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North central Florida has a long and rich history of recurrent extreme cold snaps. Take Volusia county as an example. Extreme freezes were recorded back quite a ways : Jan. 2nd 1766 -- The ground was frozen to an inch in depth along the St. John River. This wiped out the entire citrus crop in the area. Feb. 8th 1835 -- The St. John River froze 50+ feet out from the shores as the temp went into the single digits. Ocala (Ft. King then) hit 11 degrees. Fruit trees were wiped out from South Carolina and Georgia southwards. It was said that fruit trees were "destroyed, roots and all" as far south as the 28th parallel, which would include Tampa Bay on the west coast and Cape Canaveral on the east coast. Again they got hit in 1857 and 1866. The 1870s were pretty rough. with a severe freezes in 1873, 1876, 19879, and 1880. 1886 is another notable freeze. The temps dipped into the teens. 1894 - 1895 was the next big freeze. And again in 1898 where it dropped from 78 degrees to 18 degrees with freezes for 4 straight days. Then there was a 17 year stretch before the next weak freeze of 1916. After that it was mild but some hard freezes in 1962, 1983, and 1985, and of course 1989. That's 200 years worth of heavy impact freezing which repeatedly set back the citrus industry in the area. Spoken communications (recorded in Spaniard documents) with the Seminole Indian tribe, when the Spaniards kicked off planting citrus into north Florida, records a few instances where the indians were perplexed that the spaniards were attempting to plant those crops in the area. This indicates that recurrent cold snaps have been known by the indians to be very routine in the likely hundreds of years prior to the 1700s. Going into the future : Florida is geographically south of an area that has an abundance of cold air (Canada and the arctic above that). The Appalachians is the only physical barrier to cold air heading south. It's a better barrier than we have in Texas as the only barrier to our north is barbed-wire fences and that does nothing. Northern florida is not as protected by water as southern florida is, and it sits several degree further north. Climatologically it sits within the outer envelope of the long Gaussian cold tail (as do all the states that border the Gulf of Mexico). Deep south FL is in the short non-Gaussian cold tail and would require an extreme event and an abormal setup where low level blocking occurs just to the east of florida and cold air advection comes almost straight south down the center of the state and pools. Basically this climatology will not change much over time. A warmer earth will not eradicate extreme cold snaps, unless and until it could melt the poles and Greenland. I would continue to expect periodic deep freezes with temperatures similar to recent history (since the end of the little ice age). Maybe the periodicity changes as large scale processes such as ENSO and PDO continue to oscillate back and forth. Yes, those are in the Pacific ocean but they affect circulation thousands of miles downstream. This past year PDO has been the deepest negative it's ever been and is likely to flip in the next decade or so. With it, ENSO will likely go back to a state where El Nino events are seen more frequently. But, until the Polar areas completely melt away; not likely in the next few generations of humans, then the threat of cold snaps will continue. Ok, I will step off away from the keyboard now .... I originally planned to only reply about the past freeze events, but my history as meteorologist kicked in. -Matt

Becarriophoenix alfredi. Two of my biggest show no frond damage. you can see the foxtails above the first photo got fried of course, can always see damage weeks later but I’m impressed with this palm

Crazy how the west coast of florida was barely affected beyond normal temps. These coconuts are in new port richey in pasco county well north of tampa. Untouched. There use to be a massive mango tree on the property aswell the trunk was 2ft in diameter or bigger tree was massive. They cut it down. No idea why. I took this picture 30 min ago. These are growing further north than people say is possible but here they are and still look amazing after all this winter has thrown at them.

25, 24°F on consecutive nights. I had understood that the all-time low here was 23°F. Our weather station is at 10FT because my wife wanted it to better catch the wind, but I don't think that would affect the reading too much. The Port Saint Lucie area is pretty ugly and will be for awhile. I am waiting for my Adonidias and Wodyetias to succumb. Too old to start again...a young man's game. But at least I got enough left in me to clean up the mess and right-size the yard. There will be TONS of lawn waste to be picked up over the next several months although I fear many residents won't even bother. I am looking at three large coconuts across the street that will probably be there for ages. This bomb cyclone efficiently funneled the cold air right over this area. We received little to no benefit from our geography as compared to more northern and inland locations. To add insult to injury the NWS is now calling for YET ANOTHER frost here Thursday night. We saved a lot of potted stuff by filling our garage for three nights and I'm not doing that again! Such is life.

