afternoon sun and has endured some pretty nasty heat waves over the years (100°F plus) with little stress. It started out in bright but full shade and grew into the open sky. Howea forsteriana are pretty durable with time. This one’s approximately 25 years old. 
 

Wow. Quite fast for Howea standards! Impressive. Dang, one day, I'll cross half the globe and I'll come and visit your garden (with prior permission of course haha). It must be paradise on earth. 

I'll be happy if mine is 30 feet in 10 years from now. Right now it's not even 3 feet, including leaves. 

Here it is right now. It's 8.20 am. You can see the shade cloth above. The soil around it is still wet.

 

A difficult one to capture in pictures, with them being so tall in the mid canopy blending in with the rest of the foliage, but a few recognisable pictures. With a small one I was able to get some pictures of the male flowers, and with a tap on the flower a nice dispersal of pollen. A great palm that takes all sorts of growing conditions. These ones are about 25 years old, with a height of at 6 meters. An easy palm to grow and if you can look up you get to see them. 

Is that a female Richard? I've got three the same sex and they look similar to the one in your pics.

14 minutes ago, Jonathan said:

Is that a female Richard? I've got three the same sex and they look similar to the one in your pics.

Male all the pollen have it away, I was wondering what it was, then a tap on the flower and bingo we got a boy! 

Just now, happypalms said:

Male all the pollen have it away, I was wondering what it was, then a tap on the flower and bingo we got a boy! 

Dang...no point get getting pollen if I've got three boys then! But having said that, I don't remember mine having wads of pollen like in your pics.

I miss mine a lot. I had 4 in a pot and one by one something just sucked the life out of them. The fronds all got droopy and then it's like the trunks (yeah,n they had rings!) just got sucked dry. Beautiful palms. I'll get some more one day when I've got room and money. 

4 minutes ago, Jonathan said:

Dang...no point get getting pollen if I've got three boys then! But having said that, I don't remember mine having wads of pollen like in your pics.

Cmon man it’s happypalms we got lots of pollen. I do get seeds now and then so hopefully this year, but they are so tall, so I will grab the stems and bend them together and give them a good going over in the match making department. 

2 minutes ago, JohnAndSancho said:

I miss mine a lot. I had 4 in a pot and one by one something just sucked the life out of them. The fronds all got droopy and then it's like the trunks (yeah,n they had rings!) just got sucked dry. Beautiful palms. I'll get some more one day when I've got room and money. 

Phytophera perhaps too wet! Iam hopeful for some seeds this season! 

22 minutes ago, happypalms said:

Phytophera perhaps too wet! Iam hopeful for some seeds this season! 

I erred on the dry side. After they died I found out they were very fungus prone. And I had the bottle of copper fungicide all along. They were a pretty good size for potted plants indoors, and expensive too lol. Oh well. I hope you get seeds too, they're gorgeous palms and fast too. 

1 hour ago, JohnAndSancho said:

I erred on the dry side. After they died I found out they were very fungus prone. And I had the bottle of copper fungicide all along. They were a pretty good size for potted plants indoors, and expensive too lol. Oh well. I hope you get seeds too, they're gorgeous palms and fast too. 

I may be possible they didn’t like being inside for too long, I would rotate my indoor plants when I was gardening inside the house. And most times it was two weeks indoors then 4 weeks outside in a shaded place. 

52 minutes ago, happypalms said:

I may be possible they didn’t like being inside for too long, I would rotate my indoor plants when I was gardening inside the house. And most times it was two weeks indoors then 4 weeks outside in a shaded place. 

Yeah maybe. I left it on the patio in Texas and it got lots of sun and rain. I brought it here and it became a giant kitten chew toy. I bought it from Jungle Music so it wasn't cheap. Crazy though that the trunks all just looked and felt like they'd been deflated. 

 

Now that the cats have seen me swing the cultivator and watched me bury a few of them, they're all scared of me and know to stay away from my plants now. There's literally thousands of trees they can tear up here, they can leave mine alone. 

