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Really good looking palm, Tim. Here's another Hawaii entry - my quartet, planted September 2013. Photoed from my third-story balcony.

Had a nice dinner under the Roystonea regia: grilled up some cevapcici, which are caseless Serbo-Croatian lamb and beef sausages with some mushrooms in wine and garlic sauce. And a politically incorrect beverage. .

A few from the past.

At our local restaurant, they're served in a sandwich bun with side of yogurt and coarse-chopped raw onions.

A rather fast growing majestic Syagrus with stiff dark green leaves. Ripe fruit is yellow and the size of golf balls. These have got to be in the 30 foot range. (10m) Always loaded with seed. Tim

Such a beautiful Syagrus Tim, my favorite. The crown has its own unique look. Yours looks amazing. Been growing one from a little seedling via Floribunda since 2006 or so. It’s grown steadily, although a bit unevenly since then. Occasionally battling nutrient, deficiencies and such. But it’s finally on its way, having developed about 3 feet of nice swollen trunk and that wonderful looking crown.

Hey all, Got invited up to Beaumont to see fellow palm geeks Randall (inland palms) & Eric (Beaumont tropics), along with Bill (Cardiff palms). Beaumont is about 2,800 feet in elevation (I believe) and we had great weather. Both have wonderful gardens. We started at Randall’s. Yes, there is a house back there. He must have 150 palms and cycads packed in there. First up, the nerds congregate. Followed by a nice, fast growing Nanorropes richiana, and an awesome Phoenix rupicola.

The three each have seed on them so I will have to go back with a pair of lopers .

Yellow Latania

The best I can capture since it is in the corner of banana collection

Here’s the recipe for the mushrooms: INGREDIENTS 1-2 pounds crimini mushrooms chopped; 1 large onion skinned and diced; 1-8 cloves of garlic peeled and grated; olive oil; 1-2pounds ripe tomatoes; salt pepper chopped basil and thyme to taste; 1 cup dry white or red wine. PROCEDURE Coat sauce pan with 1/4” of olive oil and sauté grated garlic till golden or brown; add mushrooms, tomatoes, and chopped onion; stir; add wine, salt pepper and thyme and or basil;simmer on low heat uncovered till liquid evaporates. Stuff face, along with cevapcici. Chase with some red wine. So @dalmatiansoap what do you have with cevapcici?

My bottles don't start flowing until around 8 pm.

Hi Kyle, I do not know what causes the yellowing of specifically madagascariensis, but I do know adding lots of compost and lava rock for drainage in my clay hillside soils has helped all my palms and plants put on deeper green hues/ solid growth. The areas of the side yard I have been slower to add compost and drainage rock, has slower growing plants with more tip burn/ nutritional issues etc. I am a believer in developing the overall soil health, and dynamism to get the best looking plants which often means lots of leaf drop and litter that other folks might find less attractive etc. Every year or two I will do a big order of compost and mulch to cover the front and back yard, but this year I swapped out the organic mulch for draining 3/4 lava rock. Hope it helps with opening up my clay soils, but it also looks great against the green fronds!

Next, the best Trachycarpus princeps I’ve ever seen. Interestingly, they won’t grow very well here near the coast. But a slam dunk in the dryer air where he lives. Followed by a canopy view with a Livistona decora poking its head out. As his canopy has expanded, what used to be impossible for him to grow, is no longer out of the question. Case in point, Becarriophoenix alfredii.

Next up is a nice stout Brahea armata, followed by a great Phoenix rupicola & finally Dr. Randall explaining the characteristics of a Cycas hybrid.

Two palms on eBay one an absolute cracker of palm worth every cent; the other well iam no expert but I think it needs a proper identification!

Unless meal is too spicy, whereby a sangria would match perfectly, Bourgogne is the perfect beverage.

🙀oh, I am shocked!

A nice splash of sangria.

Borassodendron borneense, still growing.

This looks like kebab to me; not sausages. By coincidence I had local sausages yesterday; here in the south of Greece people add orange in the sausages! Personally, I prefer those from northern Greece which are packed with garlic and leek.