My alfreddii in Orlando taken this morning. Unprotected, it experienced 25.7F. I soaked the soil the morning before the freeze.

I'll get an update this week

I’ve argued a few times that the Gulf Stream isn’t helpful when there is a land breeze. Miami stayed warm because of the urban heat island (and partially because it is so far south.) Miami Beach stayed warmer because it has the same urban heat island, but also have the benefit of Biscayne Bay (cold air had to cross it.) Where the intercoastal is narrow in South Florida there’s actually not much protection. Where the Gulf Stream helped, if at all, was keeping Biscayne Bay relatively warm.

Looking around the yard, I'm convinced the wind driven cold was the biggest culprit of damage. Not palm trees, but I had z10-11 plants that look untouched under the roof overhang and also sheltered from the wind. Desert rose, cordylines, and rattlesnake plants look just fine. Desert rose flower still in full bloom.

My students and I have been landscaping our school for 40 years and we have a long-tested collection of Sabal palms. I thought that people in zone 8* would be interested in what can be grown long term. The coldest temps these palms have experienced is low teens. I will add more pics if people are interested. The list: S. causiarum, S. minor, S. tamaulipensis, S. rosei, S. x texensis, S. uresana (green and silver), S. pumos, S. bermudana, S. mexicana, S. etonia, S. palmetto Lisa. (4 years old). Added last summer: S. blackburniana, S. miamiensis. In our area, S. palmetto reseeds like crazy. S. minor is native and common in low lying areas. Rhapidophyllum and Serenoa are native about 1 hour south of town. Pictures in order top to bottom: S. causiarum, S. uresana (silver), S. tamaulipensis, S. Lisa, S. Riverside, S. palmetto

Welp, I ended up covering most of the outdoor plants. Got some surprises and some no surprises. We hit lows of around 12-14 and all of my palms are tiny soooooooo Trachycarpus Fortunei - covered with a heavy plastic pot. 2 spears pulled. 1 gallon size. Trachy Princeps x Waggy - even smaller. Covered in a small Styrofoam box. Absolutely fine. It's even pushing a new spear. Big Washy Filibusta - covered with a big Styrofoam box - already frost damaged from before. Spear pull. Small Filibusta - unprotected. Ummm it's very, very brown. Sabal Birmingham - strap leaf. Unprotected. Laughed it off. Sabal Etonia. Unprotected. Laughed it off, it's even growing. Sabal Bermudana - covered with a Styrofoam box. Laughed it off. It's growing, too. Washy Filifera - this plant has looked like crap for so long I honestly can't tell if it's any worse. But it's not dead. The Fortunei surprised me, the Princeps x Waggy REALLY surprised me (it came from @N8ALLRIGHT in KC so I guess it's seen real winter). And what's really cool is I get to cover everything back up in a day or two, but I figured I'd let them get some air and some sun. I think they'd all be cooked if I didn't listen to @Chester B. So I guess the moral of this story is I just need to go balls out with Sabals.

There were indeed 2 Elaeis guineensis at FIT that survived 1989. One of them died in the 2010 freeze, and the other randomly got budroot a few years ago and died as well.

This weeks fix of plants! Calyptrocalyx pauciflorusPinanga sarawakensis Philodendron davidsonii Ixora species Zamia hamanniiTacca palmata I should be able to get that tropical look happening with this lot!

Cold events in Central Florida and below are rare and aren't as severe and common compared to Texas ,where we literally can drop a zone and a half over night. If you look at data from history, the record low temperatures were even colder . Probably some gardeners who witnessed the 1980s freezes are still brand marked up to this date. Freezes are a natural occurrence , some places get hit more than others but they're also beneficial for the environment by killing off invasive pests.

