Can I see some well taken care of older Christmas palms?

[MC Silver]

Christmas palms are so popular but I don't really like them past their juvenile stage. And most adult specimens that I see around the neighborhood aren't that well taken care of. Can I see some well-maintained christmas palms so I can decide how I feel.  Thanks!

[mnorell]

Try this Google Maps street view in Key West as a starting point: then just explore the streets and see how beautiful they can be if grown naturally, in groves. Their twisty, leaning trunks lend a very relaxed but elegant quality to the landscape. One of the nice things about Adonidia in South Florida is the fact that they don't have to be "well taken care of" because they are in hog-heaven when grown in limestone, they laugh off the worst hurricanes, seawater inundation, etc. They are self-cleaning and are very charming when not placed all alone in a rigid grid of overly separated specimens, where their "straight-up" growth makes them look less remarkable than when placed in a grove.

Ultimately it's about your own aesthetics...it sounds like you may not be drawn to this species, and there's nothing wrong with that, but I would just tempt you with some of these groves all over Key West. There is a reason they are popular and commonplace there...they are naturally carefree and can handle lots of adversity with little or no extra help from us. And when you go through a hurricane like Irma (as we did on Big Pine Key) and see a happy Adonidia smiling back at you, perhaps having just lost a few leaves, amidst the carnage of an utterly destroyed landscape, they become adored citizens of hurricane-prone areas. Plant one next to a Wodyetia in Miami limestone, and in a few years, see which one you value, and which one you don't...

[MC Silver]

Thanks those streets and groves look really nice! But overall, I just dont like their small crown on those tall trunks.  Just my opinion lol. I guess I was hoping that with fertilizer and water their crowns would expand a bit and please my eye more. But they sure are tough palms!

[Rubberboots]

@MC Silver tough palms how?

 

[MC Silver]

On 7/1/2025 at 12:08 AM, mnorell said:

One of the nice things about Adonidia in South Florida is the fact that they don't have to be "well taken care of" because they are in hog-heaven when grown in limestone, they laugh off the worst hurricanes, seawater inundation, etc.

There is a reason they are popular and commonplace there...they are naturally carefree and can handle lots of adversity with little or no extra help from us. And when you go through a hurricane like Irma (as we did on Big Pine Key) and see a happy Adonidia smiling back at you, perhaps having just lost a few leaves, amidst the carnage of an utterly destroyed landscape, they become adored citizens of hurricane-prone areas. 

@Rubberboots for these reasons. 

[Rubberboots]

On 6/30/2025 at 9:08 PM, mnorell said:

Try this Google Maps street view in Key West as a starting point: then just explore the streets and see how beautiful they can be if grown naturally, in groves. Their twisty, leaning trunks lend a very relaxed but elegant quality to the landscape. One of the nice things about Adonidia in South Florida is the fact that they don't have to be "well taken care of" because they are in hog-heaven when grown in limestone, they laugh off the worst hurricanes, seawater inundation, etc. They are self-cleaning and are very charming when not placed all alone in a rigid grid of overly separated specimens, where their "straight-up" growth makes them look less remarkable than when placed in a grove.

Ultimately it's about your own aesthetics...it sounds like you may not be drawn to this species, and there's nothing wrong with that, but I would just tempt you with some of these groves all over Key West. There is a reason they are popular and commonplace there...they are naturally carefree and can handle lots of adversity with little or no extra help from us. And when you go through a hurricane like Irma (as we did on Big Pine Key) and see a happy Adonidia smiling back at you, perhaps having just lost a few leaves, amidst the carnage of an utterly destroyed landscape, they become adored citizens of hurricane-prone areas. Plant one next to a Wodyetia in Miami limestone, and in a few years, see which one you value, and which one you don't...

@mnorell wow beautiful landscape!

[Rubberboots]

6 minutes ago, MC Silver said:

@Rubberboots for these reasons. 

Ok I thought you meant the heat and cold tolerance.

[Bkue]

One that is convenient to me at the moment. I have 2 more sets nearly same size. I’m a zone pusher. I spend most the year shedding brown spot fronds from the cold year prior. By the time they are gone we’re back in winter.