»Before & After« Pix of Potted Palms

[Pal Meir]

Some pics of 12 palm species grown up in containers in Germany.

(1) Before & after 2 years:

Howea belmoreana 2011 & 2013

Lytocaryum weddellianum 2013 & 2015

(2a) Before & after 3 years:

Ptychosperma macarthurii 2003 & 2006

[Pal Meir]

(2b) Before & after 3 years:

Phoenix reclinata 2005 & 2008

Trachycarpus wagnerianus 2005 & 2008

[Pal Meir]

(2c) Before & after 3 years:

Rhapis humilis + R. micrantha 2012 & 2015

(3) Before & after 4 years:

Brahea armata & Chamaerops humilis 2003 & 2007

[Pal Meir]

(4) Before & after 5 years:

Licuala grandis 2003 & 2008

Sabal palmetto 2003 & 2008

[Pal Meir]

(5) Before & after 6 years:

Arenga engleri var. ryukyuensis 2002 & 2008

Phoenix rupicola 2002 & 2008

[Pando]

Wow, they all look nice! That Licuala grandis is incredible given your climate and indoor conditions. Do you keep it outside at all in summer or is that strictly indoors? Looks great.

[Pal Meir]

Wow, they all look nice! That Licuala grandis is incredible given your climate and indoor conditions. Do you keep it outside at all in summer or is that strictly indoors? Looks great.

It was all the time kept indoors under normal living room conditions; only for the photo I placed it into the garden.

[Pando]

Thanks, is the Licuala still alive and how does it look now?

[Kai]

You keep them looking good Pal! Sehr schön!

[Pal Meir]

(6) Here 3 further palm species,

before & after 3 years:

Cocos nucifera 1974 & 1977

Before & after 7 years:

Archontophoenix cunninghamiana 1982 & 1989

Before & after 8 years:

Phoenix canariensis 1981 & 1989

[Pal Meir]

Thanks, is the Licuala still alive and how does it look now?

I gave it away in 2008 to a friend. And it died within one year

[Pando]

Aww, sorry to hear that... What kind of soil did you use and how often did you water it? It looks like it was next to a window so it probably got plenty of light. For a potted plant, it looks great.

[doranakandawatta]

WOW,

Congratulation for the beauty of these potted palms

It's much more difficult to grow them this way than in normal tropical conditions !

[Stevetoad]

Awesome!!

[Pal Meir]

Aww, sorry to hear that... What kind of soil did you use and how often did you water it? It looks like it was next to a window so it probably got plenty of light. For a potted plant, it looks great.

I used a soil mixture similar to that I am using for Syagrus weddelliana, ca. 3/5 fine pine bark, 1/5 Seramis®, and 1/5 Kokohum®. A good drainage is important, so that the palm can be watered daily. But don’t let stand it in "wet feet" for a longer time. And the place has to be as sunny as possible, even here at 51.5°N avoiding direct sunlight during the summer months and about noon.

[Pal Meir]

(7) Before & after 15 months:

Lytocaryum insigne (Syagrus insignis) 2014 & 2015 (now in 2 litres container)

[DoomsDave]

Pal, those palms are some of the best indoor palms I've seen.

What kind of heating system do you have? How do you keep up the humidity im Winter?

I used to live in Ohio, a climate much like Deutschland, and forced-air heating made things dry as the desert in the winter. Many plants died, usually from drying up.

[Pal Meir]

Pal, those palms are some of the best indoor palms I've seen.

What kind of heating system do you have? How do you keep up the humidity im Winter?

I used to live in Ohio, a climate much like Deutschland, and forced-air heating made things dry as the desert in the winter. Many plants died, usually from drying up.

It is a normal central heating system for living rooms, nothing else. All my palms regular by them selves the humidity during the heating season, so that the air has almost the same humidity as during the non-heating seasons.

[Pal Meir]

(8) Before & after 10 years:

Chamaedorea elegans 1972 & 1982 (the most left one)

[Pal Meir]

(9) Before & after 19 years:

Chamaedorea metallica 1983 & 2002

[Pal Meir]

(10) Before and after 28 years:

Chamaedorea seifrizii 1980 & 2008

[DoomsDave]

Pal, those palms are some of the best indoor palms I've seen.

What kind of heating system do you have? How do you keep up the humidity im Winter?

I used to live in Ohio, a climate much like Deutschland, and forced-air heating made things dry as the desert in the winter. Many plants died, usually from drying up.

It is a normal central heating system for living rooms, nothing else. All my palms regular by them selves the humidity during the heating season, so that the air has almost the same humidity as during the non-heating seasons.

There are many kinds of central heating systems. (BS Man is a heating/AC person so maybe he'll chime in.)

Any thoughts on what your system is? That is a vital, critical issue to others in your situation.

[Pal Meir]

Pal, those palms are some of the best indoor palms I've seen.

What kind of heating system do you have? How do you keep up the humidity im Winter?

I used to live in Ohio, a climate much like Deutschland, and forced-air heating made things dry as the desert in the winter. Many plants died, usually from drying up.

It is a normal central heating system for living rooms, nothing else. All my palms regular by them selves the humidity during the heating season, so that the air has almost the same humidity as during the non-heating seasons.

There are many kinds of central heating systems. (BS Man is a heating/AC person so maybe he'll chime in.)

Any thoughts on what your system is? That is a vital, critical issue to others in your situation.

In some rooms there were radiators as you can see on #1 (Howea 2011), in others underfloor heating as in #20 (Chamaedorea 2002). But the humidity was produced by a lot of palm trees in the living rooms.

[Danilopez89]

Wow. Amazing. How do you do it so well? They look so perfect. I have so much trouble growing anything in containers, I almost killed 2 sago palms in containers...