A couple of palms to repot, good things come in threes they say, so three of each to pot up! Acanthophoenix rubra Dypsis confusa Pinanga rumphiana

Foxtails in Altamonte Springs:

True. Gulf Stream isn’t going to help if the air above is being blasted out to sea. Anywhere right near the coast in FL helps in general. But you don’t really have to worry about cold too much down here in SE FL anyways, unless you are growing Cyrtostachys renda / true tropical rainforest type stuff. This was a historic event. I turned the heat on in the house for the first time ever living here, when indoor temps hit 65F…. I’ve never done that in 15+ years, and many people at work said the same thing…. The rest have still never turned on the heat before, or don’t even have heat in their home, just AC. Still, some tropical bushes and bromeliads growing in the yard took some cosmetic damage, as they normally will around 40F usually. Starting tomorrow most days this month will be around 75 degrees, except for a couple. Not sure what exact sensor this tracks:

This is the first time I've seen the mini's cook anything! But that's a lot of them. Just one copper fungicide treatment unless it rains heavy. A cheap temp sensor will let you get the hang of how much heat you are generating.

I agree with the thermo-cube. I don't think the lights are the issue, but they should only be on when it's below freezing.

Any word on the I-drive coconut palm?

I'll second the opinion that adonidia usually show the damage later. Along with bottles and spindles. I've got a ton of tropical palms damaged on this freeze event! South Tropical Trail Merritt Island isn't a microclime in an advective freeze obviously!

Well wishes appreciated. It was the coldest temperature I've recorded on this particular property (24oF) coupled with 13MPH winds.

I feel so bad for the folks in the wake of this cold snap. By the looks of it there was a lot of damage . I just hope some of those beauties recover. Harry

My minimums were between 30F-31F throughout the yard. The minimum I see from KLAL is 28.4F at 6:50AM. I recently received word from the staff at Hollis that the garden took a pretty good hit, so expect to see some damage if you're coming to Plantae-palooza to restock on the cheap later this month. I added the ZIP file with all of the airport records from the NWS here as well as on the screenshots thread. I took a look at the Dew Point for the worst part of the freeze - 8.6F! Hourly Records for this morning - part of the attached ZIP: Dew Point: 20260203_obhistory.zip

Foxtails at Epcot. Over the years at Disney I've noticed foxtail palms have basically become the "new queen palm" as they are using it everywhere now. I understand using them here and there for accent (coinciding with recent long stretches of a lack of hard freezes), but to plant them en-masse might have been a regrettable decision. Same video source as the post above.

Current look at the Satakentias at Disney's Polynesian Resort. Credit to The Disney with Sean Show Youtube channel (still from livestream). Caryota also took it really hard

Some surprises in the yard. My cheapo vevor weather station recorded 26, 24 and 28 the last 3 days now my area is cold a lot compared to other parts of fl I have already seen 27 and 28 degrees a handful of times this year and freezing temps to many to count lol. The biggest winner in my yard to me is arecas. Under canopy they are completely untouched in the open tops are scorched. coconut palm it was defoliated last winter at 27 it looks better after this than 1 night of 27 last year. Foxtail did worse than last year but not much same with royal

