Is this a coconut or am I dreaming?

[Danilopez89]

Lol! 

Yeah its just a "cocoNOT"

[Zeeth]

Attalea are still fairly rare in California, aren't they? 

[Danilopez89]

Attalea are still fairly rare in California, aren't they? 

Yeah they are rare. And I think this one might be more rare because it didn't look like Attalea Cohune. But I dont know for sure. It just looked different to me and has a brighter green color to it. I was just trying to make a funny by saying its just a "regular ol attalea" 

[Josh-O]

Attalea Cohune are not common at all. The seed are a nightmare to germinate. The one in your picture Danny is very old for California standards.I have one a couple feet smaller in the "Vista" garden and it nearly 15 yrs old. that's pretty darn slow for a small palm. I would highly recommend you growing this for your garden. They are a home run palm for the desert.

Cheers

[Danilopez89]

Attalea Cohune are not common at all. The seed are a nightmare to germinate. The one in your picture Danny is very old for California standards.I have one a couple feet smaller in the "Vista" garden and it nearly 15 yrs old. that's pretty darn slow for a small palm. I would highly recommend you growing this for your garden. They are a home run palm for the desert.

Cheers

Yeah Attaleas are definitely not common at all. But from what I was told and what I have seen online Attalea Cohune is the most common. And the easiest to find. I bought a 15g size and it wasn't cheap. I was also able to buy a baby Attalea along with the purchase of the big one. It so cute!

Yeah Josh I think they are a real homerun for the desert. They seem to like the heat. I've been watering them a lot and they like it. 

[DoomsDave]

Attaleas are a tough grow for us on the Coast . . .

[Josh-O]

when they get big they are sure worth the wait.

 

here is a picture of mine. it's about 8' tall

 

[Danilopez89]

when they get big they are sure worth the wait.

 

here is a picture of mine. it's about 8' tall

What size container was it growing in before planting? 20g? 

[Hilo Jason]

Since you guys are posting about Attalea I thought I would post a picture of mine.  I bought this in July 2010 as Attalea Geraensis as a small 7 gallon plant.  This picture is from May of this year (I'm not home to take an updated one) and it was over 13 feet tall and growing quite a bit with each new leaf.  This has seen temperatures between 29 and 110 and has never spotted from cold or heat.  PS.  It's not actually as close to that back fence as it appears in the picture! 

Edited October 10, 2015 by Fallbrook Jason

[Josh-O]

Since you guys are posting about Attalea I thought I would post a picture of mine.  I bought this in July 2010 as Attalea Geraensis as a small 7 gallon plant.  This picture is from May of this year (I'm not home to take an updated one) and it was over 13 feet tall and growing quite a bit with each new leaf.  This has seen temperatures between 29 and 110 and has never spotted from cold or heat.  PS.  It's not actually as close to that back fence as it appears in the picture! 

perfectly grown might I say  

[Danilopez89]

Since you guys are posting about Attalea I thought I would post a picture of mine.  I bought this in July 2010 as Attalea Geraensis as a small 7 gallon plant.  This picture is from May of this year (I'm not home to take an updated one) and it was over 13 feet tall and growing quite a bit with each new leaf.  This has seen temperatures between 29 and 110 and has never spotted from cold or heat.  PS.  It's not actually as close to that back fence as it appears in the picture! 

Looks great. I love it. It's so different from other attaleas. 

If you click on the image to enlarge it just looks even better! So joocy 

[Pando]

Doesn't this one in La Quinta look interesting?

https://www.google.com/maps/@33.6767357,-116.3089495,3a,15.2y,253.43h,84.63t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sKtWV71PEy_6ZnqnQx2yoqA!2e0!5s20120101T000000!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1

Hard to see this in all the blurriness, but perhaps Danny could drive by - coconut or coconot?  

Whatever it is, it's slow, because from 2007-2012 streetview images it hasn't grow much. The leaves look kind of flat though, so maybe it's Ravenea rivularis?

Edited October 30, 2015 by Pando

[Chris Chance]

Since you guys are posting about Attalea I thought I would post a picture of mine.  I bought this in July 2010 as Attalea Geraensis as a small 7 gallon plant.  This picture is from May of this year (I'm not home to take an updated one) and it was over 13 feet tall and growing quite a bit with each new leaf.  This has seen temperatures between 29 and 110 and has never spotted from cold or heat.  PS.  It's not actually as close to that back fence as it appears in the picture! 

I just realized I have a picture of this Attalea! This thing is getting massive!

