Turning a Water Oak Forest into a Tropical Paradise in NW Orlando

[D. Morrowii]

Looking good! 

[Merlyn]

14 minutes ago, kinzyjr said:

@Merlyn Everything is looking great!  Ready for the Gardening Decathalon?

Yeah I really like how it turned out.  My neighbor was out in her backyard with her dogs and said she loves it...so good that they are happy with it from their side of the property line!

The next event in the Decathlon is the lift-and-carry of pathway pavers and river rock!  I'm estimating 108 12x12 pavers and 16 bags of rock to finish out the pathway.  That's about 2500lb that I'll have to pick up and move at least 3 times.  It's a good thing I can't haul that much weight in my van at one time, because I sure can't lift-and-carry that much at once either!  

[Merlyn]

And I completed the next event in the Decathlon @kinzyjr!  It ended up being about 3000lb worth of pavers, paver base, sand fill, and egg rock for around 35' of new 52" wide pathway.  I picked up the first load of pavers on Monday and finished this afternoon.  From the bamboo hedge end:

And on the inside I decided to stop it short of the main grassy area.  If I eventually build a patio in the backyard then I'll extend the end of it further.  I thought about flaring the red pavers out on the lower left edge, but cutting thin pieces like that is a pain and they are really easy to crack when walking over them.  So at the moment this is it!

[kinzyjr]

Just now, Merlyn said:

I completed the next event in the Decathlon

It looks gorgeous!  Nice work!

I do have a palette of retaining wall blocks that need set if you're not tired enough...

[Merlyn]

Whuf, it's hot out there.  It wasn't too bad this morning while I was repotting an Encephalartos Transvenosus x Princeps, or while I was planting a Bambusa "Kenilworth" in the SE corner and running a 1/2" dripline stub off of the main line.  Kenilworth is on the center in front of the Magnolia, and the Eutuldoides "Basistriata" on the right that I planted last week:

And then I moved my cluster of Gigantochloa "Malaysian Black" from the pathway to the other side of the driveway.  This one has really nice big leaves and striped young culms that age to black.  But it was waaaaay too big for the spot at the pathway, and a continual hassle having to cut back branches:

Of course I was a dummy in the 99F/50% humidity afternoon, I blame it on the 116F heat index.  I filled in the old hole...and then realized I forgot to dig around in the perimeter for pieces of culm first.  So then I had to dig a 3' diameter hole 20" deep AGAIN.  I found at least 7 big pieces that would have resprouted, so it was worthwhile:

And in the old spot I planted a Cyphophoenix Elegans on the left, a small Encephalartos Sclavoi in the middle, and a Cyphophoenix Nucele on the right near the Lutescens:

[Merlyn]

On the left side of the Gigantochloa Malaysian Black I had a Cycas Guizhouensis and an Agave Salmiana.  They were too close to the Zamia Furfuracea that I planted around the magnolia, and were getting crowded out.  So the Guizhouensis went over to the NW end of my pathway, just inside a flushing Encephalartos Laurentianus:

And I rearranged the Agaves away from the rampant Zamia, from left to right a Weberi, Salmiana, Vilmoriana (Octopus) and variegated Americana.  Just behind them I planted an Encephalartos Paucidentatus, centered between the bamboo and the Zamia:

And in the corner where there used to be a Dendrocalamus Longliensis, I planted a cluster of three Caryota Mitis.  I bought these as "variegated seeds" from RPS...nope.  0% variegated.  But I think it might be the first palm-from-seed that I've planted:

[Merlyn]

And I think I finally solved the case of "where is my Acoelorrhaphe Wrightii Cerifera?"  I had bought several palms from TCHP back in 2021, a couple direct and a couple from eBay.  Some of my labels disintegrated in the sunlight, so I was just guessing as to which was which.  I *thought* I had planted a Brahea Clara "Super Silver" in the front yard and in the back yard.  As they grew it became obvious that one of them was not like the other.    This front one is an Everglades Palm:

And this one I just transplanted from a too-shady spot in the backyard to a full sun spot in the front yard.  It is definitely a Brahea Clara Super Silver:

So it turns out that I thought I planted an Acoelorrhaphe wrightii in the NE side...it turned out to be a Sabal Causiarum.  And I thought I planted a Brahea Clara in the front yard...and it turned out to be the Everglades palm.  Now...I just need to solve the mystery of the missing Sabal Mauritiiformis and ID the other Causiarum that is definitely NOT a Causiarum.  Labeling is important!