@Kiplin if the lower part of the spear is still green I'd mark it horizontally against a nearby frond with a sharpie. That way you can see if it's pushing growth next week. As long as it keeps moving then the bud is alive. Don't cut anything off or give up until it's stationary for several weeks straight. Some stuff might not really grow until well into March. Likewise if the leaflets are dead but the frond stem (rachis and/or petiole) is still green then don't cut it off. For recovery any palm will need nutrients, and anything green still provides nutrients. My treatment for bud rot is a big squirt of hydrogen peroxide, followed up later with Daconil. I got that from other people on PalmTalk and it's been pretty effective. Another PT'er said to use Mancozeb on crown rots. Halley said this was very effective on his Alfredii seedlings. I've bought some but haven't tried it yet. For some of your palms, this is my experience from repeated 27-30F frosts and one night at 24.4F with frost: Pembana, Lutescens, Christmas, Macrocarpa and K.O. (now changed to C.O.) - all had problems with crown/bud rot after cold fronts. They did ok with defoliation and recovery, but some caught a bud rot and died. Pembana and Lutescens I lost trunks out of the cluster but most of the time they grew back. I did lose one big Pembana cluster from upper trunk rot (likely Thielaviopsis). Archontophoenix - Most grew back from defoliation in the upper 20s, with one Tuckeri surviving 24.4F + frost and still growing fine. Hopefully these are "bud hardy" even if they get defoliated. Royal - I've seen these get torched in Lake Mary/Sanford and grow a new frond a few weeks later. Maybe these are "leaf wimpy" but "bud hardy?" Buccaneer - very tough. I lost a small one to a random summer bud rot, unrelated to cold. Otherwise tough to 20? Areca Vestiaria - now that's unusual. Most Areca are absolute wimps to cold. If that survives 26F at your place I need to plant one here!!! Some stuff that was a sickly olive green has turned crispy brown today. For sure it'll be bonfire time in a few weeks...

Sounds like me when people plant mature adonidia merillii as a landscaping focal point up here near Pensacola.

Purchased as remotifolia, but i cannot find any information about it. All get is remotiflora very similar to lantzeana. So is this a remotifolia or a dypsis mystery palm?

I had 24F and 25F on three consecutive mornings. So far, my Becarriophoenix alfredi looks unscathed. Not even any frond damage so far. I will monitor it closely especially as we move into spring. But, I have to say this species looks to be a perfect addition here in zone 9B East Central Florida.

They were dried for a couple of weeks whilst we were away, then I cracked them in a vice. Definitely a knack to cracking, that comes from trial and error over many years (trying different positions to exploit planes of weakness). Soaked in water (changed daily) for a week, then 24 hours in 6% hydrogen peroxide. Sowed in moist sphagnum baggies in a plastic tray on a heat mat set to 35C during the day, and turned off at night (hasn’t dropped below 25C in the garage as it’s summer here).

I have a book that I have been reading about the early settlers in the Spanish colony of Nuevo Santander - now the line along basically from Laredo / Nuevo Laredo to Brownsville / Matamoros. This book has nothing whatsoever to do with weather. There are maybe 10 sentences in the first 10 chapters dedicated to weather - most describing the kind of living you would eke out in a xeric environment as a frontier settler. One brief passage, however, describes the earliest settlers heading to the Rio Grande in the 1750s somewhere around modern day Roma by citing their travel journals. As it turns out they had to hold their party in tents for nearly a week because of a blizzard that prohibited their travels further to the river. That would place them somewhere in modern day Tamaulipas in a f***ing blizzard. Man how times have changed.

Managed to top out at 83F around 3PM, before wavering between 81 -82 until about sunset down here.. 60 currently.

It is advised because any pockets can allow cold air into the root system. Our soil temps were low 60s before the event so there is some evaporation that can raise humidity and provide some heat. Problem is we had tropical storm force winds so unless sheltered, it was useless! 50 mph gusts tore my protection apart in some cases.

Recorded a high of 81F and morning low of 53F today where I am in the east valley of AZ. The warm weather looks like it will continue through the weekend before cooling off next week. This really has been a mild, if not warm winter here in the desert southwest.

Brutal. The fact that the east coast barrier islands weren't spared whatsoever gets me. Brevard south of Cape Canaveral has always looked great for its latitude and if I recall correctly, they made out decently in 2010 relatively speaking. Sadly it appears the landscape there will be getting quite the makeover. On a lighter note, I'd be very keen to obtain coconuts from surviving cocos all around east central FL

Chamadorea cataractarum can handle sun if it gets plenty of water. I use Cascabela thevetia as a hedge myself because it grows so fast. It's poisonous, but I don't eat it!

Serenoa repens takes a while to grow, but they are a great hedge when they get there. Acoelorraphe wrightii could become a little too sparse once the canes get high, but a very strong hedge. Some varieties of Sabal minor get large enough to use as a hedge. Podocarpus is my hedge of choice.