@DoomsDave great choice 😊🥂 To be clear ćevapčići are Bosnian dish in origin but they are prime dish in any grill party in this part of Europe. Honestly my favourite combo is with some cooked leafy greens with cooked potatoes and fried egg aside but most people just stuff them in pita bread add some diced red onions and some Ajvar. Balkan fast food style. In Bosnia they serve it with yogurt but here the beer is first option This video is how we prepare most veggies for side dish

I use a mixture of coco pear perlite with a good quality potting mix. most likely the problem comes from watering in summer, it has been a long hot dry summer so I have been watering quite a lot, most waterings in summer had seaweed via a Venturi. I did do a couple of Agrifos systemic fungicide waterings in combination with the seaweed. I don’t think there is any reason Agrifos has had a detrimental effect on the gausia palms. Possibly some leaching due to heavy watering. So that may have been the boron culprit at play. I have seen at work 15000 blueberrie trees burn due to boron being used, the rate for fertigating should have been 200grms not 2000grms. What an argument that was with the boss trying to blame me, in the end it came down to well that’s your handwriting to I would have used a different pen looking for an excuse to blame me. Well I had it in writing, his writing!!!

..I should add, 20ft is a general, upper- end height. exceptional specimens, like the one below, can exceed that. Puts the ..much smaller.. specimens in Glendale to shame Tohono Chul Park, Tucson, 09 / 2021: Very unique bark for a " desert " tree as well.

We have a Euromarket in town. They sell two types of the sausages; one with casing and one without. One is spicier than the other. For awhile they sold a rack of smoked veal ribs for $4.50 a pound but I haven't seen those in 6 months. Attached to the store is a small restaurant that makes the best espresso for miles around.

I agree about the swollen base but the mystery palm does not appear to have a crownshaft. I will try to get leaves but they are 25 feet in the air. My friend (owner) commented that it may just be a volunteer!

Nearby Carpoxolon macrospermum for comparison:

Yeah that was my original guess before these latest photos. I’ve only ever seen a handful of Reinhardtia p in my life but I feel like the fronds don’t match and probably the trunk girth too. The leaflets on this palm look to be held at a strong V from the rachis which was one of the things that made me think Carpoxylon. Would be really interesting to see if the old leaf bases could be removed. It certainly is strange for Carpoxylon to hold on like this but in other palms this can be climate/environmental related.

Thanks @Merlyn I don’t think there is any boron in seaweed extract that’s for sure. I might find a foliar with trace elements, I will say fertilisation is not my strong point. With so many varieties of palms mixed together and some that like this and others that don’t like that, I just stick with seaweed and rely on my soil mix.

Found a photo of the Sydney BGs Cocos October 2018. Winter of 2018 finished it off.

The tall one they planted out at the Sydney BGs died after about a couple of years. That was about 10 years ago from memory. It was planted out in May just before winter so was doomed from the start. It wouldn’t surprise me if Cocos could succeed to some extent in Sydney. Maybe not thrive or set fruit, but at least survive and look ok long term. I think there are some collector’s in the northern suburbs who have kept them alive for a while.

The tall one they planted out at the Sydney BGs died after about a couple of years. That was about 10 years ago from memory. It was planted out in May just before winter so was doomed from the start. It wouldn’t surprise me if Cocos could succeed to some extent in Sydney. Maybe not thrive or set fruit, but at least survive and look ok long term. I think there are some collector’s in the northern suburbs who have kept them alive for a while.

He was a busy host.. Notice how he seamlessly folded the mule palm into his deck!

Lastly, and a bit off-topic, Randall told me several months ago that he was relocating some palms in his backyard so that he could make a tiki hut. I’m thinking of something like maybe an outdoor barbecue/ bar area, open air, with a thatched roof. Ah no.. His attention to detail was absolutely unbelievable. Beyond words, enjoy..

@SeanK They look great! Edit: Google maps shows them still there in 2008. Wow!

It's a great hybrid, but the plant kneads moar lite.

Yes, I was thinking of sending them a message. But iam sure they are quite aware of what they have, buyer beware. Also I think anyone with half a palm collecting brain would be onto the fact it’s not a pyriformis!

