Do You Have a Saw Palmetto?

[PalmTreeDude]

I have heard the Saw Palmetto is pretty cold hardy. It can also be used as a scrub and they are used for medical purposes. But they seem to be an "unpopular" palm. Does anyone have one?

[Laaz]

I have quite a few, both green & silver. Very nice under-story palm.

[Laaz]

[Kris]

Dear Todd,

Nice visual

Thanks,

Kris.

[JMBreland]

Of course, here in Florida, they are abundant in our landscapes, both the silver and green forms. So I really can't speak for others who live far outside its range. Great question, I'm curious to know just how popular, or unpopular, our native shrubby palmetto is! 

[PalmatierMeg]

I have several green and several silver saw palmettos I grew from seeds so I would have all of FL's native palms in my yard. I prune them a couple times a year to expose their trunks that twist and crawl across the ground. I believe my silvers are the FL east coast form. I'd love to try seeds of the intensely silver GA variety. Most people don't have saw palmettos in their yards as they are common and have sawlike spines on their petioles. But local municipalities and professional buildings use them as landscape plantings, which reflects a move toward planting and conserving native vegetation that came into vogue after we moved here in 1993.

I first visited FL (Orlando) in the mid-1980s. I remember riding at the front of a bus and I noticed all these short, palmate plants lining the side of the road. I asked the driver, "Those look like little palms. Are they?" He snarled back, "Those spiny weeds? They should be ripped up wherever they grow." That was the prevailing attitude toward much of FL's native plants back then: worthless, noxious and expendable. I heard the same sentiments expressed by another local driver toward red mangroves and their island-forming habit: "Rip them out wherever they grow." Now we know how valuable mangroves are in filtering sea water and protecting fish fry. They are vigorously protected by State and Federal authorities who will slap fines and even prison sentences on people who damage them without a permit (and you need a permit to trim a branch or pluck a leaf). Just ask retired baseball player Mike Greenwell, who was caught ripping out red mangroves on his waterfront property. Local celebrity aside, he was hit with fines and lots of bad publicity.

Florida's saw palmettos have been rehabilitated like the mangroves (black, red, white all protected now). While you don't need a permit to cut one down, they are generally left alone unless land needs to be developed. And many municipalities like Cape Coral and Fort Myers now use them to landscape with native plants. What with the saw palmetto supplement craze we have a problem with people, often immigrants, trespassing on private and public lands to harvest the seeds. When I worked on Little Pine Island at the wildlife preserve, we had to chase away vanloads of people who tried to sneak onto State land to pick saw palmetto fruit to sell to supplement makers. I hope that craze fades away so older saw palmettos can reproduce naturally.

[Laaz]

They are native here as well & very under used in the landscape. The fruit are used to treat prostate problems, so the health food nuts grab all the fruit up.

[Alicehunter2000]

Can you eat the ripened fruit for the benefits? Wonder how that tastes?

[Laaz]

I hear the indians used to eat them. Just the smell of them turns my stomach!

[redbeard917]

29 minutes ago, Alicehunter2000 said:

Can you eat the ripened fruit for the benefits? Wonder how that tastes?

I've eaten one. It was ripe and looked just like a tender black olive, which I enjoy. I was curious, having read Jonathan Dickinson's account of his shipwreck off of what is today Jupiter, FL in the late 1600s. Apparently the natives weren't very hospitable and bound them up. After a few days of hunger, they noticed the natives were all eating saw palmetto berries. They begged and eventually got some. Even in a state of starvation, they spat them out, Dickinson saying they tasted like "rotten cheese steeped in tobacco juice". As a palm lover, I had to find out for myself. Well, to make a long story short, his description might have actually been kind.

[redbeard917]

I actually have saw palmetto with green leaves growing and reproducing on my property, but I also planted this blue one which is one of my favorites.

[PalmatierMeg]

I would never eat one of those things. The smell of the fruit alone makes me queasy. One time cleaning them was enough, at least for the green ones. But I'd take on fruit from an especially nice blue/silver one.

[JMBreland]

1 hour ago, redbeard917 said:

I've eaten one. It was ripe and looked just like a tender black olive, which I enjoy. I was curious, having read Jonathan Dickinson's account of his shipwreck off of what is today Jupiter, FL in the late 1600s. Apparently the natives weren't very hospitable and bound them up. After a few days of hunger, they noticed the natives were all eating saw palmetto berries. They begged and eventually got some. Even in a state of starvation, they spat them out, Dickinson saying they tasted like "rotten cheese steeped in tobacco juice". As a palm lover, I had to find out for myself. Well, to make a long story short, his description might have actually been kind.

A palm enthusiast in Pensacola had good success pickling them like olives, claiming that they taste like olives. I haven't tried one. I will have to dig up his recipe and post it here. 

[PalmatierMeg]

6 minutes ago, JMBreland said:

A palm enthusiast in Pensacola had good success pickling them like olives, claiming that they taste like olives. I haven't tried one. I will have to dig up his recipe and post it here. 

I don't like olives either but good luck. Regular olives don't grow here so why not pickle saw palmetto fruit.

[sur4z]

I have the scars on my arms from retrieving my golf ball from clumps of saw palmetto.

[JLeVert]

They grow natively about an hour south of Augusta, GA, but do just fine here.

This one is from Hobe Sound, but has been in Augusta for about 10 years.  Lowest temperature endured:  13F.  The photo does not do it justice - it is really silvery-white.

[PalmTreeDude]

37 minutes ago, JLeVert said:

They grow natively about an hour south of Augusta, GA, but do just fine here.

