14 months growth Copernicia Hospita

[sonoranfans]

Ive been noticing a lot of growth in the garden this year due to timely rainfall and of course warm temps.  One of my newer plantings is copernicia hospita which has jumped in growth over the last 14 months, at least for a copie.  Last summer, it needed to root and didnt grow much, but now it seems to be on the march this summer.  All the heat and a good amount of rain has it pumping out new leaves and gaining height.  I had this one in a container for too long in part shade and it started to look poorly.   I was waiting for the roots from a large(25'), "weevil killed bismarckia" to rot enough for me to get motivated to dig.   After planting, it initially was obviously deficient in older leaves as these cuban copernicias all HATE containers.  I dug out the spot last year and the first pick is a month or two after planting in june 2025.  The second pic is a few days ago.  The palms has increased wax production and colored up a bit along with the extra leaves.  Older leaves in pic 2 were de waxed a bit during Hurricane Milton in 11/24.  After the damage they tended to dry out from the tips after losing the wax coating.  Soon those leaves will be gone, maybe by summers end.  I am not a grower who cuts off mostly green material as this is a wasting of chlorophyll that the plant had to use energy to produce.  The palm will draw back chlorophyll and nutrients before the leaf goes totally brown.

 

 

yet more evidence that these cuban palms want to be in the ground in a big way.

[sonoranfans]

the mid sized one to the right of the big one is waxing up nicely.   It has been the one showing the most blue, though all are a nice blue. Thanks to redlands nursery in miami area.  I bought these a couple years before the pandemic in 4" pots for $20 each.

 

 

 

[sonoranfans]

A year and a half after the first pic, this hospita is growing much faster than I thought.  Its nearing 6' tall overall.   Much faster in ground than in a container.

[zero]

1 hour ago, sonoranfans said:

A year and a half after the first pic, this hospita is growing much faster than I thought.  Its nearing 6' tall overall.   Much faster in ground than in a container.

Nice to see that Tom, I hope the 3-gal blue hospita I got from @NatureGirl last month performs as well!  It didn't stay in the container long.  🙂  I planted a strap-leaf green hospita I grew from seed at the same time.

[Mazat]

20 hours ago, sonoranfans said:

A year and a half after the first pic, this hospita is growing much faster than I thought.  Its nearing 6' tall overall.   Much faster in ground than in a container.

So fast, i wouldn't have thought so. I read somewhere that it grows much more slowly, or maybe I'm misremembering 🤔

That's great, Tom. i'm happy for you that it's different 🤗.

Besides, you've found the ideal spot to plant them, and I think that's brilliant.

[Mazat]

19 hours ago, Fusca said:

Nice to see that Tom, I hope the 3-gal blue hospita I got from @NatureGirl last month performs as well!  It didn't stay in the container long.  🙂  I planted a strap-leaf green hospita I grew from seed at the same time.

I hope it thrives well for you too, Jon.

This species is truly beautiful 🤗 

I wish the climate here were milder; okayat least it has become milder... step by step 

[Tracy]

I will share a few too.

Chrysalidocarpus pembanus 

Chrysalidocarpus robustus (2 photos)

Chrysalidocarpus leptocheilos 

Cyphophoenix elegans 

[Tracy]

A few more:

Chrysalidocarpus ambositrae 

Chrysalidocarpus rufescens 

Vonitra crinita 

Chrysalidocarpus sp. Bef

Chrysalidocarpus prestonianus 

[happypalms]

I have come to realisation that if you want to grow tropical palms, or plants out of there native habitats, water and irrigation are an absolute must have. As you have noticed with all the good rains and high temperatures the difference in growth rates is very noticeable. I realised I wasn’t watering way near enough after such rain events. 

[Tracy]

Oops, I thought it was posting in Jim's post on palm trunks above.  My apologies Tom.  I wish I could grow Copernicia hospita but after my experience with 2 C bailyana × hospita,  I am not ready for the disappointment after many years of apparent success with a downturn and spiral to death. 

[sonoranfans]

On 12/20/2025 at 1:58 PM, Mazat said:

So fast, i wouldn't have thought so. I read somewhere that it grows much more slowly, or maybe I'm misremembering 🤔

That's great, Tom. i'm happy for you that it's different 🤗.

Besides, you've found the ideal spot to plant them, and I think that's brilliant.

