Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins are 3 years old

[PalmatierMeg]

I was doing more spring yard maintenance when I realized my twin (from one seed) Dwarf Red Spicata coconut twins are now 3 years old. They are from the first crop of seeds in 2016 of my late, bodacious mother palm that I first bought in 2010 and the only set of twins she had. I say "late" because she was the victim of Hurricane Irma in Sept. 2017. Both palms are growing well and still almost of equal size while quickly outgrowing cosmetic leaf damage from last winter. They really hate any temps below 50F and leaves will spot, yellow and brown tip to show their displeasure. Anyway, here they are on a warm, sunny afternoon.

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata twins, Cape Coral, FL: 3 years old

[PalmatierMeg]

Bonus Photos! Nearby my twin red spicata coconuts is a younger (2 years old) sibling from the 2017 crop of my late mother palm. Only two seeds germinated that year and this single palm was the only offspring left after Hurricane Irma wiped her out. I planted it in place of a purple tabebuia that was also destroyed. Even though this palm is a year younger than the twins, it is the same size. I believe the twins are undersized because they had to compete for resources from the same seed.

[sandgroper]

Your coconuts look fantastic!  They look very healthy in the photos, the colours are vibrant and they look very strong. I'd be very happy to have them in my yard.

[redant]

Great looking palm. I have sprouted lots of coconuts, have had 2 twins over time. One pair has croaked, the other is doing OK in my gorilla planting zone.

[GottmitAlex]

Thank you for sharing Meg. They are spectacular!!!! 

[Daryl]

They look pretty happy to me!

 

[Cluster]

Hello Meg,

First of all congratulations, your coconuts are really looking great, what a nice color!

May I ask what type of soil and how often are they watered in winter?

Regards,

Pedro

[PalmatierMeg]

15 hours ago, Cluster said:

Hello Meg,

First of all congratulations, your coconuts are really looking great, what a nice color!

May I ask what type of soil and how often are they watered in winter?

Regards,

Pedro

My soil is truly dreadful: alkaline calcareous sand dredged up when Cape Coral's canals were dug in the late 1950s. Fortunately, coconuts can grow in that stuff if they are fertilized. Palms in these photos can be reached by our irrigation system so they receive 1" of water per week in winter. Other coconuts on our garden lot have to depend on rainfall as there is no irrigation there. I occasionally hand water small seedlings but leave larger palms to their own devices. 

[palmfriend]

Beautiful plants, Meg! 

A red spicata is still one of my most wanted plants - I got to check our beaches for floaters from the south since

this species is unfortunately not available/sold over here. 

Thank you for posting and all the best for them!

Lars

 

 

[junglegalfla]

Thanks for the update Meg. I was lucky enough to get one of the sprouted seeds when you sold back in 2016. Mine is about as big as your single. It's just starting to green back up from winter here in St. Pete.

[palmfriend]

I have just made a relaxed sweep through my garden today and came across this one I have planted a few weeks ago...

...and closer

But I expect this to be one of our all present Golden Malays even if the strong yellow/orange rachis raises hope 

of being of another species (wishful thinking )...

Best regards from Okinawa -

Lars 

 

[chad2468emr]

@PalmatierMeg I realize I'm dredging this thread up a bit, but I just did some digging through the forum for "red" anything coconuts, and these look just about exactly the the one I've got! The orangey-reddish petioles + the vertical-oriented fronds are what make me feel this way since a lot of coconuts at this size tend to fan outward much more than mine has, and I've always found that unique. They're all always "nucifera" but I've been dying to know what variety mine is. Fingers crossed this is my guy, because even though its likely going to live out most it's life in a pot and as such won't get a tremendous trunk, any lack of accelerated vertical growth is appreciated here in zone 9b, haha. 

Despite my efforts, he's a bit worse for wear right now thanks to winter with yellowing tips + a few random dead spots on the newest frond thanks to winter. Eager to see this guy take off in the summer, but also nervous because like I said, need to fit it inside haha. 

