Areca Ipot flower buds -- rot! Why?

[Gbarce]

One of the balled out Areca Ipot palms that I bought about a year ago is finally developing flower buds but I have a question about it.

This bud was growing nice and fat under the crownshaft and created a nice and noticable bulge. The leaf covering these buds was already yellowing up so due to my impatience I just tore it off and the buds ( still covered in its sheath) were exposed. It was nice and fat and I was expecting for teh inflorescence to just burst out but it never did. After months the sheathe just started turning brown in one side and just never opened up.

It finally formed a small slit and the as you can see the flowers in side were all brown and rotted.

[Gbarce]

THis is the same palm.

The next set of buds was also fattening up under the crownshaft. It was creating a noticable bulge too.

With this one I just waited for the leaf that was covering this to just fall off on its own. After a few days the sheath covering the inflorescence just opened up . It looks like the inflorescence underneath was fattening up an forcing themselves out. Looks like this one will be successful in developing into flowers and hopefully seeds too.

The question is:

Is it detrimental to expose the developing inflorescence underneath the crownshaft when the leaf covering it isn't ready to fall off on its own naturally?

[www.dadluvsu.com]

Gene I wouldn't think the fungi is from prematurely removing the leaf sheath... If anything it held in moisture and some sort of icky growth spore got in there and destroyed the flowers... I'll pull my leaf sheath off tonight and take a peak!