Whats wrong with my Chamaedorea brachypoda?

[Mohsen]

Today I noticed that my  Chamaedorea brachypoda  is not as happy as it sued to be, not sure the cause but it was in my unheated green house all winter and unfortunately the same have been happening to some other potted palms in the same green house ...

is it for lack of air circulation, lack of water or too much water ( I tried to avoid both though) ? but I am sure it was happy until last week...I just get it it out to open area so it might get more oxygen...

[sashaeffer]

Probably nothing if your keeping it damp. These seem to always have brown tips on them. Phil from Jungle Music talks specifically on this species being sensitive to water they get causing the brown tips. I have visited his nursery a few times and he as a large one of these and even his had brown tips on just about all the leaves.

Mine is a 5 gallon and gets NO direct light, but in bright cool room and kept damp and I only use rain water other than winter then it gets RO water....and still gets brown tips but grows well.

Maybe the browning is lack of humidity?

[Mohsen]

Not sure , as I had some other casualties in some of my dypsis In pots !

we haven't had any rain for months maybe the humidity is low ?

[XYZ]

Dead and dying roots, spider mites, etc. Brown-tipping most definitely is NOT normal in this species and should not be accepted as such by growers. Plant needs to be treated for mites and replanted in a much more open/free-draining media asap.

Not a cloud forest chamaedorea. This species is very localized in nature and restricted to pockets of lowland rainforests of NE Guatemala and NW Honduras, but is somewhat tolerant of cool nights. If you cannot provide warm tropical conditions, you may want to try another lookalike species like stolonifera or nubium.

[sashaeffer]

"borrowed" from Jungle Music website and specific article about Chamaedorea species.

The brown tipping may only occur when in pots?

From JM

CHAMAEDOREA BRACHYPODA

 

This is a suckering species from Honduras that is considered semi-dwarf and only gets to a height of about 6 feet.  Its trunks are very thin and the leaves entire and simple apically bifid leaves.  The leaves are a dark green and sometimes mottled in different shades of green.  Cold tolerance is to about a freeze.  it wants filtered light.  It also seems to brown tip with poor quality municipal water.  If well grown, this is a gorgeous species

[XYZ]

Only part of that is strictly accurate. Almost any ornamental tropical will brown tip to a greater or lesser degree with "poor quality municipal water". The problems shown here are fairly severe and relate to root loss, poor soil aeration, etc. I'm pretty confident if this struggling division gets repotted promptly, upon examination roots will be dead or extensively damaged. Beyond that, it looks like it has severe spider mite infestation.

Delicate palms can readily brown tip with pure water combined with the wrong growing media (i.e. too heavy, too much fert incorporated, extreme pH, etc.) and/or watering regimen.