 

Edited January 12, 2021 by chad2468emr

[PalmatierMeg]

@chad2468emr, very vibrant coconut. It does have that dwarf red spicata look. Where did you get it? To my knowledge, this variety is not widely available except through specialty nurseries. Mine came from a small grower down in Naples, FL. I'm not sure if he still has them. I lost my mother palm to Hurricane Irma in 2017 and have only a few of her offspring growing in my yard.

[chad2468emr]

1 minute ago, PalmatierMeg said:

@chad2468emr, very vibrant coconut. It does have that dwarf red spicata look. Where did you get it? To my knowledge, this variety is not widely available except through specialty nurseries. Mine came from a small grower down in Naples, FL. I'm not sure if he still has them. I lost my mother palm to Hurricane Irma in 2017 and have only a few of her offspring growing in my yard.

I got it from a teeny little nursery (surprisingly diverse palm selection though if I'm being honest, even for SFL) off of University Drive in Davie outside Fort Lauderdale when I was visiting my in-laws last summer. Can't recall the name, but I think it was something along the lines of "Pop's" or something. He sold it to me as a yellow malayan, but it never looked right to me. I think I paid about $25? haha I always laugh when I see nurseries here in Orlando selling regular 'ol green coconuts for $150+ plus at this size. 

[PalmatierMeg]

Then you got a steal of a deal. Congrats. I bought my mother palm circa 2010 for $37. It was almost half the size of yours and twice the price of his Malayans. If I recall right it was his last dwarf red spicata. But it stood out like a beacon among other coconuts.

[PalmatierMeg]

BTW, "Dwarf" is a bit of a misnomer. This cultivar gets large, full and fat if not particularly tall. When I lost her in 2017 my mother palm had 15-20' fronds, 24-30" diameter trunk and loads of orange-red fruit.

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata, Cape Coral, 2014-15

[Palmarum]

7 minutes ago, chad2468emr said:

I got it from a teeny little nursery (surprisingly diverse palm selection though if I'm being honest, even for SFL) off of University Drive in Davie outside Fort Lauderdale when I was visiting my in-laws last summer. Can't recall the name, but I think it was something along the lines of "Pop's" or something. He sold it to me as a yellow malayan, but it never looked right to me. I think I paid about $25? haha I always laugh when I see nurseries here in Orlando selling regular 'ol green coconuts for $150+ plus at this size. 

That would be Pop's Nursery, a local mainstay in the South Broward, Pembroke Pines, W. Hollywood plant world for a long time, years and years. I am not far from it. It is one of my earliest plant sources as a kid. I would ride my bike there and look for palms and plants. I was around 7 or 8 years old. I used to look for, and find, the unusual stuff and would not be surprised if a one-of-a-kind species or variety would show up there. They have been around for so long, that their sources on plant material could be quite expansive.

It could be possible (albeit very rare) to be a Red Dwarf Spicata, but I think it could more likely be a Red Malayan Dwarf, as they are more common. Rarer than the Yellow or the Green Malayan Dwarfs, but old, mature Red Malayan Dwarf specimens are around.

I do remember seeing a pair not far away in a eastern Pembroke Pines housing area, Pasadena Lakes I believe. it was a pair, growing outward from a single planting location, bearing nuts close to the ground, with angled trunks curving away from each other. Front yard of the house, well manicured, well lit with landscape lighting. They were definitely Red Malayan's. It was at night and I was exploring on my bike, so I don't remember where exactly. I wish I had photos but I had to stop photographing neighborhood plants at night (I learned the hard way). If you see that Apricot Red color on a dwarf coconut and it has a regular branched inflorescence, it's probably a Red Dwarf Malayan. I am quoting the great Dave Romney on that.

Ryan

[chad2468emr]

1 hour ago, PalmatierMeg said:

BTW, "Dwarf" is a bit of a misnomer. This cultivar gets large, full and fat if not particularly tall. When I lost her in 2017 my mother palm had 15-20' fronds, 24-30" diameter trunk and loads of orange-red fruit.

^^Oh, for sure, haha. I'm just hoping that means it puts on height much more slowly to give me more time with this palm until I have to haul it south to my in-laws' and plant somewhere in their lawn, haha. 