This one is from Hobe Sound, but has been in Augusta for about 10 years.  Lowest temperature endured:  13F.  The photo does not do it justice - it is really silvery-white.

Are they really as cold Hardy as people say? Zone 7a?

[Walt]

Saw palmetto is the most common native palm on my property, followed by Sabal etonia, the Sabal palmetto. All my native saw palmetto are the green form. I have about 25 blue form I introduced. I like these palms as understory palms planted around taller palms or trees. When I first bought my property there used to be signs up offering you money to let berry pickers come on to your property and pick Saw palmetto fruits. But those days are now long gone.

On my property I have many saw palmettos with 4-5 feet of trunk. I have one particular clump that has trunks 10-12 feet of semi-vertical and serpentine trunks, shown in the below YouTube video I took in July of 2015:

 

[indianapalmguy]

As an experiment I put a small one in the ground in central Indiana (6A) last spring and it made it through the the winter fairly well and is doing fine now. I only covered it in about 12" of leaves in December. I might add another larger one to see how well it does along with the Sabal Minor and needle palm.

[TexasColdHardyPalms]

Here are a few silver ones that i have. I hand picked these out of 10,000 7g plants. 

[Matthew92]

The only native palm in the part of the FL Panhandle where I live. Have a nice one in the backyard that was already there when the house was built. It just flowered.

[Bill H2DB]

     Here is a picture taken during Daytona Speedweeks , way back in the '50's . It is on the south end , and much of

what you see has been developed , but remnants are still there .

   Up the road , a few miles , as you go from Ormond Beach north on AIA , this same scenery still exists . The east coast has / had much 

of this. 

   The harvesting of the fruits for use in Prostate OTC meds has created a small industry in some locales .

 

DaytonaBeachFL1950s_1000-700x466 copy by Bill H, on Flickr    

[Laaz]

A local Walmart here on James Island has used saw palmettos exclusively in their parking lot. This is where I collected my original seeds.

 

[Howeadypsis]

No but I have a sore thumb...

[Walt]

Perkins Nursery of Labelle, Florida, has literally tens of thousands of Serenoa repens in various sizes. I bought many of them over the years from them.

http://www.perkinsnursery.com/

 

[Kris]

Here's one with me,needs repotting but it is very tuff indeed.

.

[Keith N Tampa (ex SoJax)]

Yes, we have them too.  All of ours except one native green clump have been planted since 2012.  This property is an old citrus grove so it had no native plants at all.  We've planted specimens with Silver or Blueish foliage, for the most part.  We also have one that I salvaged from the neighbor's lawn waste pile.  It was about 8' long and it rooted from the trunk.  It's flowering this summer.   All of the smaller ones planted during  the same rescue attempt died, even though some grew leaves first. They do need good watering while they get established whether pot grown or stem cuttings.  Once established, they are tougher than nails.  Do give them some distance from structures, however.  They are a fire succession species and burn vigorously so you don't want them igniting something valuable if they happen to catch fire.  

[Tampa Scott]

They claim a lot of space in my yard, but I love 'em.

Edited July 9, 2016 by Tampa Scott

[Palmə häl′ik]

I do believe the FL black bear enjoys this fruit

[redbeard917]

15 hours ago, Palmə häl′ik said:

I do believe the FL black bear enjoys this fruit

Yes, in earlier years I spent a good bit of time walking along trails in the nearby national forest, where piles of dung that seemed to consist almost entirely of saw palmetto seeds were seen every few feet. The palmetto exists in uncountable numbers in forests here. I imagine local bears have very healthy prostates, assuming they have them at all anyway.

[NorthFlpalmguy]

I don't have any as I have enough snakes in my yard already, as the seeds attract all sorts of vermin and their predators. These went from weed status to one of the most popular with the native landscape movement. I do like them trimmed up where they look like chamaerops.

[rick]

Ive got several clumps both the blue and green forms that were probably here when the house was built. Here is one of the largest with a 5 gallon bucket for size. The small palm in front is a Dypsis leptocheilos.

 

Here is another big one thats grown up the fence.

[ErikSJI]

[Phil Stager]

Have both green and silver forms - bulletproof except for idiot neighbor's chain saw.  They are a great screening palm.  Pic is  a few years old.  Difficult palm to transplant due to very deep root system.

[_Keith]

They have certainly proved difficult for me in South Louisiana's soils and climate.  Next time I try one, I'll probably add a foot (minimum) on top of our clay soils.

[Laaz]

We have red clay here & they do great. Your climate is pretty similar to ours.

[Las Palmas Norte]

"Do you have a Saw Palmetto?"

I do now (barely) ... thanks again Todd (Laaz) for the seeds last fall.

Cheers, Barrie.

 

 

[Dave-Vero]

The native range is north to Beaufort and Jasper Counties, South Carolina (Manual of the Vascular Flora of the Carolinas).  Present in coastal Alabama and Mississippi.   I think it's been grown in Eugene, Oregon.  I've got a clump hiding in my back yard.  

This photo is at Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park south of Orlando.  Frequent fires keep the saw palmettos and everything else quite short.  The palmettos creep across the ground with the stem tips occasionally bifurcating, so that over a long period, perhaps back 10,000 years or more, a single genetic individual can spread into many growing tips and cover a substantial space.  Aerial photos of palmettos at the southern Brevard County beaches seem to show distinct clumps with different shades of green and silver.  

[Dave-Vero]

Here's a screen shot of palmettos at Archie Carr National Wildlife Refuge in south Brevard.   Google Maps.  

[Mohsen]

I do have and grow some a Saw Palmetto  

This is my biggest one so far   thanks to @Phoenikakias....

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