THE FARM 3

[Exotic Life]

Hi,

Nice picture's.. What's the latin name of the ponytail? And when on with height ore age does a Washingtonia bloom?

Robbin

[Tad]

Nolina recuravata. washies here at my farm usually bloom at about 12 to 15 foot of height, at about 7 or 8 years old.

[Xavierdlc61887]

hey tad remember i told i was gonna landscape my yard well here it is

BEFORE -

AFTER -

wish u could have hooked me up with a nice niced pygmy or something but its all good hahah j/k well sorry for using this to show my yard

[Tad]

man this bismarck bloom just grows by leaps and bounds

i wish i had the counterpart for it!!

pretty color too

[Tad]

update on the wifes garden, cucumbers from hell take over everything!

[Tad]

ok I think I have it now, the wifes cucmbers from hell

[Tad]

cukes and onions

[Tad]

carrotts and tomatoes

[Tad]

a case of australian tree ferns, my Dad has been doing etremely well growing these he only had a few so I ordered him a case!

[Tad]

yabbies

[John in Andalucia]

  palmotrafficante said:

ok I think I have it now, the wifes cucmbers from hell

Your wife might enjoy one of our - Cucumber pueblos! :lol:

[Tad]

nice shade houses, exccellent terracing!

[Tad]

getting the cable posts ready to ospho and paint. these are made of a thick wall 2- 5/8 th tubing That I got from Royal Wireline a company owned by one of my partners.

the trailer with extra pipes and the other pipes already welded. David Martin and Tim Reid gave me some wireline too but I think its a little bit heavy duty for what we need,

[Tad]

more bizz bloom shots!

[Tad]

the posts are in the ground, I will let the cement dry and we will stretch cable on wednesday, tuesday we will paint in place and take measurments for shade cloth and cable.

laser level,quite handy for making sure everything is where it is suppposed to be!

[Tad]

another shot of my orchid in bloom, I never get tired of looking at this one!

and another shot of the tee tiny bizzie flower.

[Tad]

roll of cable, and here we go stretching cable for the shade cloth that will soon enough be attached to it!

[Tad]

view from the top, cables stretched, now waiting on cool wall and shade cloth!

[Xavierdlc61887]

is this all being funded by the olive clients???? cauise that bad asss if yes

[Tad]

yes, it's being funded by the olive company, but it comes out of the bottom line, so the more that goes into the cost of production is less that I can ultimately put in my pocket so while it's neat getting to do some of this stuff, I get knocked out of earning 45,000.00 dollars on the crop of cuttings that were lost due to temperture extremes, NOT SO BAD ASS!! plus it costs me 2 months production time NOT SO BAD ASS, plus it cost the olive company a crap load of money, NOT SO BAD ASS, and it cost them production time,again NOT SO BAD ASS, plus it makes me look bad (in my opinion) DEFINITLEY NOT BAD ASS!!!!! I ultimately have to answer to the owners for what happens and does not happen. I wouldve much rather had a decent percent of the cuttings take and made forward progress than loose 2 or 3 months and the production suffer, this makes it much more difficult to justify the high price they pay for me to grow them, and makes them less likely to want to put another chunk of change down as further investmment . NOT BAD ASS AT ALL!!!! I dont mean to rant xavier but it's pretty frustrating to be in this position. :beatingdh: and to pound it home it's pretty far from bad ass!

Edited May 3, 2008 by palmotrafficante

[Xavierdlc61887]

hey man sorry um ok well good luck and hope all turns out good ill pray for you

[Tad]

well thank you senor, having someone pray for me is definitley bad ass!!

in the initial engineering phase I asked for several amenities for the green house and basically they got cut from the budget, this crop was growing like gangbusters and the gold ring was just hanging there waiting for me to snatch it! at the last minute the wild Texas weather snatched it from me ..... i could just begin to smell the gold!!

After discussing the problem with the grower in Israel, we found out the very very very hard way that some of the things I asked for wer needed after all so we are retrofitting and moving forward. In a time where sales are not so brisk, the olive contract and some of my other custom growing contracts really go a long way to filling in the gaps. this loss was a reall kick in the huevos, but I will triumph over it!