That pin is pretty far from anything other than a few scattered houses, deep into where Golden Gate becomes uninhabitable swampland. I'm skeptical that it actually got down to 22 there but in any case I'm sure the palmettos and bald cypress are fine.

Didn't realize there's also a Satakentia at Epcot by the Guardians of the Galaxy Roller Coaster entrance. Credit to Daily FastPass Youtuber (screenshot from livestream today).

Wow, we all took a pretty good whack! Hope some of it comes back at least, @Merlyn!

Nice one Paul, hope it goes well for you. Yes, I've also seen many H forsteriana getting by here in less than ideal circumstances, a testament to their resilience. Kentias seem to take sun well at a young age around here, if need be. This one got cooked a few years ago, but now grows well fully exposed for most of the day. It's a bit lost in the Lobelia. Worth ripping out less favored plants to have a few Howea of either species. H belmoreana in full sun all day. Neighbor's Strelitzia behind it. These two are just starting to go upward a little. Still better with a bit more shade though. Not growing either of the other two LHI palms. I'm happy with Howea. Getting a bit off topic, but here's a little LHI gem, Dietes robinsoniana below. Flowers one day? We'll see. Maybe you and I can have a visit in the spring. Good to see a few photos from your garden in the meantime.

Haha, yep, the interweb is full of 'information'. Reality has become even more opaque since the rise of AI unfortunately...it's hilarious and a bit ironic that humanity has invented a new way of making ourselves confused, lol!

Richard says Brownsvile = Daytona Beach, give or take. I think his take is mostly true. This event for Florida was probably nothing like 2021 for the RGV, despite the temps. Although I would say that the temps in much of central FL were pretty strikingly low. I think the official temp for central Brownsville in 2021 was 22F but I don't know of any stations other than the airport that measured that. I saw something like 20F in Ocala which seems crazy to me. Difference is I believe it warmed up pretty substantially during the day in FL this go around.

Houston isn't anywhere near the latitude of central Florida or Orlando. It falls right around St Augustine and long term is pretty analogous to that region of northeastern Florida. All time record lows in the 1980s and 1890s are very similar in Houston-Galveston and Jacksonville-St Augustine. A 2021 event in Florida would have snow on the ground in Jacksonville for days with consecutive freezing hours numbering in the days, not hours. With a low somewhere in the low-mid teens. The January 2025 snowstorm that nuked Louisiana through to the western FL Panhandle was pretty similar. Florida really starts to diverge temp-wise relative to latitude deeper in the peninsula with increasing water moderation. Roughly around a line from Daytona to Ocala to the Gulf +/-. All places south of there are warmer or much warmer than the equivalent latitude in TX. Nothing to debate there. Extreme southern Texas might draw comparisons to central Florida, not Miami. Miami/southeast Florida especially is crazy crazy warm, one of the most anomalously warm places on earth. It's warmer there than 21-22 degrees latitude in Mexico along the Gulf, coastal Vietnam at 18 degrees latitude, etc. A continental location at 25-26 degrees latitude with a nearly 70 degree average mean temp in January is absolutely bonkers. Some winters don't even drop below 50F. Don't want to detail this thread into some climate debate comparison. Hopefully winter is over for all of us!

In our last significant freeze in 2010, Adonidia took a few weeks to show damage. We probably won't know full extent of cold damage until March.

Common but colourful Radicalis.

Sounds like my coconut. Day 3 and still a little green near the top. I'm hopeful that means it's still kicking. Now trying to figure out how t treat with peroxide as the meristem is out of my reach.

The NWS recorded a minimum of 24.3F overnight at ~4:15AM. Temperatures in my yard ranged from 26F-28F. The forecasts throughout the area was for 27F-28F, so respectably close. It wasn't as mild as @pj_orlando_z9b's place, but better than another 24F on the board. The forecast tonight is for 30F. At this point, there's a chance that a few of the damaged palms here will live, but if we get another spell like this, they'll definitely be headed to the mulch pile. The lineup for the first half of the month is less than impressive by our standards:

The BEST collection in zone 8