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In January 2020 I received my Mule Palm from MPOM. Over the last 5 years its grown substantially and now I am faced with a decision to up-pot yet again, sale it, or plant it. Of course I chose to plant it. A new pot the next size up would be about $300, and then what? In 2 years I'll be faced with the same predicament. This mule has endured the last 3 seasons outside since it's been too large to come in the house since 2022. The lowest we've been since then is 10F and its suffered minimal to no damage (granted - I laid it on the ground and threw a bed sheet over it when it got that cold). Otherwise it's stayed outside year-round. Now, before anyone comes for me about planting it (Yes, I'm in zone 8) my logic is that considering its survival and knowing its marginal palm here - I am willing to see what happens. Who knows, maybe we won't have anymore century level events for the next 100 years. *fingers crossed* Anyway, the predicament has been WHERE to plant it; the backyard is quite full these days. So, the decision to remove my Namwah banana mat was made yesterday, and plant the mule in its place. While I love my bananas, and they do extremely well here - the Namwah was the right plant in the WRONG place and was a constant pain to keep off of the fence, and off of the patio. Not to mention I have plenty of other varieties of bananas. I made the right move. After 9 hours with only a quick dinner break today I managed to somehow remove the established mat of namwahs, and excavate a planting hole for the mule. (word to the wise - do not plant bananas without intent. Be sure that's where you want them for all eternity and have ample room around them. Oh, and use heavy lifting equipment if you need to move them.... ugh😫) Post trunk chop from winter and now the heavy lifting begins... About 2.5hours into it and I'm questioning my life choices ..... QUEUE 200 LB POTATO..... After about 6 hours I finally managed to get the giant potato from hell out of the ground and dig out a 2 foot deep 2 foot wide meteor impact crater .... *notice the red clay - if you know you know* Once removed from its prison... er, I mean pot.... I had to do some root pruning/releasing. It was extremely root bound and swirling. Once the mess of roots had been freed from themselves - the rest is the easy part. To settle in I made sure to add plenty of plant tone and water in incrementally as I back filled the hole using a mix of seaweed extract, superthrive, and root stimulator water. Hopefully that will minimize transplant shock. Fingers crossed. I do expect to lose some of the lower fronds just from how aggressive I had to be with the root mass. Finally after about 9 grueling hours, sunburnt and bleeding .... Hopefully the Mule likes this spot as much as the bananas did, and I get to see some explosive growth. As per usual it will receive nothing but regular waterings with seaweed and unsulfured molasses water to establish the root/soil microbiome this season with no fertilizers for the next 90 days. IMG_0208.HEIC

There was quite a display of some lovely collectors palms on display, along with a vast amount of palms and cycads for sale. There was something there for pretty well anyone who was interested in starting a collection that’s for sure.

Added a few more plantings - papaya, hibiscus, Chrysalidocarpus pembana and Phoenix paludosa hybrid. Unfortunately I had to move my Sabal uresana. It was sitting in standing water and slowly dying. Hopefully it'll survive the move - I did my best to avoid damage to the growth point and roots.

A baby Ravenea glauca went into the ground today.. Hopefully it likes the location.

I bit the bullet and planted a California Fan Palm (or what I believe to be a very pure Washingtonia Filifera) at the advice of the Plant World staff in Albuquerque. I planted it in a protected spot near the house by the fence. Got a really good deal, massive 15 gallon for $200. Asking for care advice, and also if these need protection. The California Fan Palms outside of Bahama Bucks seem to be thriving, but they are protected. There are also many unprotected palms in Roswell. We had an exceptionally cold winter and all the established palms seem to be fine. Pic attached.

The annual pacsoa show is on this weekend and the buy of the week is this Itaya amicorum. What a gorgeous looking palm never heard of it but I have now. Hopefully it will take the cold you just never know until you try.