Do you ever replace their soil? Do you keep them in small containers for a purpose? You said you water them daily...? What do you feed them? Sorry for all the questions, but this really interests me. I'd like to grow a few containerized palms, one I've always wanted in a nice container is the Phoenix Rupicola. By the way, it looks cool the way your rupicola's fronds twist so much. Looks like they do a 360° twist.

[Pal Meir]

Wow. Amazing. How do you do it so well? They look so perfect. I have so much trouble growing anything in containers, I almost killed 2 sago palms in containers...

Do you ever replace their soil? Do you keep them in small containers for a purpose? You said you water them daily...? What do you feed them? Sorry for all the questions, but this really interests me. I'd like to grow a few containerized palms, one I've always wanted in a nice container is the Phoenix Rupicola. By the way, it looks cool the way your rupicola's fronds twist so much. Looks like they do a 360° twist.

I treated most palms in a different way, according to the conditions in their natural habitats which I studied before. – You asked about Phoenix rupicola: The palm on the photos was grown up from seed in 1983 and was potted into the container (without hole) you see on the pic of 2002, that I filled with Seramis® without removing the old substrate. As you can see on the other photo the palm remained in the same container with the same substrate, which I kept always wet. As fertilizer I used liquid COMPO®. That's all. – But for other palms I mixed other substrates, some without any organic matter, others mostly with fine pine bark, etc.

[Pal Meir]

Another example for a soil mixture is this one I am using for Lytocaryum insigne (Syagrus insignis) seedlings and which I can recommend for palms which grow on light acidic rocks at hillsides or slopes, as it has an excellent drainage. The pots are 8x8x9cm, the plant is 1 year old:

[sashaeffer]

What a great comparison thread. Beautiful palms there.

[realarch]

I agree, amazing success, ( by no accident either), with potted specimens. They look fantastic.

Too bad about the Licuala, it was a beauty.

Tim

[Danilopez89]

You got skills Pal!

Thanks for sharing your expertise with potted palm with us! Now I know how to "properly" choose soil for indoor growing. I had already pretty much given up on having some indoor palms after trying some kentias and miserably failing... but now I feel encouraged to try again. Thanks!

[Josh-O]

awesome pic's

gotta love the after pictures best.

great job growing these palms!!

[Surf Guy]

Gut gemacht!

[Sabal Steve]

The before and afters are great, I love the old film photos.

Die Palmen sind sehr schön!

[OverGrown]

This is epic documentation! Very nice looking palms!

[Monòver]

Thanks for the pictures and the information.

The Chamaedorea seifrzii is amazing!

[Pedro 65]

Pal, your pics show your "keenness" , so are you using "grow lights" or a "heated" Hot house to get great growth with many of those palms since winters are so "freezing cold" @ 52 deg Nth of the Equator??

Keep Keen

Pete

[Neil C]

Great looking palms Pal!

Regards Neil

[Pal Meir]

Pal, your pics show your "keenness" , so are you using "grow lights" or a "heated" Hot house to get great growth with many of those palms since winters are so "freezing cold" @ 52 deg Nth of the Equator??

Keep Keen

Pete

After the seeds had germinated I don't use bottom heat (I did this only in arlier times, but it wasn’t good for the roots at all; pic 1) or a special greenhouse for the seedlings, but placed them on the floor of a living room (pic 2) or on a window sill (pics 3). When the winter (or even the summer) was too dark here, I placed some palms e.g. under a reading lamp (pics 4&5). Other palms like Chamaerops and Trachycarpus were all the year outdoors; only during heavy or long lasting freezes I put them into a greenhouse (pics 6&7). As I like to live together with palms I have them in my living room (as you can see also with the Phoenix rupicola (pic 8), that I had carried into the garden only for taking a better photo.

(1) Palmseedlings on window sill over heating in 1972

(2) Palmseedlings on floor of living room in 2003

(3) Palmseedlings on window sill in 2014

(4 & 5) Juvenile Lytocaryum weddellianum under halogen reading lamp in 2014 March & August

(6 & 7) Greenhouse as shelter from freezes and storms

(8) Living together in a living room, here with Phoenix rupicola in 2008

[Pedro 65]

Pal, your pics show your "keenness" , so are you using "grow lights" or a "heated" Hot house to get great growth with many of those palms since winters are so "freezing cold" @ 52 deg Nth of the Equator??

Keep Keen

Pete

After the seeds had germinated I don't use bottom heat (I did this only in arlier times, but it wasn’t good for the roots at all; pic 1) or a special greenhouse for the seedlings, but placed them on the floor of a living room (pic 2) or on a window sill (pics 3). When the winter (or even the summer) was too dark here, I placed some palms e.g. under a reading lamp (pics 4&5). Other palms like Chamaerops and Trachycarpus were all the year outdoors; only during heavy or long lasting freezes I put them into a greenhouse (pics 6&7). As I like to live together with palms I have them in my living room (as you can see also with the Phoenix rupicola (pic 8), that I had carried into the garden only for taking a better photo.

Cool, thanks for the reply Pal, everything looks healthy n happy Pal, in Oz a "green house" is a "shade house"( open and covered with 50% Shade cloth) and a "hot house" is a sealed outside rectangle x semi circle shape covered with clear plastic or 30 50 or 70% filtered, I haven't had an Oz hothouse for a few yrs now, time to build another 1 , palms go so darn fast in them.

Pete

[Pal Meir]

My living room is my greenhouse or "shade house", so I can grow up only such palms I can live together with , as you can see on these two before&after pics:

Before & after 1½ year Lytocaryum weddellianum "workplace" from February 2014 and July 2015 (today!)

[Danilopez89]

Awesome Pal. I like your "workplace". I wonder how I can bring some palm trees inside my house without my wife going crazy on me? I should start small, maybe she wont notice them...