We got hit pretty hard by hurricane Lala With many trees down. I got very lucky that the only palm loss was a Kerriodoxa elegans that had the unfortunate fate to end up under a giant fallen Guatemalan cypress and one of my peach palms came down. The Kerriodoxa still has a spear so it will make it. I chainsawed the peach palm and will eat the heart of palm, but it’s already got suckers coming up so no problem there.

We’ve had a number of hurricanes come by pretty close, but nothing was ever as bad as hurricane lala. I also learned that the damage seems to be consistent with winds coming down vertically from above as opposed to sideways, which is very weird. Several places had trees down in a 360° radius. I looked this up and it seems to be a thing with hurricanes. They’re called mini downbursts.

I was pleasantly surprised by the amazing tolerance of Bismarck palms. But also very disappointed in beccariophoenix which sadly are pretty much all leaning sideways. I am going to leave them that way so they make that coconut style curve at the base. But talk about a weak palm none of them have trunks yet so perhaps they will root in better once they make a trunk.

I figured the Big Island would be a pretty safe place from global warming, but clearly it’s not. The super El Niño is churning out storm after storm and Hawaiian waters are now warm enough for them to actually intensify close by. on Sunday, another tropical storm is passing by this time much further to the south.I guess you can pick your poison, either fire And drought or hurricanes.

I also learned what a hurricane cut means. Most of our royal Palms are now sporting that hurricane cut. They have a very effective coping mechanism of just dropping lower leaves, which is not good for anything going under them, but they look fine.

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Given the potential damage it sounds like you did pretty well. The fact that you didn't bring up any damage to your house, safety issues must have been limited to flying debris.

26 minutes ago, Tracy said:

Given the potential damage it sounds like you did pretty well. The fact that you didn't bring up any damage to your house, safety issues must have been limited to flying debris.

Wowo

Anyone know how jeff (floribunda) place ended up?

Spoke with Jeff a couple days before; wasn’t worried about rain, but the potential wind had him a bit stressed. It’s an active planet, no doubt.

Crownshaft palms seem to take storms better

That is pretty intense , I’m so glad you are ok . This is the first report of damage from the hurricane from our Big Island people . I see a lot of contributions from folks that live there and hopefully they are ok. My friend lives on Kauai and they had a bit better go of it , mostly rain and wind like tropical storm strength. I’m not sure how Southern California will do this winter but forecasts seem to agree that we are in for a lot of rain. I was here in 1997/1998 El Niño , the first year in our new home . It was pretty gnarly with some squalls dumping 1” per hour or more. Reminded me of 1969 and other wet years living in Ventura County . I am not a scientist but I do know , in my lifetime , things have changed a bit . We just have to hold on and hope for the best. Harry

20 hours ago, Tracy said:

Given the potential damage it sounds like you did pretty well. The fact that you didn't bring up any damage to your house, safety issues must have been limited to flying debris.

We had some roof leaks during the storm. Probably will need to get the roof inspected. The house did not suffer more damage because I preemptively cut down trees before the storm, knowing how bad it was going to be. The southern end of the island got hit hard and is completely closed off. Roads down there are washed out and homes are damaged. It will take them months to recover.

9 hours ago, Harry’s Palms said:

That is pretty intense , I’m so glad you are ok . This is the first report of damage from the hurricane from our Big Island people . I see a lot of contributions from folks that live there and hopefully they are ok. My friend lives on Kauai and they had a bit better go of it , mostly rain and wind like tropical storm strength. I’m not sure how Southern California will do this winter but forecasts seem to agree that we are in for a lot of rain. I was here in 1997/1998 El Niño , the first year in our new home . It was pretty gnarly with some squalls dumping 1” per hour or more. Reminded me of 1969 and other wet years living in Ventura County . I am not a scientist but I do know , in my lifetime , things have changed a bit . We just have to hold on and hope for the best. Harry

Honestly, I don’t see a lot of activity in our local Palm society and I don’t see very many people from Big Island posting here. I’d say the palm scene on the big island is kind of in a very dormant phase. Also Palm damage from the hurricane is rather limited heading into the Hilo area. Most of the damages from fallen trees. Palms are clearly more resilient to the hurricanes than the junk trees that grow all over the place here.

15 hours ago, quaman58 said:

Spoke with Jeff a couple days before; wasn’t worried about rain, but the potential wind had him a bit stressed. It’s an active planet, no doubt.

Jeff’s place is all Palms no trees so I’m pretty sure he’s fine. Some roads flooded in Hawaiian acres during the storm. The rainfall at my place is in record territory for 2026. Before the storm we were already north of 200 inches for the year with still four months to go. The real danger for the Palms on the Big Island is the dreaded winter drought promised by El Niño. Rainfall will drop off significantly by October and we may look at very dry months all the way into February. But the El Niño is so strong it might be different. This El Niño is so strong that it has pushed the tropical convergences on literally to the doorsteps of Hawaii. This song is the cradle of hurricanes in the Pacific. Hawaii used to be a good thousand miles north of it. But the waters are so warm that the zoom now extends all the way to 500 miles south of Hawaii.

I’m old enough to have lived through the El Niño of 1983 when I was a late teen. That was the first time that that term actually entered the lexicon of the English language. We had been in a drought for a number of years and we were being told that it would take 10 years of above average rainfall to replenish our supplies in California. One winter took care of that. So maybe a repeat, maybe not. It definitely does shift the weather patterns around, which is great for some areas and terrible for others. Had a buddy just get back from an eight day fishing trip down to Central Baja, they were targeting a fish called wahoo. Ono in Hawaiian. The water temp in the area they were looking was 85°, which was deemed too warm for wahoo. Crazy.