TEXAS 2025

[Ivanos1982]

oh and here is a pic of my ravenea rivularis. I have four of these and they look ok 

[Fusca]

9 hours ago, ahosey01 said:

Forecast for last night ended up being way off.  NWS predicting 30F and we bottomed out at 37F.

Whole thing really a non-event here in Brownsville.  Over in Mission it looks like it's down in the upper 20s.

Same here - 33°F this morning after 27°F Monday.  Everything is uncovered now and only damage I see so far is the typical foliar damage to my royals, bananas, Delonix regia and Jatropha.  Looks like future damage to the newly planted spindle palm but should be minimal.  Somehow my Celeste fig still has leaves intact and flowers on my newly planted Valencia orange look OK.

[MarcusH]

5 hours ago, Robert Cade Ross said:

Survived the hard freeze - coldest night was “only” 23.7° F  (Manvel ) spring please hurry up 🙌 

 

I’ll venture over to Alvin in a few days to see if anything is dead lol. 

My Robusta is already turning brown lol. Nothing new .

[SeanK]

Glad the Great State of Texas fared well. My place hit 12°F this morning.

[Chester B]

16 hours ago, MarcusH said:

My Robusta is already turning brown lol. Nothing new .

So your lowest was 21 or 22.  How long were you below freezing?

How about the filifera?

[Robert Cade Ross]

For once the Houston Area palm lovers are being spared and Florida is getting abused 😆❄️ . 

[MarcusH]

7 hours ago, Chester B said:

So your lowest was 21 or 22.  How long were you below freezing?

How about the filifera?

I can't tell you how long I lost track of it but it felt like a whole day of freezing temperatures. Definitely colder here than Houston plus the ice would not melt on most palms on Sunday . 

It was close to 22 in my neighborhood. 

Damage report : well it is too early to say that everything looks better than I thought.  Filiferas look the same. Robustas is slowly turning brown I just don't know by how much yet. Butias look the same. Sabal minor look the same. Your Trachies look the same,  Queen looks the same.  Phoenix dactylifera spear pulled yesterday and looks brown.  I pulled on all spears.  Let's see how things go next week after the next cold front.  Low 20s for us in the forecast but no precipitation. 

[UK_Palms]

1 hour ago, MarcusH said:

I can't tell you how long I lost track of it but it felt like a whole day of freezing temperatures. Definitely colder here than Houston plus the ice would not melt on most palms on Sunday . 

It was close to 22 in my neighborhood. 

Damage report : well it is too early to say that everything looks better than I thought.  Filiferas look the same. Robustas is slowly turning brown I just don't know by how much yet. Butias look the same. Sabal minor look the same. Your Trachies look the same,  Queen looks the same.  Phoenix dactylifera spear pulled yesterday and looks brown.  I pulled on all spears.  Let's see how things go next week after the next cold front.  Low 20s for us in the forecast but no precipitation. 

Your Dacty spear pulled already from 22F...!? That was like 3 days later. Did you have any snow with this freeze?

[MarcusH]

27 minutes ago, UK_Palms said:

Your Dacty spear pulled already from 22F...!? That was like 3 days later. Did you have any snow with this freeze?

Yes it did. We only had freezing rain without snow but ice didn't melt all on the first day due to lack of sunshine.  

[UK_Palms]

27 minutes ago, MarcusH said:

Yes it did. We only had freezing rain without snow but ice didn't melt all on the first day due to lack of sunshine.  

 

That Dacty doesn't look good at all. It is definitely on borrowed time for you there. It looks fairly dry where you are too as well. I am surprised how bad that Dacty has fared though from just 22F. And how quickly the damage has showed.

Are there any half decent sized Dacty's in San Antonio? Or even Houston?

[RedRabbit]

[MarcusH]

8 hours ago, UK_Palms said:

 

That Dacty doesn't look good at all. It is definitely on borrowed time for you there. It looks fairly dry where you are too as well. I am surprised how bad that Dacty has fared though from just 22F. And how quickly the damage has showed.