Those meats in the OP are ground meat, for sure. But I've also had Land Animal Kababs as well: Marinate 1 - 2 pounds of pork, beef, veal, goat, lamb, camel or even chicken, cut into 1 - 2 inch pieces in olive oil, lemon juice garlic, rosemary, chopped onions - leave sit overnight in the fridge if possible, then skewer over a fire, cook till done and eat. Be careful about pork and chicken to make sure they're done all the way through, so you don't catch anything. The rest can be a bit rare and still good. Serve with rice pilaf, and a hearty beverage, including, as @Phoenikakias suggests, some burgundy wine, so fine . . .

I sometimes have that too; put some dry red wine in the mushrooms above. But I like sangria because I like sangria.

Still anticipating the disclosure of the beverage👀

The poor Livistona rigidas- exactly what happened to the one you gave me. I assuming baking it in heat would be beneficial but I reckon I cooked it. Good learning for those that remain.

There’s a few planted around Woolgoolga,Mullaway and Red rock. I tried to grow them only 10 minutes drive away further north inland but no luck. Definitely a coastal palm for this area!

I'm not very familiar with this species, as it's not often seen here in Florida. Saw this today at Edison Ford Estates and it's a stunning palm, but surely Normanbyi would have plumose leaves at this size, correct? I'm not sure what it is though. The crownshaft is closer to Wodyetia than Veitchia, and the leaves arch in a way that reminds me of Adonidia more than anything. Are there known Normanbyi hybrids or is this a species that I'm not thinking of?

This year will be more of a work-in-progress year. A lot of stuff has been removed, a lot of stuff will be added. This year might be the year of the Brahea and Livistona plantings. The success of Brahea edulis here has been a motivator to bring more species from this gorgeous genus in for a try. The bed was condensed to a circular scallop bed to make room for a path in this area. Due to the success of Brahea edulis thus far, the former desert bed is getting an expansion with copious trials of Brahea aculeata, Brahea brandegeei, and a few Brahea 'Icy Blue'. All but one of the plantings was grown from RPS seeds picked up last year at this time. About half of the bed is still empty, but there are more Brahea armata, Brahea dulcis, and Brahea 'Icy Blue' waiting for their turn. There might even be a Nannorrhops ritchiana here at a later date. Start of desod - notice how un-Florida-like the soil is here A few views of the first plantings in this area. More to come.

Hearing talk of the "Super El Niño" later this year with the most recent analogs in 2015-2016 and 1997-1998. Well here's the lowest temps recorded for those winter seasons: 2015-2016 IAH: 32F Hobby: 34F 1997-1998 IAH: 28F Hobby: 32F Yes bring on the great warming!! 10b winter 🤞🌴😄

Surely the most cold hardy and most resistant to humid conditions would be from the population in southern Turkey? Crete is an island and stays fairly mild year round with the exception of their hot summers. Lows in winter rarely drop below 40F and rainfall is also only around 20 inches. So it is fairly dry and mild in Crete. Whereas the population in southern Turkey are exposed to rainfall totals of around 30-35 inches in their locality, with wet-cold winters that regularly see frost, since Turkey is not an island, and cold air masses can travel freely from the north of the country to the south. I should think the Turkish population see winter frosts down to -3C most years, something the Crete population never experiences. Bearing in mind that is also a wet-cold as well, as southern Turkey receives lots of rainfall in winter. The Turkish population would definitely be hardier in that respect. Both populations seem to have equal hardiness in regards to wet, humid conditions, but the Turkish population is more resistant to wet-cold, surely. Not that it is an enormous difference though. It probably differs by a few degrees when it comes to wet-cold. I believe the blueish Theo type is the Turkish one and the greener variety is the one from Crete. I can't be sure though. There is also a third population, that is slightly different, found on the Greek mainland, in very small numbers, that was once part of an ancient palm forest. I also think the native specimens in Anafi island and Astypalea island are slightly different to the Crete and Turkish populations. Ultimately there hasn't been enough study or data carried out on Theophrasti as a whole.

Here it is today. P. sargentii on the L. P. ekmanii center. P. vinifera on the R.