[Xavierdlc61887]

thats good to hear man and yes i know how texas weather is this past weekend it rained and was like hell the next : CRAZYYYYYYY but its all good u will triumph tmrw ima get some banana corms from a co worker wooooo they are saba n manzano ok well laters and that green house looks awesome hope u get to utilize it some more for more delicado plantas k talk to u laters tad oh by the way your palms u donated to the fernie future nursery project are doing great some already started putting more leafs while some are still there trying figure out if they should start growing or stay the same size but i will get some palm food for them and wake them up k laters and good luck with the tejas weather

[Palmetro]

  palmotrafficante said:

Nolina recuravata. washies here at my farm usually bloom at about 12 to 15 foot of height, at about 7 or 8 years old.

I think Nolina recurvata is the old name, Beaucarnea Recurvata is the " new botanical name"

Saludos

[Tad]

Got the back wall of the propagation house tied up this afternoon, coolwall starts this week as well.

this should help to cut some of the heat off the west end of the house.

[Utopia Palms]

Hi Tad

The Farm is looking bigger and better every day!! Did you ask Dial about those Caryota Zebrina’s they must be quite large by now?

He should have some there to sell you cheep!!!

Clayton

[Tad]

Hola Clayton, good to hear from you, the last I saw of the zebrinas he had them down at the camp in Mexico, and looking quite well!

He has been obssesed with building his cemetery as of late. looking to be at the camp in a few weeks, I will take pics and post them!

[Tad]

Got one wall glassed in and fans mounted, electric to follow sometime thursday and in the morning we start framing in the wall for cool wall

[Tad]

components galore, pumps,pads and troughs!

[Tad]

outside looking in

[FRITO]

Tad, as always quality stuff you got there! Nice fans!

Is that a Royal palm? is that cold damage on that brown frond? how low did you get this winter?

Luke

[Tad]

luke that is a royal, and no cold damage, here in Tx when you field grow them and transplant they shock back a little, thats been my observation, plus i transplanted it back in late sept or nov, so it just sorta sat thru the winter not doing much but looking sad! but its pushing new spear quite well since our heats been turned back on 90 plus today!

[NBTX11]

I went down to the valley in Mar and noticed quite a few big royals. Unfortunately, I did not bring my camera, it was a very fast trip and I did not have time go sightseeing. Also noticed Washingtonia outnumbered every other palm by at least 10-1, maybe 50-1. Who came along and decided that the Washingtonia was the state tree of South TX.

[Tad]

George Pletcher the self proclaimed "palm king" of the now defunct Pletchers nursery from the harlingen area...which is now a logans road house, and a kohls store/ strip mall!

His legacy lives on in the valley, he was the first nurseryman to plant gobs of them and sell them state wide! this is a post card of him circa 1960's

[FRITO]

  syersj said:

Who came along and decided that the Washingtonia was the state tree of South TX.

TAD!

[Tad]

Well, not so much me, but I feel I ust also add Brad Crocketts name to the list, as Crocketts was also very influential in the spread of washingtonias, they were also very well known for citrus,hibiscus,and bouganvillas, I never got to meet George or Brad, I do know Brads son quite well tho, and between last week and this week I have delivered 5000 one gallons to one farm, and another 2000 washingtonia one gallons to another farm, besides what I have set aside and in the pipeline for my farm, they are still quite popular.

Edited May 7, 2008 by palmotrafficante

[Xavierdlc61887]

lol my dad says they call the valley "el valle de palmas" the valley of palms lol its true everywhere u turn u see them

[Tad]

it also used to be called "el desierto del muerte" before the army corps of engineers , and the wpa, came in and set up irrigation ditches !

and before the herds of cattle moving north it was less brush country and more grass savanah....

[NBTX11]

Could it possibly be that the RGV has more Washingtonias per square mile than anywhere in the world. Including SoCal. Seriously, it could be possible.

[Tad]

it could be, I personally am acountable for about 8 to 10 thousand a year just in one gallons