[Merlyn]

@Austinpalm here is a photo of my Elaeis Guineensis v. Idolatrica aka "Whole Leaf" mutation.  I bought three seedlings from cfkingfish in May 2019, unfortunately I managed to kill two of them due to inexperience and cold fronts.  I planted this in April 2021 as (I think) a large 1 gallon palm.  I protected it during a couple of freezes down to about 26-27F in this area of the yard, generally by just putting a big cardboard box over it.  Right now it's about 8 feet tall overall.

[Merlyn]

About 10 feet to the left of the above photo is one of my largest Beccariophoenix Alfredii.  On the SE side I had an Encephalartos Transvenosus x Princeps, and it was really unhappy with the large amount of shade and relatively rich soil.  I repotted it and replaced it with a Reinhardtia Latisecta as an experiment.  It might want more shade...we shall see!

On the NE side I had a fairly big Licuala Peltata v. Sumawongii, but it got leaf burned a couple of times and slowly declined and died.  So I replaced it with a pair of seedlings I bought from @NatureGirl in summer 2022.  Those are in the middle.  In the upper right is a Crysosophila Warscewiczii, bottom center is Chuniophoenix Hainanensis, and upper left is Chuniophoenix Nana. 

[Merlyn]

Friday at lunch I used my reciprocating saw and 12" Diablo 3TPI pruning blade to slice out the ~5' trunk of the Phoenix Sylvestris.  I had beheaded it on my post on 4/19/24 but didn't have the time or energy to yank it out.  It had attempted to grow the new spear leaves, but they were drooping off to the side...a typical sign of LB.  The trunk cross-sections looked "normal" without obvious signs of Thielaviopsis or Ganoderma. 

That was the first step in cleaning up and planting out the NE corner.  This morning I moved this Chrysalidocarpus/Dypsis Lutescens that I planted waaaay too close to the pathway a couple of years ago:

I replaced it with two 3g Pinanga Philippinensis that I bought from Floribunda as 1g last June.  These hopefully will be ok with this much sun...and be far enough from the path to not be a pain:

In the back left of the Phoenix picture you can see the fronds of an Encephalartos Laurentianus sticking up.  I moved that one to clear some additional space in the NE corner: 

[Merlyn]

The last bit of clearing was moving four clusters of Zamia Furfuracea (aka Cardboard Palm) off to the NW side and N center as "small fillers."  And in the cleared area where I used to have the Zamia, Sylvestris and Laurentianus, I have two pots of Baileyana, one Fallaensis, and one Borassus Aethiopum.  After clumsily managing to slice my arms up moving the Zamia, I decided I'd had enough for the day.  So these will get planted sometime this week...maybe in the spots circled...maybe not!

[Merlyn]

Over the weekend I planted out the "Copernicia Row" on the NE side.  These were all grown from strap leaf seedlings for several years.  I had to circle them because they were still really small, despite busting roots out of a 3 gallon pot!  Closest to the camera is a Fallaensis from CFKingfish in 2019, followed by two Baileyana staggered a bit from NatureGirl in 2020:

On the far side of the agave-ish plant (maybe a Furcraea or Beschorneria) I ended up not planting the Borassus Aethiopum.  Instead I planted three Copernicia Hospita blues that I got from NatureGirl in 2021 as strap leaf seedlings.  These were packed with roots in small 4x4x9 treepots, but I figured they would grow faster in the ground anyway.