Indoor gardening is challenging to say the least. I used to have houseplants and it became too hard to keep them happy. Between keeping the cats away from chewing on them ( near impossible ) and keeping them clean ( dust free ) , then taking them outside for a break , it was exhausting . Put them permanently outside side , problem solved . I do spend a lot of time in my garden but it is enjoyable outdoors. 
   I know there are some plants that will not like the indoors . The only work around for those that live in cold climates is a heated greenhouse . Even here in my palm heaven , I would have one if I had the space . I built a nice one at the old house for a fraction of what a store bought kit would cost . I remember seeing one built out of old house windows and a couple of stained glass panels , it was lovely , sort of like a quilt. Harry

Indoor growing is tricky for sure but like, every time I buy something or plant it out I find out there's a moth or a caterpillar whose goal in life is to destroy it. There's less bugs and it rarely snows inside. And I've got plants and palms that would be killed by both our summers and our winters, so - it's a tradeoff. But I really just want to keep expanding inside and outside. Nothing a few hundred bucks worth of grow lights, a truckload of mulch and compost, a few more heat mats, a pallet of potting soil, some fans, another TV, a bunch of 1020 trays with tall domes, an RO water filter, some lumber, a few miles of landscape edging, a bunch of tools, a dump cart, a robot lawnmower, a mountain of nursery pots, a bunch of wire racks, maybe some solar panels to run the grow lights, a few hundred paver stones, a wood chipper, a tree trimming service, a truck, a few hundred feet of landscape fabric, some more tools, a couple dozen established plants, a few hundred seeds, and a solid customer base wouldn't fix. 

Good work. You have jolted my memory as I think I’ve some hidden away I need to resuscitate. 

6 hours ago, JohnAndSancho said:

Yeah maybe. I left it on the patio in Texas and it got lots of sun and rain. I brought it here and it became a giant kitten chew toy. I bought it from Jungle Music so it wasn't cheap. Crazy though that the trunks all just looked and felt like they'd been deflated. 

 

Now that the cats have seen me swing the cultivator and watched me bury a few of them, they're all scared of me and know to stay away from my plants now. There's literally thousands of trees they can tear up here, they can leave mine alone. 

I get palms that just drop dead for some reason or other. Some I can put down to growers fault others I have no idea, but most problems are from overwatering and over fertiliser and of course cold weather. So now you’re becoming a crazy cat man hey John sancho won’t like that! 

5 hours ago, JohnAndSancho said:

Indoor growing is tricky for sure but like, every time I buy something or plant it out I find out there's a moth or a caterpillar whose goal in life is to destroy it. There's less bugs and it rarely snows inside. And I've got plants and palms that would be killed by both our summers and our winters, so - it's a tradeoff. But I really just want to keep expanding inside and outside. Nothing a few hundred bucks worth of grow lights, a truckload of mulch and compost, a few more heat mats, a pallet of potting soil, some fans, another TV, a bunch of 1020 trays with tall domes, an RO water filter, some lumber, a few miles of landscape edging, a bunch of tools, a dump cart, a robot lawnmower, a mountain of nursery pots, a bunch of wire racks, maybe some solar panels to run the grow lights, a few hundred paver stones, a wood chipper, a tree trimming service, a truck, a few hundred feet of landscape fabric, some more tools, a couple dozen established plants, a few hundred seeds, and a solid customer base wouldn't fix. 

You forget shade cloth and dura weave plastic! 

6 hours ago, Harry’s Palms said:

Indoor gardening is challenging to say the least. I used to have houseplants and it became too hard to keep them happy. Between keeping the cats away from chewing on them ( near impossible ) and keeping them clean ( dust free ) , then taking them outside for a break , it was exhausting . Put them permanently outside side , problem solved . I do spend a lot of time in my garden but it is enjoyable outdoors. 
   I know there are some plants that will not like the indoors . The only work around for those that live in cold climates is a heated greenhouse . Even here in my palm heaven , I would have one if I had the space . I built a nice one at the old house for a fraction of what a store bought kit would cost . I remember seeing one built out of old house windows and a couple of stained glass panels , it was lovely , sort of like a quilt. Harry

I kill enough plants outside, so indoor gardening to me is not my cuppa tea, I used be a fanatic about indoor plants with dozens inside. It’s a great way to learn growing plants and once you learn indoor gardening outside seems a lot easier. I have those windows lying around with an octagonal shape building and they even have some panels of stained glass, I will let you know when iam not busy and start building it……..