@Palmarum > Wow, do I miss South Florida... even hearing descriptions of areas I used to drive through every day makes me so homesick! I didn't get his name, but I had asked for what more unusual palms they had and an oder gentleman showed me around and we had a good talk about palms. He seemed to be the owner, so I assume he was "pop." I think he was surprised to see a guy dressed like me in his late twenties who could hold his own in a conversation about rare-ish palm species because there were species I asked about and he kept looking surprised, haha. Great guy!

I had no idea this was even a rare variety of coconut prior to my pontificating that I may have one... are they that rare? For red spicatas, what is it that makes them look different than a typical red Malayan dwarf? Honestly I'd never even heard of one before finding this thread. 

[junglegalfla]

Here is my dwarf red from Meg's original. 5 yrs now? It's a robust grower. It's been cold here in St. Pete so it's a bit ratted out at the moment. No fruit yet. I do not fertilize it due to a dog that is attracted to it & attempts to eat it!

[junglegalfla]

And for context, this was its size Sept 2017 when Irma came through

[chad2468emr]

1 hour ago, junglegalfla said:

Here is my dwarf red from Meg's original. 5 yrs now? It's a robust grower. It's been cold here in St. Pete so it's a bit ratted out at the moment. No fruit yet. I do not fertilize it due to a dog that is attracted to it & attempts to eat it!

That's awesome! I have a few archonto alex seedlings from Meg as well and hope to be able to share such an update in a few years. 

[Palmarum]

2 hours ago, chad2468emr said:

... I didn't get his name, but I had asked for what more unusual palms they had and an oder gentleman showed me around and we had a good talk about palms. He seemed to be the owner, so I assume he was "pop." I think he was surprised to see a guy dressed like me in his late twenties who could hold his own in a conversation about rare-ish palm species because there were species I asked about and he kept looking surprised, haha. Great guy!

I had no idea this was even a rare variety of coconut prior to my pontificating that I may have one... are they that rare? For red spicatas, what is it that makes them look different than a typical red Malayan dwarf? Honestly I'd never even heard of one before finding this thread. 

He might have been a relative of the original Pops, but I remember talking to an older owner/operator in his late 70s back in the 1980s and he was extremely knowledgeable. I always considered him thee 'Pops' but I may be mistaken. I also got the same weird stare and look as a kid asking for different Palms and plants by their binomial names.

The Red Dwarf Spicata is a rare cultivar as all plants were derived from the same source; grower and coconut expert Dave Romney. They were never mass produced. All the original cultivated plants were sold during Palm sales (or at his nursery) as small 3-gallon specimens back in the 1990's into the early 2000's. He might have had five or ten plants (at most) at any one time. (I can still picture his booth in my head as if it was yesterday, with all the coconut cultivars in rows, left to right) The original surviving plants have produced at least two generations since then, maybe more. Hard to tell how many plants are out there. I know of four mature specimens in four separate private collections and a fifth 'grouping' down in Homestead. I have a medium size plant in a pot.

The largest one (or close to a tie) I knew of was Meg's pictured above, before it was lost. Her mother plant was the perfect definition of the cultivar. It is short and stocky, but will still reach considerable height at some point, featuring that bright, apricot-red color on the nuts and petioles. Dwarf coconuts are described as such because they flower and bear nuts close to the ground to aid in harvesting, not because they remain 'dwarf' in size. The main defining feature of the Red Dwarf Spicata is the inflorescence, which is unbranched or 'spicate' in form. If you look close at Meg's photos you will see the nuts arranged in a single spiral around a center rachis, without the branched parts found on most other coconut cultivars.

I know there is more info on the cultivar, in regards to its origin, but I would need to find Dave Romney's coconut book to find the info. I know I had a couple copies of it, but I don't know where. I got so many books... It's a small book, but unique if you like coconuts. I do remember there were also Yellow Dwarf Spicata and Golden Dwarf Spicata cultivars, but they were not as popular as the Red. They would be left behind in the sale booth late on Sunday's as the Red had sold out.