[Merlyn]

Tonight between the thunderstorms I yanked out an overgrown cluster of about 8-10 Bordelon bananas.  They were crowding a Cryosophila Warscewiczii that has grown really well, so I wanted to give it some more space:

And standing more or less in the same spot and turning around, I used to have a 10+ foot tall Queen a couple of years ago.  I had used it as a "frost canopy" for some of the other stuff, but dug it up last summer.  In the open spot I planted an Attalea Brejinhoensis that I bought from Neil at the CFPACS show last spring.  It's just getting out of monster strap leaf mode, behind the foreground Butia x Jubaea:

[Merlyn]

After putting down some mulch on the above palms and bare spots, I decided to remove my front yard Sylvestris.  This was actually one of my first palm purchases, back in 2018.  But with Lethal Bronzing all around me now, it just doesn't make sense to keep growing a palm that's likely to die in a year.  And a palm that can be infected is also one that will spread the LB phytoplasma to even more leafhoppers, so keeping known hosts is just a way to spread the disease faster and further.

@miamicuse here's how I cut out the stump, 12" Diablo 3TPI carbide blade:

And about 10 minutes of digging and slicing around all of the dense root mass is gone.  It was roughly 2' in diameter and 12-18" deep:

[Merlyn]

I did a huge amount of work the last 2 weeks cleaning up, spraying weedkiller, dousing all the Cycas with Dinotefuran for a scale insect explosion, two whole notepad pages worth of stuff.  Some of the big items are finally having a bonfire with the remaining Viburnum branches, and at the same time cutting out the last Sylvester palm.  I planted this one from a 7g back in mid 2018.  With a 50/50 chance of LB killing it soon, there's no point in having it take up valuable space.

Right next to it I had planted some donated Rhapis Excelsa (Lady Palm) and they had started sending out 4-5' long underground runners.  So I dug these out before they became too invasive:

In the front yard I finally cleaned up the big Bordelon banana clump, and cut up the Agave Angustifolia/Vivipara that bloomed on the right side of the photo:

[Merlyn]

In the front NE side I started pruning old fronds from an unknown Phoenix hybrid, possibly Loureiroi or Theophrasti.  After being stabbed for the 11ty billionth time in about 10 minutes, I just chopped it all off and dug it out:

And just to the left of the above photo there was another big cluster of Rhapis Excelsa, and I found a runner popping up underground 6 feet from the parent culm.  That's not acceptable.  I have a bunch of clumping bamboos, but they put out new shoots a few inches from the parent culm.  I'll never plant a running bamboo here, and I sure don't want a running palm either!  Here's the small hole from the stump and the big Lady Palm cluster:

On the upper left side you can see the ~6 foot long runner that forced me to rethink having *any* Rhapis Excelsa in my yard:

[D. Morrowii]

Thats a lot of deleting! Makes me glad I at least tried to contain that Rhapis Excelsa I just planted. Time will tell if it actually works. Those banana plants have some nice coloring, pretty cool. 

[Merlyn]

@D. Morrowii I kinda pooh-pooh'd the people saying that Rhapis Excelsa was a colossal menace...until I found shoots popping up 4-6 feet from the parent culm.  That was a few weeks ago, so I have been planning the replacements in that area ever since.  So today I spent about 10 hours filling it back in.  First off was moving a trunking Agave Angustifolia/Vivipara from the corner to replace the one that flowered.  This was a pup from the original about 4 years ago:

To replace it I planted a pair of Cycas Debaoensis (possibly Multifrondis) that I got from MB Palms at last year's open house sale:

And just on the other side of the Debaos I planted a triple Cycas Micholitzii in the shade between the Alfredii, Butia, and big Chamaerops:

Both Cycas groupings have a scale problem, Micholitzii and Debao/Multifrondis are absolute scale magnets...

[Merlyn]

Stepping backwards about 10 feet from the last photo, I added a Licuala Ramsayi on the left side, moved a Cycas Guizhouensis to the middle bottom, and added two more Kerriodoxa Elegans to the one that's hiding behind the Guizhou:

And stepping back to the left about 10 feet I moved a pair of smaller Encephalartos Laurentianus into the opening, one on the bottom left and bottom center.  In the middle is an Elaeis Guineensis, and to the upper right is a Cycas Litoralis/Edentata.  The Litoralis got torched 2 years ago in ~26F with frost, and the main growing point died.  I repotted it and it eventually sprouted 4 new heads!

