Lady Palm

[Bob Koncoski]

I'm in Savannah Ga and my lady palms got hit by our last freeze first time in 15 years, should I just cut the brown fronds off and hope for the best? I just joined today.

[Fusca]

1 hour ago, Bob Koncoski said:

I'm in Savannah Ga and my lady palms got hit by our last freeze first time in 15 years, should I just cut the brown fronds off and hope for the best? I just joined today.

Welcome to Palmtalk!  It looks like they are in a container?  In ground they are very cold hardy (assuming that they are the common Rhapis excelsa).  Regardless I wouldn't trim off any frond that is not completely brown since the palm can still get nutrients from a frond that's partly green.  I think it will recover but it will take a while for it to look good again.

Jon

[SeanK]

I would let them recover a bit first. Water and afternoon shade.

What sort of nighttime temps do you expect the next 3 nights? Maybe bring them in. In May, you could look for a place to plant them in-ground.

[Robbertico18]

Howdy neighbor !

I wouldn’t plant them in the ground just yet, it looks like we have one final cold snap coming thru where we may have a frost Tuesday morning. 
 

I have a younger one planted in the ground and left it mostly unprotected during our hard frost event a few weeks back and it’s got some damage as well, but I’m sure it’ll bounce back 

[Laaz]

They will recover without a problem, I have many here in Charleston.

[Las Palmas Norte]

PalmPedia makes reference to this being a zone 8b palm, but indicates the threshold of hardiness at mid 20°F's (-5°C). That's realistically zone 9a. 

[Harry’s Palms]

Welcome ! I would give it some shade and protection from any further cold . It should rebound . When the fronds become crispy , cut them . Harry

[mnorell]

On 2/21/2026 at 9:21 AM, Las Palmas Norte said:

PalmPedia makes reference to this being a zone 8b palm, but indicates the threshold of hardiness at mid 20°F's (-5°C). That's realistically zone 9a. 

My experience with Rhapis excelsa when I lived in Natchez, Mississippi (9a with averages like Savannah but Savannah's proximity to the Atlantic means "hard jabs" are further between) are that in the humid Deep South:
1) leaf-damage starts around 23-24F (we could pretty much depend on a degree or two around 23F in 2/3 of years);
2) canes may die back (bud-death) starting around 20F, very, very likely in the upper teens;
3) recovery from the roots (i.e., after the clump suffers full cane-death) is very, very slow, though I saw it come back in Natchez from 13F in 2018. So the plant will almost certainly return. But here's the rub: it generally takes 3-5 years after a really major, long, hard freeze to have a plant that has any appreciable size or good appearance.  I found that R. multifida was several degrees hardier for me, and I felt it was a superior choice for Natchez since it would escape leaf-damage most years and canes were hardier as well.

While the overall organism may survive as a "zone 8b" palm as a dieback perennial most years, an "average" 9a zone may mean leaf-damage/leaf-death fairly regularly. As a permanent landscape subject that can be depended upon for good year-round appearance, it really is a 9b/10a palm (and even there you might still experience a full dieback every 10-20 years or so).

And remember...USDA zones in the deep south/southeast are nothing but a statistic. When Old Man Winter decides to blow your direction, he doesn't mess around, and there's precious little you can do about it. A 10-year period consisting of nine years at 27F followed by a single year at 12F results in an average of 25.5. That puts you in zone 9b, but your plants will sit you down for a stern lecture after a nice, long hard freeze that bottoms out in the low teens. This is why, except for half-hardy perennials, tough clustering palms, etc., you really need to look at extreme lows for your area, the frequencies between probably-lethal temps, and design accordingly depending on what is large and foundational vs smaller and more ephemeral.

Even in zone 9a, if you need, say, a privacy hedge or a permanent-looking mass of background greenery, you might want to use a row of Rhapidophyllum--which can give a similar effect en masse--but it will never disappoint.

If you take the time to research these variables and are armed with the knowledge in advance, you can make informed decisions and spare future disappointment when the inevitable happens. While we hope it doesn't happen again soon, I think personally that it is very useful when designing the  ratio of hardy to less-hardy palms and other plants, to take into consideration, as an example, the illuminating data displayed on this map of low temperatures experienced during 1985, one of three well-known Arctic blasts of the 1980s.