Talk about a kid in a candy store omg. What fun it is to have so many new palms to choose from and some absolute bargains. As a palm grower myself I could not resist a kerriodoxa even though I have 700 of them in my greenhouse I just had to buy it. Even a nice Cham genoformis, dypsis poiveana I already have quite a few in containers and in the ground but I still had to buy them I just can’t help myself. So the list of palms I purchased are as follows. cham genoformis, pritchardia martii, licuala pelata sumowongii, synecanthus warscewizianus, hydriastele pinangoides, dypsis managenerensis, dypsis rosea, Cham elatior, ptychosperma cuneatum, rhopalastylis sapida, dypsis poiveana, dypsis pinnatafrons, Cham nubiums Pinanga insignis dypsis arenarium blue form, dypsis robusta, Chuniophoenix humilis, Calum’s muelleri and an Arenga caudata. An absolute feeding frenzy of palm buying and the best part was a total blast of fun doing so. Just a couple more for the collection.

Good luck with it! I hope you get many good years out of it. That looks like a really tiring day...and exactly how every weekend should be. Thank goodness spring is here.

Chambeyronia Macrocarpa just got the ring

So I'm just wondering about other people's experiences when buying from this company? Specifically any reviews of their Butyagrus seeds that they have been selling in recent years...? Someone in the UK brought a batch about 2 years ago and I was able to source some of them from him via Ebay about 20 months ago now. I paid £36 / £48 for 8 of those seeds from him plus UK postage. I think he had ordered 100 seeds for about $250 and had to pay about $40 postage to get them to the UK. Some of those he was able to sell on to other collectors like myself. Well fast-forward almost 2 years now and I haven't had any of my 8 seeds germinate and I haven't heard about any germinating from the other guy's seed batch. I also know there is a member in Spain @Peachs who has purchased 50 seeds from them for 192 Euros / $205 around the same time and he has not had a single one germinate either in 2 years now. So there is a definite red flag there and a common theme of European buyers being sent 'dud' seeds at least. Whether or not others in the States have also had this issue...? Has anyone else got any experience with dealing with this company and specifically purchases of their seeds, as it does seem we may have been sold 'dud' seeds that were not viable. If they were cheap, then like 'whatever'. But the two other buyers who I mentioned have clearly paid enormous prices to ship dud seeds across the Atlantic. It's not really good enough, is it!? 🤬

A visit to Brisbane botanical gardens. Quite an impressive garden with a lot of age with the plants on display throughout the garden. They certainly have there work cut out for them with this garden. It’s absolutely gorgeous. With some very large mature palms.

That seems about right unless , of course , there is a rain event that waters the palm for you. Be sure to do the finger in the soil check to make sure it is not drying out or getting too much water. Weather can affect the requirements. Harry

1)High drainage check, 2) green sand worked to help the appearance, check. Its a potassium deficiency but there could be other problems as well. When we talk of sand or gravel changing the soil chemistry two factors matter. Solubility in water, and surface area. SUrface areas of gravel decrease rapidly with gravel size. Therefore granite 3/4" will do nothing on both counts, its big so has a low surface area/lb and its not appreciably soluble (dissolvable). Limestone is another matter its quite soluble in water for a stone. I would expect that unless you have limestone or dolomite, minimal chemistry changes will occur from gravel. But the low surface area also means low cation exchange especially if the gravel is deep into the soil. Low cation exchange in high drainage soil is exactly what is in my yard. White/grey sand is the worst soil, bring on the ammendments to up the cation exchange and moisture retention. Lack of moisture retention means more frequent watering which can lead to a hardness accumulation from irrigation water if it is of a significant hardness. That further prevents soil wetting and water/fertilizer uptake. I would go straight to sulpomag(langbeinite) and consider some soil ammendment, perhaps turface MVP.

I didn't take a picture of when it looked its worst, here it is today, 4 new green fronds shooting up.

Here are some mature Sabal mexicana in Plazuela de San Pedro, Antigua Guatemala. They had the boots removed by chainsaw and have an interesting trunk pattern now. Seems to me that Sabal mexicana is synonymous with Sabal guatemalensis. There were no fruits to be seen on any of the palms, the birds stripped them clean.

A soaker hose seems like the easier of the two options.

The list of donated palms for the gardens in Coffs Harbour. Kindly donated by Lyn Crehan and Colin Wilson.

$200 for this massive 15 gallon! There's probably 2 foot or more of trunk there, we have a pretty tall fence.

An update on one of the coconuts in the last post - it is now known fruiting and is a Golden Malayan to my surprise. It has no foliar damage at at all from the cool spell and is loaded with fruit.

Wow, that is some swampy-looking ground. It is probably great for those hibiscus. I hope your uresana recovers for you. They are really nice palms. It would be a shame to lose it.