[Merlyn]

Last Sunday was clean-up day in the NE corner along the driveway.  I pruned (er...overpruned) 7 big trunking Cycas Revoluta, pulled out all the dead leaves and trunks from the Bordelon bananas, trimmed off dead fronds from the Allagoptera Arenaria, and pulled a bunch of weeds.  3 huge trash cans later it looks mostly clean, except for the ratty gingers:

In the left side of the above photo there's a Revoluta triple that I made around March 2021, using three single plants each with 3-4' of clear trunk.  One of them decided to become a 2-header!  I don't recall this one taking any cold damage or physical damage, so I'm not sure what prompted it.  Maybe I whacked the head back in 2021 and it just decided to split?

In the backyard I continued my "deletion" rampage against Rhapis Excelsa.  This cluster had just started sending out runners too, I found rhizomes going out in all directions at least 3-4 feet away.  None had quite broken the surface yet, so I caught it right before it started really taking over:

After removal you can see the well-behaved Arenga Engleri on the left, "Tiger Grass" Thysanolaena Maxima just to the left of the Beccariophoenix Alfredii triple:

[Merlyn]

As I posted earlier in the Cycads cones and flushes thread, this Encephalartos Ferox FINALLY decided to flush again!  This was planted in August 2021 as an almost-trunking plant, lost most of the leaves to the January 2022 frost, then coned in April 2022.  I made the mistake of cutting off the cones, so it sulked for a year and coned again in April 2023.  This time I just left the cones to mature, and it's pushing 14 big new fronds now!

Last week I put in my 4th order with Floribunda, which is why I have been slow replying to people who have kindly offered Ptychosperma Elegans and Carpentaria Acuminata.  Here's a group photo of (left to right), in the back two Chrysalidocarpus/Dypsis Basilongus, 5 seedings of Vonitra Fibrosa, 2 gallon pots of Reinhardtia Latisecta, in the front 4 D shaped quarts of Cyphophoenix Nucele.  In the center back is a Cyphophoenix Alba and 2 Actinokentia Divaricata, then 4 quart pots of Ptychosperma Salomonense and 3 pots of Arenga Caudata (from Lets Grow Florida).  On the right are two Chrysalidocarpus Albofarinosa gallons, then two gallons of Dioon Rzedowskii, then two quarts of Chuniophoenix Hainanensis. 

The reason there's only one Cyphophoenix Alba is that I immediately planted one of them on the East side pathway.  It joins Elegans and Nucele that I planted in late May, and are just getting adjusted to full blazing sun in that spot:

[Merlyn]

I forgot one from Sunday!  I had planted a Caryota Gigas/Obtusa on the edge of my driveway last summer.  As much as I like them, I just get too many upper 20s frosts to be able to grow them here.  So I dug this one out and planted a Copernicia Alba in between the (left to right) Allagoptera Arenaria, Gigantochloa Luteostriata #4447 and Cycas Panzhihuaensis x Debaoensis.  That'll complete the "Copernicia Row" along the East side:

This week I had another 10 cubic yards of cypress mulch delivered, and I've already put down about 8-10 wheelbarrows full on recent plantings.  I also finally gave up on the second Arenga Micrantha, which has struggled for 6 years with repeated defoliations and suffering a couple of excessive transplants.  I replaced it with a Lytocaryum Hoehnei on the left, a pot of Sanseveria "Golden Flame" and a Lytocaryum Weddellianum on the right.  These suffered in pots with probably too much water:

On the West side I planted another pair, a Hoehnei in the foreground and Weddellianum in the upper right.  These are shaded by a Livistona Chinensis triple.

And in the front yard I replaced the Sylvester with a couple of Arenga Undulatifolia big seedlings.  I got these from Floribunda as seedlings in May 2022 and they are just starting to put out some big character leaves:

[Bkue]

Looks awesome. Would love to come check it out. I’m in Oviedo and more diligently planted comparatively speaking due to size constraints. Recently started a fruit garden on a s exposure side not visible to guests. 