Are there any half decent sized Dacty's in San Antonio? Or even Houston?

Yes it's definitely on borrowed time.  Dactyliferas are rare in San Antonio,  most of them where replanted after 2021. I'm not sure how many survived but I know for sure some did. Overall with our cold winters they struggle to look good. Houston on the other hand has way more Dactyliferas and they do look nice from what I've seen so far.  

I planted mine as a seedling last year.  I would assume it was too young  to battle the cold weather.  It got down to 22/21 . No Dactylifera should be killed by that temperature , at least not a mature one. 

[UK_Palms]

2 hours ago, MarcusH said:

Yes it's definitely on borrowed time.  Dactyliferas are rare in San Antonio,  most of them where replanted after 2021. I'm not sure how many survived but I know for sure some did. Overall with our cold winters they struggle to look good. Houston on the other hand has way more Dactyliferas and they do look nice from what I've seen so far.  

I planted mine as a seedling last year.  I would assume it was too young  to battle the cold weather.  It got down to 22/21 . No Dactylifera should be killed by that temperature , at least not a mature one. 

The reason I ask about mature Dacty’s in San Antonio and Houston is all the rainfall and humidity. And the wet-freezes that you can get (even though it looks quite dry in your photo) so I was wondering whether they can even survive that sort of climate there.

I lost a Dacty here after a mild, wet winter. Think my minimum that winter was about 26-27F maybe. My Washingtonia Filifera sailed through fine, but the Dacty spear pulled like your one and just rotted away. Again Filifera was totally fine. Shows that Dacty’s need even drier and less humid conditions than Filifera, which can actually take a fair bit of wet-cold. Dactylifera’s on the other hand cannot.

[Xenon]

Wow local media and NWS way off this morning again, they had a light freeze 30-31F forecast for "Houston". And yet nowhere inside the Beltway is remotely near that 😂, a good chunk of 610 is above 40F 😂.  Even Katy is in the mid 30s and not upper 20s

[Chester B]

2 hours ago, UK_Palms said:

The reason I ask about mature Dacty’s in San Antonio and Houston is all the rainfall and humidity. And the wet-freezes that you can get (even though it looks quite dry in your photo) so I was wondering whether they can even survive that sort of climate there.

I lost a Dacty here after a mild, wet winter. Think my minimum that winter was about 26-27F maybe. My Washingtonia Filifera sailed through fine, but the Dacty spear pulled like your one and just rotted away. Again Filifera was totally fine. Shows that Dacty’s need even drier and less humid conditions than Filifera, which can actually take a fair bit of wet-cold. Dactylifera’s on the other hand cannot.

There are mature CIDP, dacytilifera and syslvestris all over Houston.  The last two years we recorded 19F and I haven't seen a dead one anywhere.  Frond damage was minor to major but all seem to survive.  There are dead Washingtonia telephone poles all around still, so if any Phoenix died there likely would be a few left.

 

12 hours ago, RedRabbit said:

That's not correct all.  I didn't go below freezing until Sunday around 10 am and was above freezing the next morning.  WeatherUnderground data shows IAH at 26 hours below freezing which is inline with what I saw.

[Robert Cade Ross]

My HGC robsutas ? Don’t have any damage showing up so far.

[MarcusH]

7 hours ago, UK_Palms said:

The reason I ask about mature Dacty’s in San Antonio and Houston is all the rainfall and humidity. And the wet-freezes that you can get (even though it looks quite dry in your photo) so I was wondering whether they can even survive that sort of climate there.

I lost a Dacty here after a mild, wet winter. Think my minimum that winter was about 26-27F maybe. My Washingtonia Filifera sailed through fine, but the Dacty spear pulled like your one and just rotted away. Again Filifera was totally fine. Shows that Dacty’s need even drier and less humid conditions than Filifera, which can actually take a fair bit of wet-cold. Dactylifera’s on the other hand cannot.