Thanks for the grow tips . I have a spot in mind for it, but my garden is so packed under the canopy iam going to plant it in the middle of pathway that’s like a three way intersection, to heck with the pathway I can walk around it I say but it’s a prime spot with great thermal protection out of the wind. It’s one beautiful palm that’s for sure. My low temperatures are around 2 degrees Celsius so iam hopeful it will make it. Be shame to kill it now, after all the years it has been alive to get to the size it is in a container.

I agree with @Las Palmas Norte - even in East Texas they don't look good if they are in full sun and not irrigated well. Brahea species and Sabal uresana would do much better although they grow slowly. Majesties aren't going to last long at all due to their thirsty habit and lack of cold tolerance.

Trachycaprus fortunei Windmill palm doesn't perform well in arid, high heat areas. I think the best you might hope for is a shaded (especially during the hottest part of the day) area and routine deep irrigation.

Encephalartos cerinus flushing in late winter. Counting the days until Northern Hemisphere spring begins. It is just 19 days away.

I put my existing pots of Dendrobium speciosum onto larger pots as they grew. The three in the tall ceramic pots were the ones that Harry recommended that I put in shallow pots after blooming season ends. I threw in the photo of the Dendrobium speciosum ssp grandiflora that I planted in a shallow layer of bark on a partially exposed rock. All Dendrobium speciosum in this group are ssp Pendiculatum, Grandiflora or Curvicaule.

Wow! What a haul!

Here is Adam's Tahina.

Zamia hamannii starting it's yearly "flush" of a single spike. My favourite of the plicate zamias

So I guess I would have looked like this one then in the picture. I really didn’t have much of walk around the gardens as the car was full of palms and we all know you can’t leave plants inside hot cars especially in sunny Queensland. Iam glad you at least talked her into buying a kerriodoxa if we can convert one person a day into a palm nut we are getting there slowly. Richard

Mt newest addition is an Anthurium seleri. This is a young plant but seeing the mature plant leaf structure was the attraction.

That is an awesome palm for the price Richard. Itaya has always been one of my favourite tropical palms I wish I could grow. A friend of mine has a nice one growing down here in a heated glasshouse. I think you’re a chance in your location but maybe keep it protected until it establishes. Here’s one at Gardens by the Bay in Singapore. Photo taken 9 years ago.

Are Sabal guatemalensis and Sabal mexicana the same palm? I want to add some especially after seeing these in this thread: These look great! Big robust palms more so then the common petite in comparison S. Palmeto I have by the hundreds around me.

Hey, everyone I recently got a new trachy with about 4 feet of trunk. It was originally in clay soil and that's also what I have it in. All of my other trees have been much smaller so I'm not too sure how much water I should be giving this until it's established. (I've since added more rocks, this is just a few days ago)

I purchased ten seeds from them in 2022 or maybe 2023, they actually sent 12 seeds and I got 100% germination, 9 of which are now in the ground, one died and I have two still in 1 gal pots. Now I am wondering if what I have are actual mule palms

It certainly is Colin just kept on donating plants for the Coffs botanical gardens. In the end I said I have no more room which was kind of sad because it meant I couldn’t buy anymore palms. There is another load of palms going to the Coffs gardens today as well someone is dropping them off I will be busy planting them I know that much.

I haven't attempted to grow this species, but I would've assumed (perhaps wrongly) that Euterpe edulis would not get enough consistent warmth here in San Francisco. I have been top dressing my H belmoreana with a bit of azomite and lots of kelp meal. I use kelp meal a lot in the garden, along with a broad spectrum organic fertilizer mix. Generally no nutritional issues, though deficiencies may take time to present themselves and my garden hasn't been around that long. Not sure about the gravel, but if you're on native SF sand, it's mostly volcanic in origin, which is good. I've certainly adulterated my soil with quite a bit of gravel (including cheap orange box store purchased pea gravel) around my H belmoreana, and haven't noticed any ill effect.

@Foggy Paul do you know the type of rock? Granite is mostly silica and may not dissolve much, but marble chips are mostly calcium carbonate and dissolve much faster. I don't know if it would be enough to really affect the palms or not. Two things come to mind: too much of one nutrient can inhibit absoption of others with "nutrient antagonism" So too much N or Mg = K deficiency. The other is soil ph: But it looks like Potassium is only affected by really low pH, which is probably not an issue.

