Recommended palm/s for within decking, close to house. Portugal.

[Michaelaflynn]

I have bought a new build house in Portugal (near Lisbon) and sadly have to remove a pine tree which is growing within the decking as it is not healthy and very old. 

I would love to replace it with a Palm, but I am a newbie and looking for some recommendations. My plan would be to buy a mature palm, say 2-3m tall, and I would remove some deckboards if needed of course. I have attached a picture of the position, I imagine I'll have to prune some fronds as it grows up past the house.

 

Requirements

Withstand full sun? The palm will be in full sun for a lot of the time.

Water. I can add irrigation if needed but would be ideal if it didn't require constant watering.

Ideally will grow taller than the house eventually (say 10-20m?)

Doesn't drip anything like sap/resin.

 

Nice to have

I was thinking of planting 2 next to each other to get that nice slightly curved look. At the moment the pine trunk is visually interesting and worried one skinny palm doesn't look so interesting from the context of inside the house.

I like the 'neater' looking palms like Alexandra, Christmas, Archontophoenix cunninghamiana etc.

Thanks in advance for any help!

[Scott W]

I was just in Lisbon, Porto and Lagos and much of what I saw in and around these areas were Phoenix palms, Med Fan palms, Washingtons and a few queens and Brahea.  Only crown shaft palms I recall seeing were in Belem at the outdoor seating area for Pastéis de Belém and these were pretty protected from winds and cold.  I did see a few palm nurseries closer to Lagos as well.

With that this thread may help you out better....

 

 

[PalmatierMeg]

I reckon you have a Mediterranean climate, not a tropical one. The testimony of a PTer who has visited Portugal tells me that. His list is almost entirely palmate - Washingtonia, Brahea, Phoenix (bipinnate), and one non-crown-shafted pinnate palm, the ubiquitous queen. Only one unnamed crown shafted palm in a protected commercial area. Like most palm newbies you are focused on crown shafted, i.e., self-cleaning, "neater" pinnate palms to the exclusion of other palms. The problem you run into is that the vast majority of crown shafted palms tend to be tropical. I suggest you take a day and drive around all neighborhoods within a 5 km radius of your home. Take note of how many palms you see and what they look like. Take photos if you don't know their scientific names. How many have fan/palmate leaves? How many have pinnate/feather leaves? How many pinnate palms have crown shafts? If you don't see the pinnate palms you are looking for chances are they won't grow there outside of a conservatory. Cross Adonidia merrillii (the Christmas palm) off your list - they are almost as cold/cool sensitive as coconut palms. I also suggest you study your climate to get a good idea what the palms you favor will face. What are daytime temps in winter? Above 20C? Nighttime temps above 10C? Be aware that tropical palms will not photosynthesize when temps fall below 10C even when the sun shines. What are highs and lows in summer? Does most rain fall in winter or summer? Cold rain in winter can be lethal to tropical palms.

This past record winter almost all of my tropical palms took a beating. My lowest temp was 44.8F (7.1C) but we had 94+ cloudy days and our highs ran in the 50s/60s. Way below normal. I ended up with tattered yellow leaves on all my coconuts and tropical palms. Unhappy doesn't begin to describe how they looked. Shows that you don't have to see the thermometer plunge to freezing to experience cold damage.

Welcome to PalmTalk 

[SeanK]

4 hours ago, Michaelaflynn said:

I have bought a new build house in Portugal (near Lisbon) and sadly have to remove a pine tree which is growing within the decking as it is not healthy and very old. 

I would love to replace it with a Palm, but I am a newbie and looking for some recommendations. My plan would be to buy a mature palm, say 2-3m tall, and I would remove some deckboards if needed of course. I have attached a picture of the position, I imagine I'll have to prune some fronds as it grows up past the house.

 

Requirements

Withstand full sun? The palm will be in full sun for a lot of the time.

Water. I can add irrigation if needed but would be ideal if it didn't require constant watering.

Ideally will grow taller than the house eventually (say 10-20m?)

Doesn't drip anything like sap/resin.

 

Nice to have

I was thinking of planting 2 next to each other to get that nice slightly curved look. At the moment the pine trunk is visually interesting and worried one skinny palm doesn't look so interesting from the context of inside the house.

I like the 'neater' looking palms like Alexandra, Christmas, Archontophoenix cunninghamiana etc.

Thanks in advance for any help!

Dare I state the obvious, but the pine tree's trunk will have to be ground down. You may end up removing a 2m x 2m area of decking to clean out trunk and roots.

[Tyrone]

I’m thinking multiplanted Kentias may look good there.
 

There’s a lot of work to remove that tree. 

[Michaelaflynn]

Thanks for all the advice so far.  Definitely mediterranean climate as mentioned.

And yes sadly will have to lift the decking to get the roots out, it doesn't have a huge rootball though as we did build the decking over it originally (turns out a mistake!!)

I did a scout around our neighbourhood and these ones caught my eye as they look similar to the ones I was looking at and seem to be doing OK? Can anyone ID them? Especially interested to know about the one in the right in the second pic!

Thanks in advance

 

 

[Cluster]

Those are Archontophoenix cunninghamiana and queen palms, they will grow well for you, but Archontophoenix do not look the best in very windy zones. The Kentias as people have already said could be a nice option.

If you are in a protected area you may also try a Royal Palm as I have seen some in Lisbon, another one you can try to push is dypsis lutescens (a few of them together), again if you are in a warm area.

 

If you like fan palms, maybe a bismarckia nobilis.

[happypalms]

Cocothrinax eckmanii slow growing so a much better longer lasting look if you plant archontophoenix and syagrus you will be fast looking at a power pole with such a great setting shame to put a power pole in Howea bellmoreana would give you more of a exotic look than Howea fosteriana the syagrus would drop a million seeds and leaves that would flatten a nice deck table perhaps a chambeyronia macrocarpa an advanced specimen planted would take the sun if irrigated and pop with the background setting choose the watermelon variety at least the trunk will look half decent and slow so the effect your after will be for a lot of years good luck with such a great setting spend good money on something different it will be worth it