Ryan

[IHB1979]

Meg's Spicata was amazing, I didn't know it was gone. 

I've been able to get a few Red Spicata's through the FNGLA auctions over the years. The nuts specifically came from Montgomery Botanical Garden and are listed as, "Cocos nucifera 'Red Spicata." I have one planted, it's about 3 years old, trunking and flowering like crazy. No nuts yet, but I've noticed the palm doesn't have the spicata flower arrangement. I checked out the spicata page over at palmpedia and one of the main images shows a flowering red spicata with the a traditional flower with spikelets but on the bottom of the page it shows both spicata and traditional flowers. Can a red spicata have spikelets?

I have some pictures below. The petioles were fire orange after germinating and as the palm has aged, they have slowly turned a more green/yellow/orange color.

Seeds after germination

 

Overall view of the palm

 

This palm has a very small trunk, no bole

 

Picture of the flower, with spikelets

 

Here's a close up of the flower (Many of these early flowers open while still halfway in the protective spike)

 

I also have Red Spicata from Redlands Nursery in Homestead. This palm seems like a hybrid as it has many tall characteristics. Specifically the developing lean, which all my tall's have done prior to trunking.

Trunk of the Redland Nursery Red Spicata

Any help would be great! Thanks!

[Zeeth]

3 hours ago, IHB1979 said:

Meg's Spicata was amazing, I didn't know it was gone. 

I've been able to get a few Red Spicata's through the FNGLA auctions over the years. The nuts specifically came from Montgomery Botanical Garden and are listed as, "Cocos nucifera 'Red Spicata." I have one planted, it's about 3 years old, trunking and flowering like crazy. No nuts yet, but I've noticed the palm doesn't have the spicata flower arrangement. I checked out the spicata page over at palmpedia and one of the main images shows a flowering red spicata with the a traditional flower with spikelets but on the bottom of the page it shows both spicata and traditional flowers. Can a red spicata have spikelets?

I have some pictures below. The petioles were fire orange after germinating and as the palm has aged, they have slowly turned a more green/yellow/orange color.

Seeds after germination

 

Overall view of the palm

 

This palm has a very small trunk, no bole

 

Picture of the flower, with spikelets

 

Here's a close up of the flower (Many of these early flowers open while still halfway in the protective spike)

 

I also have Red Spicata from Redlands Nursery in Homestead. This palm seems like a hybrid as it has many tall characteristics. Specifically the developing lean, which all my tall's have done prior to trunking.

Trunk of the Redland Nursery Red Spicata

Any help would be great! Thanks!

Your smaller trunk palm is true to type from what I've seen at Fairchild and the USDA. To me, the Red Spicata dwarf essentially looks like a spicate version of the Tahiti (Rangiora) red dwarf. I have heard that they have different origins, so take that with a grain of salt. The nice thing with the RSD is that hybrids tend to carry the color through, but most don't keep the gracile form. 

[palmfriend]

On 1/13/2021 at 8:24 AM, Palmarum said:

...The largest one (or close to a tie) I knew of was Meg's pictured above, before it was lost. Her mother plant was the perfect definition of the cultivar. It is short and stocky, but will still reach considerable height at some point, featuring that bright, apricot-red color on the nuts and petioles. Dwarf coconuts are described as such because they flower and bear nuts close to the ground to aid in harvesting, not because they remain 'dwarf' in size. The main defining feature of the Red Dwarf Spicata is the inflorescence, which is unbranched or 'spicate' in form. If you look close at Meg's photos you will see the nuts arranged in a single spiral around a center rachis, without the branched parts found on most other coconut cultivars...

Ryan

Ryan,

 Thank you very much for your description - and to Meg for posting images of the mother palm, so

I could check right away - very helpful and valuable!

best regards from Okinawa -

Lars

 

[junglegalfla]

My red spicata from Meg's orig plant she lost is still thriving. It's now getting ready to flower. Trunk is a fatty. 

[junglegalfla]

[Looking Glass]

I don’t have the kind of place where I should be putting a coconut in (we are too packed in here), but I must say, those golden/red beauties look very nice indeed.  I am also suddenly inspired to check out Pop’s Nursery!  

