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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.

Yeah, I'd hate to lose the uresana even though I have several other Sabals. It's like a shallow pond area now with no other plant affected except possibly a bougainvillea which is in a high spot about 6' from the water's edge.

Dedication beyond the call! It's gonna be baaaad.

It looks like it could be cold damage possibly? Does E edulis generally do ok in SF?? I tried the orange crownshaft variety here and found it pretty wimpy...our climates are reasonably similar if you're in the cooler parts of SF. Just a thought.

I certainly have a lot to look forward too if that’s an example of what I have, stunning palm you have there!

I first spotted these in 2022 when I was staying at one of the houses nearby, now I just remembered them. There’s this vacant lot out in lakeway that has at least 3 wild CIDP growing. Plus a few Butia, which don’t look too good. I can’t confirm for sure that these are naturalized, however there are two mature CIDP just a block away that they could have come from. Also these are expensive homes, and I’m pretty sure if anyone wanted a CIDP they would just transplant one. There’s also about a dozen Filifera on the same street that are all pretty big. Unfortunately the views when you drive past aren’t great, but you can still see a few of them. Aerial view isn’t much better

I have had success with Chamaedorea costa-ricana, full sized seed, but the epicarp still somewhat green rather than black.

They are a bit like a licuala but the leaves get massive. They survive in the Fairchild Botanic Garden, which is in the middle bit of Florida where it can get cool in winter. One of the palm nurseries in Brisbane had a batch of them about 20 years ago (when I was still in primary school) At the time I was told they are a good house plant but for some reason I never bought one. The nursery your palm came from is sort of halfway between Brisbane and the Gold Coast, so it should take any cold your place throws at it. Peachy

Just wanted to share - looked greater in the sunset. 3-4 years old from a 5 gallon Santa Ana, CA

Mine are somewhere between 10 and 15 years old. Tough as nails as long as they get shade. Mine have been relocated a few times and even once took a reciprocating saw to the rootball for separation. They're in the darkest corner of the yard but a recent freeze took out my banana canopy so this new exposure to direct evening sun is not doing them any favors.

Most palms can be air layered. Clay soil is awesome. Freezes build character. I can go on.

One would think so as have I. As odd as it seems, newly planted Needle palms are susceptible to crown rot typically with the larger main stem. The smaller offsets seem to weather the first few years better. Providing an overhead canopy assists overcoming this issue.

Pelagodoxa henryana. Actually kind of amazed that they have done this well for having little soil. They must have found fractures in the lava rock. I do keep a lot of mulch as dressing though. A bit of canopy while young and in a somewhat protected spot. Tim

I have never ordered seeds or plants from MPOM. The seeds I purchased a few years ago were from another member and while he boasted an approximate 50% germination rate i was lucky if I got 25%. But there's a lot of variables that go into germination, and while I'm experienced I am not an expert....I just emulate what a few others do and have success and am working to improve my successes. With that it's known that Butia and butia hybrids need higher soil temps for germination. I'm talking upwards to 95F for the first several weeks until germination is noted before even backing down the temps. It's also possible with a small batch order you unfortunately received all duds. Most that do produce seeds cut open a random sampling to check for viability and have an eye for what is good and what isn't without the need to. I would hope that MPOM do the same thing and would not be shipping duds. I highly doubt they attempted a backcross of anything back onto a Butiagrus for the simple fact that the amount of work that goes into this doesn't fit the bill, and would only produce a plant that begins to resemble more of one of the parents. Hopefully your contact with them will result in some amicable resolution.

I have just got confirmation from yet another buyer who did not have a single seed germinate out of a batch of 50 Butyagrus seeds that were purchased around the same time in late 2022. However this person is in Wisconsin in the USA, which tells me that Mule Palms of Mississippi have produced a batch of dud seeds in general and sent them out to various people in various places, not just a few folk in Europe. However people in Europe have also spent $40-50 on shipping as well, which makes it an even more bitter pill to swallow. 🤬 Mule Palms of Mississippi suggests a germination rate of 60-70% for their Mule seeds, however it is 0% with all 4 people that I have spoken to, plus my own 0% success rate on top of that. So that's 0% success rate for 5 of us. I wonder if there will be any acknowledgement or responsibility from the company for this dodgy seed batch, given the prices involved...? Probably not. But it does seem this is a much wider-scale issue than first thought now. Potentially their entire 2022 batch of Mule seeds were duds and they probably made thousands $$$ off the back of these bogus seeds... 🤔 I would not order any seeds from this company period, until they can clarify or explain themselves i.e. admit to the dodgy seed batch from 2022 and confirm that subsequent seed batches are actually viable after being properly tested. Until then, don't even bother and save your money! 🙄

Pritchardia martii, abaxial side of the leaves. Almost looks like a frosty morning shot. Super dense lepida, (white hair like covering), one of the traits of this beautiful endemic species. Tim

They look great! Arrived and potted up today. I'll likely plant one of each next spring once I decide on a spot for them. Haha! Thanks so much!

Dmv oaks: 1 and 2: Cape Charles

Q. geminata? This was a broken twig I found on the ground.

What characteristics point towards Q. geminata rather than Q. virginiana? Many sources say Q. geminata is not native to/ found in Virginia, yet others do.