[Merlyn]

I posted this in the Bamboo thread yesterday.  Here's an interesting tale of two boos...one is a culm division from the other so they are genetically identical.  I bought a 3g Bambusa Tuldoides "Swollen Internode" from Tropical Bamboo back in January 2020.  I planted it in February 2020, then moved it and divided it up in February 2021.  One section of ~3 culms went in the SW corner.  It's in a slightly high area and is mostly sandy soil and is around 15' tall and seems to be reliably bellying:

And the bellies look good on the older ones.  It's hard to judge on the new shoots:

The other set was planted in the SE corner in the spot where I removed the Bambusa Maligensis (Seabreeze) that was getting WAY too big.  This is the lowest area in my yard, and runoff from the neighbors flows into this spot in heavy storms.  There's a Dendrocalamus Maroochy crowding in from the left.

This one has no signs of bellies, and is ~25' tall from the 1-1.5" diameter culms:

The new set of ~15 culms growing up are about 2-2.5" diameter, and already 15 feet tall with no signs of slowing down.  With tons of water this clump appears to have reverted to the "normal" Tuldoides at 2.5" diameter and 45' tall.  I cut this cluster down yesterday and will be digging it out this weekend.

[Merlyn]

Earlier this week I decided that I really had to move my big Flamethrower triple.  I had planted this Hookeri / Watermelon / regular Chambeyronia Macrocarpa clump back in November 2019 in front of the window.  I did not, however, realize that they get 10-20 foot long fronds when grown in shade.  The biggest one is the Watermelon, and it's got a ~15 foot tall spear in the below photo.  The Macrocarpa has an 8' frond blocking half of my pathway:

So on the West side I have a triple Livistona Chinensis.  I had planted a wider spaced triple Flamethrower from seedlings back in late 2021, two Hookeri and one Watermelon.  I dug these up and repotted them into 3 gallons.  Then I took my reciprocating saw and 12" blade and sliced up a big square of dirt.  My wife helped me put it onto a 2 wheeler and steadied it as I rolled it over to the West side:

And I repacked with dirt, added 3x 0.5gph drippers, and covered with 3 inches of mulch!

[kinzyjr]

@Merlyn Your place is looking great.  Count me as jealous. 🙂

[Merlyn]

Instead of digging out the bamboo, I decided that some West side queens needed to come down with a bad case of chainsawitis...before...

And after...

[flplantguy]

I planted my Chambeyronias out yesterday but i did not think about the frond length when i did it. They are not too close to the house but they may be too close to other palms.  I would be terrified to cut a root ball like that but i hope it works out well!

[Merlyn]

@flplantguy when I planted them I was thinking it was going to be a short-lived experiment.  I tried 4 or 5 smallish Chambeyronia out in the main yard, and while they survived summer's blazing sun okay...they all died after the first upper 20s frost.  So I put a triple up near the house in my nursery area without considering the ultimate frond length.  I figured they would die after the first bad winter.  Realistically that spot needs something with a maximum diameter of about 6 feet...not 16 feet!  On either side in the photo you can see a couple of fairly stout Bottle palms, I'd rate them about the same in overall hardiness.  The Queens did a great job of protecting them from frost, though. 

The fronds played nice with the Bottles and Queens, and were never an issue with other palms in the nursery area, except in a hurricane.  A spindly Chamaedorea Pinnatifrons got beheaded by a Chambeyronia frond a couple of years ago.  But the 75+mph gusts could have done that to a Pinnatifrons without assistance from a stout Flamethrower stem.

I found that the "Palms for CA" pages on Palmpedia have been pretty good for overall sizes.  I didn't look at them earlier, or I would have noted 12-16' overall spread.    https://www.palmpedia.net/palmsforcal/Chambeyronia_macrocarpa

I also didn't see this photo:

[flplantguy]

Wow thats a nice one!

