B. Alfredii palms badly burned

[sacts]

My B. Alfredii palms after the recent florida freeze.  I'm in Orlando.  Had these in the ground for about 9 years.  Not very cold hardy if you ask me.  I went to lucas nursery and they have several that seemed burned as well.  They trimmed all of theirs fairly aggressively after the storm.  Most of them have 4 or so fronds on them now.  Anyways, I sprayed copper fungicide on the center spear more so into the center of the crown.  Hoping that helps.  Most worried about appearance since these have been sloooooow growing so will take forever to replace these crowns.

[happypalms]

From the looks of the picture, it just looks like foliage burn, I do see a green leaf in the middle. They should recover and as you say they are slow growing so expect a few years of something a bit unsightly. After your winter trim of any obviously dead leaves, apply a good fertiliser and sit back and wait for the recovery. 
It’s heartbreaking to see a plant you love and have been growing for some years take a beating. It must have been cold, during that freeze it even made the news in Australia. 

[Jonathan]

4 hours ago, sacts said:

My B. Alfredii palms after the recent florida freeze.  I'm in Orlando.  Had these in the ground for about 9 years.  Not very cold hardy if you ask me.  I went to lucas nursery and they have several that seemed burned as well.  They trimmed all of theirs fairly aggressively after the storm.  Most of them have 4 or so fronds on them now.  Anyways, I sprayed copper fungicide on the center spear more so into the center of the crown.  Hoping that helps.  Most worried about appearance since these have been sloooooow growing so will take forever to replace these crowns.

They look like they'll bounce back ok.

What was your low temperature there, out of interest? 

[TropicsEnjoyer]

In St. John’s a few houses in my area have them. I saw them turn completely bronze/fried. Made me think for a second they might be coconuts not alfredii 😂. I’m sure they’re gonna bounce back though. 

[Zeeth]

They're nice palms other than the cold damage lol. They look like they should recover fine. 

[sonoranfans]

They look a little burned but they will be fine.  Sometimes palms respond with a little extra, my alfredii seemed to respond well to getting hammered by hurricane milton.  These are just 2-3 degrees more cold hardy than cocos.  WHen we say cold hardy that means death not leaf burn.  My sympathies for the leaf burn, it will take a couple summers to fully recover.  My alfredii in full sun puts out about 10 new leaves a year, shaded ones put out about 7.

[kinzyjr]

Temperatures in the Orlando area this go-round were ~24F in most spots.  Hope for a full recover for all of them.

[Merlyn]

@sacts those look a lot like my 5 big Alfredii.  I didn't have much if any damage in the past 7 or so years, down to ~27F several times with heavy snowlike frost.  Mine took mostly light leaf burn at 24.4F and frost, and did take nearly a year to totally grow a new crown from that.  I'm guessing they are going to look kinda ratty through mid summer.  I fertilized mine 2 weeks ago, hoping for quicker recovery.  I also did hydrogen peroxide and then Daconil into the crowns, but not copper...yet.  I will probably cut off the lower fronds in a week or two.  That's partially for looks, and partially to make sure there's good airflow and sunlight into the green bit left in the center.

[RiverCityRichard]

Mine look roughly the same. Honestly, at 24f in our area I would say these palms are winners. That was a brutal freeze outside of the norm. Fertilize well this year and I would think they will have mostly regrown crowns within a year. Mine give me 7-8 leaves every year with 3x seasonal application of Palmgain and lawn irrigation twice a week.

[FlaPalmLover]

Kind of a side note but is it actually helpful to plant palms on mulch mounds like those? 

[Merlyn]

On 2/19/2026 at 8:41 PM, FlaPalmLover said:

Kind of a side note but is it actually helpful to plant palms on mulch mounds like those? 

I have read on here that Alfredii are ok with being planted deeper than normal.  This helps them grow broader roots quicker, and makes them less likely to tilt in hurricanes.  I asked MB Palms about that at the last open house, as all of theirs look waaaay too deep.  He said they haven't had any tilting problems, and none have had any rot problems or lower trunk problems.  

That might be a roundabout way of saying that mound planting isn't necessarily a great idea with Alfredii.  BUT...if the mound is a bunch of mulch that overs the RIZ and a couple inches of lower trunk, then it may help the palm grow strong horizontal roots.  In the photo the mulch looks like it is covering the RIZ and the lower trunk isn't "girdled" like the Royal at the end of the row.  It looks like @sacts might have had problems with tilting, thus the straps.  At around the size of his palms my 5 went through ~100mph gusts and 50-60mph sustained without tilting.  Maybe they were a bit too high initially and the extra mulch will help.