San Antonio is semi dry . It does get humid but on most days not anywhere close to places like near the coast or Houston .  SA is in an extreme drought since 2022 and hasn't seen above average annual rainfall since 2018. It's super dry !!!! 

They say P. Dactylifera don't like humid conditions but I see them all over the Gulf Coast ( I'm not mixing it up with P.Silvestris) so it shows they can handle humid conditions.  It's definitely a heat loving palm. I would assume you would struggle to keep one alive for long in the UK. Too wet , too cold . They thrive in hot climates but don't expect fast growth under ideal conditions either.  Slow to moderate.  

[Chester B]

I looked at my robustas again today.  Some of the mostly older fronds have a little bit of yellow spotting but its not really all that noticeable.  

[MarcusH]

1 hour ago, Chester B said:

I looked at my robustas again today.  Some of the mostly older fronds have a little bit of yellow spotting but its not really all that noticeable.  

Mine is about to defoliate as always.  Can't even handle low 20s what a sissy.  At least I get to see the trunk after the annual haircut 😅. Filiferas don't even get mad at temps in the low 20s. Here's a picture from the frond yard. Difference between day and night . 

[Xenon]

Houston looks good all things considered. Better than the 2014 freeze. Definitely a below average winter but probably right at the median for the last 10-15 years +/- 

[Xenon]

7 hours ago, Chester B said:

 

 

That's not correct all.  I didn't go below freezing until Sunday around 10 am and was above freezing the next morning.  WeatherUnderground data shows IAH at 26 hours below freezing which is inline with what I saw.

That's total hours below freezing not total consecutive. Yeah the way it's presented is not clear 

[Robert Cade Ross]

Alexandre no damage thankfully 😄. 
all my citrus are okay looking. Hopefully this upcoming freeze will be the last  till next winter 🤞

[MarcusH]

25 minutes ago, Robert Cade Ross said:

Alexandre no damage thankfully 😄. 
all my citrus are okay looking. Hopefully this upcoming freeze will be the last  till next winter 🤞

Looks very good.  How much cold can they usually take? 

[Chester B]

@MarcusH my robusta looked way worse last year after our cold spell almost immediately.  You still have some green in yours so I wouldn’t remove until they’re totally brown. The good thing is it will look fine in a couple of months.  I know my most vigorous ones grew around 40 fronds this year, not an exaggeration either. They lost all their fronds last year and I started trimming them mid summer when they had 24 fronds.  They’re like the bamboo of palms. I wish Sabals grew half as fast. 

[ahosey01]

19 hours ago, MarcusH said:

Mine is about to defoliate as always.  Can't even handle low 20s what a sissy.  At least I get to see the trunk after the annual haircut 😅. Filiferas don't even get mad at temps in the low 20s. Here's a picture from the frond yard. Difference between day and night . 

Robusta probably won't even defoliate just get brown on the leaf edges.

[Las Palmas Norte]

32 minutes ago, ahosey01 said:

Robusta probably won't even defoliate just get brown on the leaf edges.

Meanwhile, for comparison up in the PNW, my Washingtonia are under cover from this. It rained cats n dogs all last night.

*A warm front drawing in moist, subtropical air continues to produce rain, at times heavy, across East Vancouver Island today. The heavy rain will ease to showers this afternoon.

[MarcusH]

3 hours ago, ahosey01 said:

Robusta probably won't even defoliate just get brown on the leaf edges.

I'll keep you up to date.  

[MarcusH]

Just now, MarcusH said:

I'll keep you up to date.  

The last few days I've been spying on our friends in Florida. They aren't amused this winter at all.  The cold has been pretty brutal east of the Rockies.  

[Robert Cade Ross]

On 1/29/2026 at 6:40 PM, MarcusH said:

Looks very good.  How much cold can they usually take? 

Maybe 25-26° briefly when mature. This and my purpurea are my most sensitive zone push . Hoping I can get both to have around 5-7’ of solid “wood” before they die out. 