[PalmatierMeg]

Bren, your DRS is the spitting image of her late mother. Glad to hear she is flowering. My twins (same crop as yours) and year younger solitary show no signs of flowering yet. I need to post current photos of them.

[PalmatierMeg]

My Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins are now 5 years old. I didn't realize I hadn't posted photos of them since 2019 so today I took their portraits for 2021. I also photographed my Dwarf Red Spicata Single that is now 4 years old. Despite being a year younger it is larger than either twin. I believe having to share nourishment from one seed has slowed the growth of the twins even after all these years. All 3 palms are offspring of my late mother palm, which fell victim to Hurricane Irma in 2017.

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins, 2021, Cape Coral, FL

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Single, 2021, Cape Coral, FL

[junglegalfla]

And here we go!

[GottmitAlex]

On 7/10/2021 at 12:08 PM, PalmatierMeg said:

My Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins are now 5 years old. I didn't realize I hadn't posted photos of them since 2019 so today I took their portraits for 2021. I also photographed my Dwarf Red Spicata Single that is now 4 years old. Despite being a year younger it is larger than either twin. I believe having to share nourishment from one seed has slowed the growth of the twins even after all these years. All 3 palms are offspring of my late mother palm, which fell victim to Hurricane Irma in 2017.

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins, 2021, Cape Coral, FL

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Single, 2021, Cape Coral, FL

My goodness @PalmatierMeg, what splendid palms! Thank you for sharing.

[Plantking165]

On 7/10/2021 at 3:08 PM, PalmatierMeg said:

My Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins are now 5 years old. I didn't realize I hadn't posted photos of them since 2019 so today I took their portraits for 2021. I also photographed my Dwarf Red Spicata Single that is now 4 years old. Despite being a year younger it is larger than either twin. I believe having to share nourishment from one seed has slowed the growth of the twins even after all these years. All 3 palms are offspring of my late mother palm, which fell victim to Hurricane Irma in 2017.

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins, 2021, Cape Coral, FL

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Single, 2021, Cape Coral, FL

Any update on these now would love to see how they look.

[PalmatierMeg]

9 hours ago, Plantking165 said:

Any update on these now would love to see how they look.

A little the worse for wear after Hurricane Ian. The solitary is so large and heavy we are having trouble keeping it upright. Hurricane Ian blew it to the west, Hurricane Nicole blew it to the south. The twins are staked upright. But this multi-day cold front caused a lot cold-spotting and yellowing even thought temps fell only to 40.8F and never rose to 50F for 3 days - cold damage and cool damage. And because temps never topped 50 no chance of photosynthesis either.

I will take photos.

[Plantking165]

40 minutes ago, PalmatierMeg said:

A little the worse for wear after Hurricane Ian. The solitary is so large and heavy we are having trouble keeping it upright. Hurricane Ian blew it to the west, Hurricane Nicole blew it to the south. The twins are staked upright. But this multi-day cold front caused a lot cold-spotting and yellowing even thought temps fell only to 40.8F and never rose to 50F for 3 days - cold damage and cool damage. And because temps never topped 50 no chance of photosynthesis either.

I will take photos.

Yeah can't wait to see how they look, mine is holding in there, some necrosis on the leafs after we had 2 consecutive nights that hit 32 and 31 degrees and a 3rd night in the 30s it still looks great considering those Temps and the fact that I only wrapped the trunk with a towel that was it.

Edited December 28, 2022 by Plantking165

[PalmatierMeg]

As requested, I took the following photos of my surviving Dwarf Red Spicata Twins and their Solitary sibling. Quick reminder, these palms are offspring of my late bodacious mother palm that I lost to Hurricane Irma in 2017. If memory serves me, the twins germinated in 2015 and the solitary in 2016. Even though it is a year younger, the solitary coconut is almost twice as large as the twins, which have not caught up with having to share sustenance from the same seed.