[Chris Chance]

Doesn't this one in La Quinta look interesting?

https://www.google.com/maps/@33.6767357,-116.3089495,3a,15.2y,253.43h,84.63t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sKtWV71PEy_6ZnqnQx2yoqA!2e0!5s20120101T000000!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1

Hard to see this in all the blurriness, but perhaps Danny could drive by - coconut or coconot?  

Whatever it is, it's slow, because from 2007-2012 streetview images it hasn't grow much. The leaves look kind of flat though, so maybe it's Ravenea rivularis?

hard to tell but looking at different angles it could be Ravnaea. It looks yellow and unhappy that's for sure.

[Josh-O]

ravenea rivularis

[Hilo Jason]

Since you guys are posting about Attalea I thought I would post a picture of mine.  I bought this in July 2010 as Attalea Geraensis as a small 7 gallon plant.  This picture is from May of this year (I'm not home to take an updated one) and it was over 13 feet tall and growing quite a bit with each new leaf.  This has seen temperatures between 29 and 110 and has never spotted from cold or heat.  PS.  It's not actually as close to that back fence as it appears in the picture! 

I just realized I have a picture of this Attalea! This thing is getting massive!

cool, thanks Chris. I'm looking forward to finally being home and seeing my yard in a couple weeks!

[Matthew92]

lol... all this coco in California business... Getting queens to grow in the FL Panhandle would be the equivalent. When I was a new palm enthusiast several years ago I would scout out neighborhoods and watch for them. So many newly planted ones died on their first or second winter. Was uber-thrilled spotting a fully mature queen in someone's backyard in a neighborhood that was a slight microclimate. That thrill of excitement discovering something so rare was unforgettable (much like your Palm Desert coco)  It was so gorgeous and might as well have been a coconut- it looked SO TROPICAL with rich, green, drooping fronds looming about 25 feet above the landscape of mundane, typical zone 8 vegetation. I held my breath when we had a freeze in the low 20's, and while smaller one's died, I was amazed this one looked untouched. I speculated if it was a more cold hardy strain. I looked for it everytime we drove by. It even pulled through the 2010 freeze during which it must have endured around 20 degrees. Unfortunately, the polar vortex winter in 2014 killed it- although by that time I wasn't driving by it anymore. I recently confirmed its death on Google Streetview. It was one healthy and vigorous sucker. Soon (and when I can post pictures) I will include pictures in another blog post.

[Danilopez89]

Why does it look so coconutty? What is it? I've been driving by here for years now and today was the first time I realized it wasn't a regular queen palm 

[Danilopez89]

[Zeeth]

Looks like a mule!

[Chris Chance]

I was about to say it looks like a mule. Nice looking too!

[DoomsDave]

JYA!

MULE!

[enigma99]

So what the consensus on how cool hardy a coconut is. If I have repeated lows in the low 40s will they croak?  Let's say 42F at night, 60F during the day

Edited November 9, 2015 by enigma99

[Sandy Loam]

Are these mature coconut trees growing in Dana Point, California?  (See photo below)

[enigma99]

1 hour ago, Sandy Loam said:

Are these mature coconut trees growing in Dana Point, California?  (See photo below)

Looks like archontophoenix to me?

[Sandy Loam]

Oh yeah, if I strain my eyes, I might be able to see a crownshaft on those trees.  My mistake.

[bubba]

Reviewing  weather underground La Quinta, California temperatures for January 2007 I found the following: 

 (1)-12 days with low temperatures below freezing;and

(2)- from January 11, 2007 to January 21, 2007 the maximum and minimum temperatures were as follows: 69/35, 55/27,52/25,52/18,59/20,64/26,60/17,69/33,58/34,57/27,64/30; and

(3)- while there is no doubt that the winter of 2007 was extremely cold, the remainder of low temperatures continued in the high 30s and low 40s throughout the month.

 No area in Florida could successfully grow coconut palms with temperatures of this nature. I recall that the La Quinta coconut was butchered but it’s trunk was mature at the time of the pictures in 2015. Perhaps that coconut was a mature palm that was replanted in La Quinta. The other palms pictured were far less mature but appeared to be surviving but perhaps not thriving by Florida standards.

To my knowledge, the desert region has not experienced similar cold compared to the 2007 arctic incursion recently.  That stated, successive lows in the low 20s and teens or simply not conducive to long-term Cocos nucifera culture. It seems most likely to me that the most likely areas for long-term success with Cocos nucifera would be not so much in the desert but rather in those areas with heat close but outside the marine influence where the Newport Beach coconut survived for many years. Just my two cents but the temperatures experienced with low 20 and 18 and 17 degree nights could never allow survival long-term in that climate, microclimates notwithstanding.