Richard 

8 minutes ago, happypalms said:

I get palms that just drop dead for some reason or other. Some I can put down to growers fault others I have no idea, but most problems are from overwatering and over fertiliser and of course cold weather. So now you’re becoming a crazy cat man hey John sancho won’t like that! 

Sancho loves the little kittens. He's indifferent once they get older but when they're tiny he's fascinated by them. Anyway yeah it just up and died, I've just - I've seen rot I've seen leaf loss I've seen spear pull but these just looked like they deflated, like an empty Capri Sun pouch, like something literally sucked the life out of them. 

Anyway eff these cats. 

 

4 hours ago, KrisKupsch said:

Good work. You have jolted my memory as I think I’ve some hidden away I need to resuscitate. 

Nothing like a bit of shock therapy kris to get the old memory bank working again. I got a stack of different chamaedoreas varieties available. Chamaedores once observed are quite interesting palms and a joy to work with. They may not be the most sought after palm, but a lot of interesting varieties amongst them worth learning how to breed, but I personally don’t recommend cross pollinating them and creating hybrids as some do. 

4 minutes ago, JohnAndSancho said:

Sancho loves the little kittens. He's indifferent once they get older but when they're tiny he's fascinated by them. Anyway yeah it just up and died, I've just - I've seen rot I've seen leaf loss I've seen spear pull but these just looked like they deflated, like an empty Capri Sun pouch, like something literally sucked the life out of them. 

Anyway eff these cats. 

 

Some dogs eat cats some dogs love cats others stay well away from them. The more you kill palms the more you learn, well some people do some don’t! 

11 minutes ago, happypalms said:

Some dogs eat cats some dogs love cats others stay well away from them. The more you kill palms the more you learn, well some people do some don’t! 

I've quoted Brother Dave so many times, but he once told me if you ain't killin' you ain't growin'. 

On 9/6/2025 at 5:18 AM, JohnAndSancho said:

I've quoted Brother Dave so many times, but he once told me if you ain't killin' you ain't growin'. 

Well iam a growin, with the amount of palms I have killed!

1 hour ago, happypalms said:

Well iam a growin, with the amount of palms I have killed!

Hopefully that's one area I don't catch up to you!

On 9/5/2025 at 12:43 PM, happypalms said:

Phytophera perhaps too wet! Iam hopeful for some seeds this season! 

Or Rhizoctonia

2 hours ago, Phoenikakias said:

Or Rhizoctonia

Well spotted we need a pathologist on the job.

The only way I can successfully have that tropical look I want in the garden, and grow the tropical plant varieties that require water is hook up one inch sprinklers that soak the ground and create the humidity required for such tropical plants. Twenty minutes of watering with one will every second day in summer should do the job. I can’t move to Hawaii so I will bring Hawaii to me, the old saying if Muhammad won’t go to the mountain then you bring the mountain to Muhammad! 

8 minutes ago, happypalms said:

The only way I can successfully have that tropical look I want in the garden, and grow the tropical plant varieties that require water is hook up one inch sprinklers that soak the ground and create the humidity required for such tropical plants. Twenty minutes of watering with one will every second day in summer should do the job. I can’t move to Hawaii so I will bring Hawaii to me, the old saying if Muhammad won’t go to the mountain then you bring the mountain to Muhammad! 

IMG_4216.mov

Were it not for the eucalyptus, I would have thought you were in some tropical rainforest!

6 minutes ago, Slifer00 said:

Were it not for the eucalyptus, I would have thought you were in some tropical rainforest!

A subtropical climate, there is plenty of rainforest in my area and pockets of them, creeks lined with rainforest. But yes the gum trees are a moisture drinking curse for me they store so much water and drink so much water, if I was to bring out the chainsaw there would be a lot more moisture in the soil. But I have created a rainforest jungle garden it can be done amongst the gum trees.