The twins, being smaller, dealt better with Hurricane Ian's winds (cat 4/5 for hours), so we were able to to stake them securely upright. The solitary was, and still is, a problem. Ian's winds pushed it about 60 degrees to the west leaving it unstable on its roots/growing plate. And it is so heavy it takes several people to push it upright and tie it off. The instability left it wobbling precariously and ropes have a tendency to stretch out. In Nov. Hurricane Nicole's winds pushed it to the south and we had to restake it. But yesterday a brisk wind blowing from the south pushed nearly upright so we rushed to re-tie the ropes while the wind did the lifting. It still leans a bit SSE and we pray it will establish new roots. If it actually hits the ground, it will be goner as we just can't right it again.

Both the solitary and, esp., the twins, show the effects of the hurricanes and the Christmas cold front that beset us with 3 days and nights of temps that never reached 50F and fell as low as 40.8F. And the sun never shown for even a moment during those miserable days. I took closeups of the twins' leaves that show brown tips from wind, yellowing and cold/cool spotting. Coconuts deeply resent any temps below 50 and will display their unhappiness for all to see. You don't need just a night at 32F to kill them. String together some chilly, dreary, sunless days and they can turn up their toes. They can't photosynthesize below 50F and all the sun in the world is useless to them when it is 40 degrees.

If you look closely you will notice the solitary palm is less damaged. I'm sure that is because the leaves it has left after Ian are held vertical/upright and less exposed to cold air. Most cold damage will be to the underside of the leaves because of its lean. The coconut twins, on the other hand, have a number of leaves held horizontally and open to the sky. Hence, cold damage. Not a good start for this winter. I hope at some point these coconuts get a break.

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins, Cape Coral, FL, Jan. 2023

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Solitary, Cape Coral, FL, Jan. 2023

[Plantking165]

1 hour ago, PalmatierMeg said:

As requested, I took the following photos of my surviving Dwarf Red Spicata Twins and their Solitary sibling. Quick reminder, these palms are offspring of my late bodacious mother palm that I lost to Hurricane Irma in 2017. If memory serves me, the twins germinated in 2015 and the solitary in 2016. Even though it is a year younger, the solitary coconut is almost twice as large as the twins, which have not caught up with having to share sustenance from the same seed.

The twins, being smaller, dealt better with Hurricane Ian's winds (cat 4/5 for hours), so we were able to to stake them securely upright. The solitary was, and still is, a problem. Ian's winds pushed it about 60 degrees to the west leaving it unstable on its roots/growing plate. And it is so heavy it takes several people to push it upright and tie it off. The instability left it wobbling precariously and ropes have a tendency to stretch out. In Nov. Hurricane Nicole's winds pushed it to the south and we had to restake it. But yesterday a brisk wind blowing from the south pushed nearly upright so we rushed to re-tie the ropes while the wind did the lifting. It still leans a bit SSE and we pray it will establish new roots. If it actually hits the ground, it will be goner as we just can't right it again.

Both the solitary and, esp., the twins, show the effects of the hurricanes and the Christmas cold front that beset us with 3 days and nights of temps that never reached 50F and fell as low as 40.8F. And the sun never shown for even a moment during those miserable days. I took closeups of the twins' leaves that show brown tips from wind, yellowing and cold/cool spotting. Coconuts deeply resent any temps below 50 and will display their unhappiness for all to see. You don't need just a night at 32F to kill them. String together some chilly, dreary, sunless days and they can turn up their toes. They can't photosynthesize below 50F and all the sun in the world is useless to them when it is 40 degrees.

If you look closely you will notice the solitary palm is less damaged. I'm sure that is because the leaves it has left after Ian are held vertical/upright and less exposed to cold air. Most cold damage will be to the underside of the leaves because of its lean. The coconut twins, on the other hand, have a number of leaves held horizontally and open to the sky. Hence, cold damage. Not a good start for this winter. I hope at some point these coconuts get a break.

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Twins, Cape Coral, FL, Jan. 2023

Cocos nucifera Dwarf Red Spicata Solitary, Cape Coral, FL, Jan. 2023

Wow those are gorgeous, can't wait to see them produce coconuts