[Pando]

On ‎11‎/‎21‎/‎2017‎ ‎9‎:‎53‎:‎51‎, bubba said:

I recall that the La Quinta coconut was butchered but it’s trunk was mature at the time of the pictures in 2015. Perhaps that coconut was a mature palm that was replanted in La Quinta. The other palms pictured were far less mature but appeared to be surviving but perhaps not thriving by Florida standards.

The one in Palm Desert was cut. The La Quinta tree is alive and well. They were not replanted.

However, there is one in Corona that is the current record holder in terms of latitude. Other than a few more around Salton Sea I don't know of any others.

Edited November 24, 2017 by Pando

[Cluster]

Last time i saw the Salton Sea coconuts they were looking really bad (compared to the first pictures shown here a while ago). I had the impression one or two had already disappeared from the plantation, but might be my imagination. I can't seem to find the topic anymore with the recent pictures.

 

[kylecawazafla]

Here are the coconuts in the salton sea a few weeks ago.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/36838058@N03/37924721572/in/album-72157687672130151/

[veeman55]

I beleive some of those gandia temp stats are bogus. Like the record highs of jan feb and the record lows above zero. Not even malaga almunecar and almeria have record lows so high. Fake weather stats

[veeman55]

On 6/6/2015, 9:08:01, Alicante said:

 

+1 this is true, Plumerias and Papayas aren't a indicator.

 

I got small Plumerias on my flat terrace (they are the entire year located outdoors) and I've seen big plumerias in my zone. They grow in a lot extension of the coast of Spain.

 

Papayas at La Mojonera: (probably the only place in continental Europe when they are growing and fructifying, but I don't state that, if someone knows another places with Papayas on continental Europe be free to say it!)

 

 

Papayas also grow in certain places of the southernmost coast of Spain, which has the mildest climate in continental Europe (there are some zones which never achieved a temperature below the freezing mark) like Almería or the zone of Almuñecar; and in all of those places all the tryings of coconuts failed.

 

In Málaga, in the Central Park, the planted Roystoneas grown extremely fast in only 2 years, and mangos are largely cultivated in that area. Also Málaga has a park with almost all the species of palm trees; but you will not see any coconut.

Deep southern italy in a sheltered frost free zone. Plumerias, mangoes huge 24 foot papayas , octopus trees that flower twice a year, fruiting and full maturation cold sensitive cavendish bananas all the above growing easily without any protection whatsoever. This location is as mild or milder than anywhere in spain greece or cyprus.

[Aleitalyyy]

On 21/6/2015 at 04:10, Danilopez89 said:

gennaio 2014

 

Febbraio 2015

 

 

Maggio 2015

 

Il triplo impianto

 

25 dicembre 2014 (un giorno prima del freddo)

 

 

Marzo 2015

 

Maggio 2015

 

 

hello did your coconut get back in  the garden or is it dead?

[Jim in Los Altos]

6 hours ago, Aleitalyyy said:

hello did your coconut get back in  the garden or is it dead?

We’ll probably never know. He’s not visited Palmtalk since January, 2017. 

[Aleitalyyy]

17 ore fa, Jim a Los Altos ha detto:

Probabilmente non lo sapremo mai. Non visita Palmtalk da gennaio 2017. 

 

[Aleitalyyy]

pity this tread was interesting

[Danilopez89]

On 10/26/2020 at 7:34 AM, Aleitalyyy said:

hello did your coconut get back in  the garden or is it dead?

Those died. I've tried several more but I end up killing them by neglecting them when they needed the most attention. I could have given them some protection from the cold, I could've kept water from getting on to the crown and not watered them too much while it was cold. I think...

Pretty sure they would have done better I planted them in a location that gets more sun. Maybe next to my driveway. 

I have no problem growing them in pots. It's when they hit the ground that I've had problems 

[Danilopez89]

[Danilopez89]

I've had no problems growing attaleas though. They are pretty tough guys 👌

It's the palm tree with the super long fronds 😄

Bismarck. B. Alfredii. Attalea Cohune.

[cocoloco]

On 6/5/2015 at 9:49 AM, Danilopez89 said:

I also found these...

 

 

These weren't aborted by the palm like someone mentioned earlier I climbed 20 feet of trunk to get these...

 

I wonder if this is the first time the fruit gets this far along. There is more fruit like this on the tree (I only took 3)lol. And I wonder if that fruit will fully mature.

Was I wrong about collecting the fruit? I mean, what if the house sells and the new owner wants to "remodel" the front? Then what? And no, I didn't actually climb it...

Hey, the little aborted ones look exactly like the ones I got from the La Quinta Coconut. I have photos of them here on this link from a discussion.