Definitely wait for it to finish blooming before you try replanting it. I just had this discussion with my friend Harry while touring his garden today. Harry’s brother is Andy of Andy's Orchids here in Leucadia. I was picking up this Dendrobium speciosum Hillii. He recommended very shallow pots for me to replant some of my smaller specimens. I planted ssp Grandiflora on a thin bark layer on top of a rock that is slowly rooting after 2 years in the ground.

Now that it has warmed up, these have resumed growing. The two by the road are slowly tearing off there oldest fronds. They will peel off over a couple of months. Still getting Boron issues at times, and now some brown-tipping without yellowing. The three little ones are making progress, and the fast growing variety is the least happy of everyone. Forgive the weeds. I need a full day of hand ripping on my hands and knees to restore order for a couple months. I can’t deal right now.

I actually have the same hybrid and it is has really taken off. It's developing the same beautiful blue color and the recurved fronds are all starting to twist to the side.

I would contact them myself, but I did not source my seeds directly from them due to the shipping costs involved. So I cannot quote an order number or properly discuss a transaction. Someone else in the UK purchased a large batch and sold some on, so ideally they need to reach out to the company. But it seems people in the States have also purchased large numbers of dud seeds from them as well. I am aware that a few members on here have received good, healthy palms from this company. I am not questioning their ability to supply palms in any way. I am only questioning their methods of obtaining Butyagrus seeds, their quality control/testing of said seeds, and the lack of diligence when sending out thousands of unviable seeds for hefty sums of money. As a result, I am encouraging those who purchased large batches (100+) to reach out to the company in hope of a refund. At the bare minimum there needs to be an acknowledgment of the issue by MPOM and an apology given the scale of this issue. They will definitely be aware of the issue (since they germinate and grow on the seeds themselves) so I would have expected them to reach out and apologise themselves to customers who brought large batches, or offer replacements, or a refund, or something. Anyway I will try to message them myself. For the sake of transparency, I would like them to be up front and give an explanation as to why the seed hack may have failed, for whatever reason. Otherwise it’s hard to trust them moving forward when it comes to seeds, without knowing what processes are being used exactly. As I said, I highly suspect it was a failed back cross using male Butyagrus pollen on a Syagrus, which produced a batch of unviable seeds. If so, I highly doubt they would admit to that, since it would also result in a 75% Queen dominant ‘Mule’ as well, which is less cold-hardy. Either way they need to clarify things.

I know that generally MPOM has had positive reviews but that was people buying palms not seeds. They may not even be aware of the issues with their seeds. It’s worth contacting them first to see their response to people’s concerns.

Chrysalidocarpus prestonianus. Just an epic palm. Tim

Recently trimmed up Cyrtostachys Renda, when cleaned up like this the colors pop even more. I still pinch myself that I am growing these in my own garden in Hawaii!

Looking pretty silver now

I wonder if this is what is in the courtyard at the San Antonio botanical garden? I had heard the seed was collected in Mexico but don’t know much else about them. There is one that looks like a causiarum type.

In almost any other event yes, but not this time. It was 14F in the Galleria and central Houston. The nuked queens and robustas would seem to agree.

I don't have Sabal mexicana but I have a Sabal guatemalensis given to me as a seedling by Peter Pacific (who lives in Guatemala). I disagree with the "Lumpers" who want to subsume this palm into the mexicana species. It is quite different from any other Sabal I have seen in person or in photos. It is indeed slow growing and is nowhere near trunking or flowering even though it is ~10-12 years old. It grows in full sun on my garden lot, yet notice how upright the leaves are and how long the petioles. It appears stretched out like a shade grown palm. When it was younger it seemed prone to yellowing from nutritional issues so I gave it extra nutrients. Now all I do is fertilize 2x per year. If you love Sabals this species is well worth growing, if you can find one. I've never seen it available in the US. If not for Peter's generosity years ago I wouldn't have mine. You'll have to search diligently and frequently. The two photos below are of my S.g. taken 4 years apart. Sabal guatemalensis, 2014, Cape Coral, FL Sabal guatemalensis, 2018, Cape Coral, FL

Nice work, Ben!