I have been asking myself about that, why so fast?  I do remember and its worth mentioning that that hospita was my first experiment using turface MVP instead of organics in the site soil mix.   I used a little bit of organics but I used a lot of turface, perhaps 15 lbs of the ammended soil and also another 10-15lbs of dolomite gravel, 1/4" mesh used in fish tanks, not the dolomite from the home and garden large 3/4 to 1" size.   This was mixed with the soil already dug from the the planting hole with mulch on top.  The smaller gravel size and its much greater surface area will add more calcium and Mg(by dissolving it) as compared with the dolomite 3/4"-1" rock landscapers use.  The site drains faster than it would with coarse rock. but stays more moist due to turface and its getting 3x a week from a sprinkler head 6-8 away, maybe a near optimal soil/sun sun site for the hospita.  The other two hospitas 1 had been traumatized by root damage due to sloppy handling, and it was very slow recovering while the second was in a smaller pot (7g vs 15g for the big one) so I used less turface and dolomite gravel(~1/2) when ammending.  When I dig a hole. I  dig it to at least 3x the volume of the pot, then backfill with ammended soil by habit.  I have two other palms that got heavy turface ammendment(but no dolomite), two 5 gallon teddy bears and they are like rockets grew 6-7' in height this year.  They are also right near a couple sprinkler heads 7-10 feet on each site of the two.  This of course leads me to think about the hospita speed with the same treatment though it also had dolomite gravel.  My mature bailey and fallaensis got lots of dolomite too so I was previously convinced it was a good thing, verifying what the "copernicia man" Ken Johnson told me" : "tom put down dolomite if you want them to be happy".  I have learned to listen very carefully to Kens advice as my treatment of palms these days is just about exactly what he recommended.  Many of you may not know Ken, but if you are lucky enough to get advice from him, listen very carefully.  I killed a palm (a hospita hybrid, imagine that) by not listening closely enough, not so smart.  It was a 90(?) gallon palm and I was not gentle enough putting it in the planting hole.   A palm with a heavy rootball is much easier to damage the roots, it just physics.  You could say I learned by experience(failure is a great teacher to humble you).  His advice I have passed on to others as much as I can and I attribute 90% of my success with copernicias (and several other palms I have bought from him) to his advice.

[Mazat]

On 12/23/2025 at 9:48 PM, sonoranfans said:

I have been asking myself about that, why so fast?  I do remember and its worth mentioning that that hospita was my first experiment using turface MVP instead of organics in the site soil mix.   I used a little bit of organics but I used a lot of turface, perhaps 15 lbs of the ammended soil and also another 10-15lbs of dolomite gravel, 1/4" mesh used in fish tanks, not the dolomite from the home and garden large 3/4 to 1" size.   This was mixed with the soil already dug from the the planting hole with mulch on top.  The smaller gravel size and its much greater surface area will add more calcium and Mg(by dissolving it) as compared with the dolomite 3/4"-1" rock landscapers use.  The site drains faster than it would with coarse rock. but stays more moist due to turface and its getting 3x a week from a sprinkler head 6-8 away, maybe a near optimal soil/sun sun site for the hospita.  The other two hospitas 1 had been traumatized by root damage due to sloppy handling, and it was very slow recovering while the second was in a smaller pot (7g vs 15g for the big one) so I used less turface and dolomite gravel(~1/2) when ammending.  When I dig a hole. I  dig it to at least 3x the volume of the pot, then backfill with ammended soil by habit.  I have two other palms that got heavy turface ammendment(but no dolomite), two 5 gallon teddy bears and they are like rockets grew 6-7' in height this year.  They are also right near a couple sprinkler heads 7-10 feet on each site of the two.  This of course leads me to think about the hospita speed with the same treatment though it also had dolomite gravel.  My mature bailey and fallaensis got lots of dolomite too so I was previously convinced it was a good thing, verifying what the "copernicia man" Ken Johnson told me" : "tom put down dolomite if you want them to be happy".  I have learned to listen very carefully to Kens advice as my treatment of palms these days is just about exactly what he recommended.  Many of you may not know Ken, but if you are lucky enough to get advice from him, listen very carefully.  I killed a palm (a hospita hybrid, imagine that) by not listening closely enough, not so smart.  It was a 90(?) gallon palm and I was not gentle enough putting it in the planting hole.   A palm with a heavy rootball is much easier to damage the roots, it just physics.  You could say I learned by experience(failure is a great teacher to humble you).  His advice I have passed on to others as much as I can and I attribute 90% of my success with copernicias (and several other palms I have bought from him) to his advice.

Huge compliments to you for doing exactly what said  "copernicia man" Ken Johnson ".

I apologize for the late reply, Tom.

Wonderful explanation and execution, extremely exciting and detailed. I really appreciate it, and Sabine felt the same way.

It's pretty cold here, always slightly below freezing at night and above freezing during the day, up to 35.6 F, so we can't complain...

What's the weather like where you are?

[sonoranfans]

I am away from my garden now but in my garden it has been a warm winter.  Out low has been 39F(x2) but mostly lows over 45F(10-12 days) and more typically in the mid 50's for a low.  Highs are in the 63-79F range so things are still growing.   Next 10 days show a 40F low weds, 46F thurs and the rest are in the 50-59F range.  Predicted highs are 59-77F.   the next 8/10 days are full sun, 2 are part sun My BxJ and (BxJ)xJ are loving the cool weather, its peak grow season for them.  Rain has been almost zero this late fall/ winter.