[RedRabbit]

On 1/29/2026 at 6:11 PM, Robert Cade Ross said:

Alexandre no damage thankfully 😄. 
all my citrus are okay looking. Hopefully this upcoming freeze will be the last  till next winter 🤞

I’m impressed. What did you do to protect them? We’ve had a few cold weeks, I thought it would take a toll on anything crownshafted.

[Robert Cade Ross]

1 hour ago, RedRabbit said:

I’m impressed. What did you do to protect them? We’ve had a few cold weeks, I thought it would take a toll on anything crownshafted.

I’ve only protected them from the recent hard freeze . They have been exposed to upper 20s about 2-3X this winter already no issues. 
I’m gambling a bit more with them this weekend (26-27°) expected Sunday night. I imagine they should be fine 🙌🤞

[RedRabbit]

13 hours ago, Robert Cade Ross said:

I’ve only protected them from the recent hard freeze . They have been exposed to upper 20s about 2-3X this winter already no issues. 
I’m gambling a bit more with them this weekend (26-27°) expected Sunday night. I imagine they should be fine 🙌🤞

I’d probably protect them. In my experience, the don’t always bounce back after being defoliated.

[Xenon]

I lost all of the leaves on this one last winter (skimpy protection to save the bud). These are all 2025 leaves (pic from December 2025). This is a few years old direct seeded 

Hopefully it still looks +/- like this when the covers come off tomorrow. I probably damaged all the emerging spears trying to make the covers fit 😕  Is winter over yet ???! 

 

[Xerarch]

Here is my Foxtail a week after my ultimate low of the season and only night below freezing. Hit 26.8, I can no longer reach the fronds to protect, so they were on their own. I’m pleasantly surprised. A little bit torched but really looking pretty good considering.  Better than the Royals at least. 

[ahosey01]

1 hour ago, Xerarch said:

Here is my Foxtail a week after my ultimate low of the season and only night below freezing. Hit 26.8, I can no longer reach the fronds to protect, so they were on their own. I’m pleasantly surprised. A little bit torched but really looking pretty good considering.  Better than the Royals at least. 

Foxtails are absolutely hardier than royals.  In last year's 28F event here in Brownsville, every royal had substantial leaf damage.  None were killed (that I'm aware of) including smaller ones, but no Foxtails in the immediate vicinity except the very small ones had any damage at all.

[Robert Cade Ross]

3 hours ago, Xenon said:

I lost all of the leaves on this one last winter (skimpy protection to save the bud). These are all 2025 leaves (pic from December 2025). This is a few years old direct seeded 

Hopefully it still looks +/- like this when the covers come off tomorrow. I probably damaged all the emerging spears trying to make the covers fit 😕  Is winter over yet ???! 

 

I started mine from seed back in 2022 and planted them that summer. They managed to survive 17° in December of 2022 ❄️. With just a bucket and some hope lol . 

[MarcusH]

3 hours ago, Xerarch said:

Here is my Foxtail a week after my ultimate low of the season and only night below freezing. Hit 26.8, I can no longer reach the fronds to protect, so they were on their own. I’m pleasantly surprised. A little bit torched but really looking pretty good considering.  Better than the Royals at least. 

Besides Queen palms , Foxtail palms are also my favorite.  I wonder if I should try grow one in a pot hmm.  I know palms in pots never look as beautiful as the one growing in the ground.  Keep us up to date with your Foxtail please. You should be fine.

[MarcusH]

On 1/30/2026 at 11:56 AM, ahosey01 said:

Robusta probably won't even defoliate just get brown on the leaf edges.

Update . Took this picture this afternoon.  Not much green left anymore. 

[Robert Cade Ross]

21 minutes ago, MarcusH said:

Update . Took this picture this afternoon.  Not much green left anymore. 

This is how palms tend to look in Texas lol 

[Chester B]

3 hours ago, Robert Cade Ross said:

This is how palms tend to look in Texas lol 

So far in Houston they look good. I haven’t seen any damaged palms yet. My neighbors queens (protected) still have green fronds as well as their Livistona chinensis all look flawless.