[Merlyn]

Two more Queens caught the 'itis at lunch Friday.  This time it was a small battery-powered reciprocating saw-itis with a fresh fine tooth blade.  It was easy to cut the upper side of the petiole partway through and let the frond slowly bend down as the structural fibers crack.  Then once it's hanging mostly vertical just lop through the last 1/2" or so and carry it down the ladder.  The chainsaw is a lot faster, but the fronds just go ka-whumph and land on random stuff.

This morning I had to get onto the roof to cut down the last fronds on the left one.  That was a wee bit sketchy hanging a chainsaw off the edge lopping off bits and pieces at a time.  Fortunately the Stihl MSA70 only weighs about 9lb, so it's not too crazy difficult to do it single-handed.  The rest was on the ladder chopping off 1-2' pieces at a time:

The Monarch/Wart ferns there are a wee bit unhappy with me, but they'll survive. 

[D. Morrowii]

Nice work! I’m not looking forward to the day I need to take out a full size palm. Is that the standard method? Remove short pieces one at a time? 

[sonoranfans]

29 minutes ago, D. Morrowii said:

Nice work! I’m not looking forward to the day I need to take out a full size palm. Is that the standard method? Remove short pieces one at a time? 

Yeah just take it out before it gets 15' trunk and weighs a ton.  Biggest mistakes I made was waiting too long and having a tougher, more expensive removal job.

[Merlyn]

@D. Morrowii and @sonoranfans exactly!  I was planning to leave these until winter when it isn't 11ty billion degrees outside.  But with hurricane season here I started looking at frond clearance to my brand new roof, and decided it was time.  It was a good choice too, because the left one in the latest photo was too tall to reach on the top of a 10' A-frame.  15-16' of trunk is the tallest I can safely reach.  If I'd left them until December they'd all be too tall to reach, and become a real nightmare to remove.

I could have chopped the fronds off and then dropped the whole trunk.  That's what the pros would do.  I just felt it was easier and safer to chop a foot off at a time and just drop each 50lb piece by hand.  And it leaves me with reasonable size and weight pieces to toss in the wheelbarrow and move over to dry out:

[Merlyn]

Around the SW corner I had just transplanted a big clump of Rhapis Humilis/Multifida.  I thought it would be a good spot under canopy because they don't like too much sun.  Aaaaaand then I cut down the canopy.  Whups.  At least it hadn't spent a bunch of energy rooting in yet.  The Humilis is circled in red.  I moved my small rock wall out about 2 feet to the left, towards the bamboo.  This will give enough space to put a Caryota Mitis roughly in the yellow circle.  It needs to be 8-10 feet from the house to avoid having fronds hit the walls or roof.

[Merlyn]

One downside to cutting up so many Queens at one time is that big pile of stump chunks.  I was just outside looking at tomorrow's projects and killed FOUR adult palmetto weevils.  Apparently they were attracted to the cut stump of a Phoenix Sylvestris from about 2 months back and were all rustling around trying to find a good place to mate and lay eggs.  I grabbed two with my gloved hands and spiked them to the concrete and stomped on them.  A third tried to hide inside the trunk and failed.  The fourth buzzed around me and I pulled a Godzilla move and swatted it out of the air.  I think it's time to chop these stumps to bits and burn them.  I don't want to be attracting more weevils to my yard...I may dose my 5 or 6 big trunking palms with Imadicloprid systemic.

Last weekend I did finally finish digging/cutting out all the Queen stumps, and cut them into pieces.  This one was the biggest at about 18-24" diameter at the base.  My method was the 12" 3TPI carbide pruning blade straight down on a square around it and then cut a wedge out of the side facing the camera and on the back side.  Once I had a wedge out then I cut horizontally underneath the trunk.  Then use the 4' tall stump chunk as a giant lever to break any roots I couldn't reach.

Once I had those dug out I cut them up with a new purchase, an Oregon CS1400 15A plug in chainsaw.  That was a bad choice, as it popped the 15A breaker every time I started bogging down a bit.  It might be ok if I had 20A breakers and 10ga or 12ga house wiring, but I do not.  So back to HD and I bought a replacement Homelite 9A 14" saw.  I'll use that to cut up the rest of the chunks.  It'll be a lot easier than the Stihl MSA70...which cuts great and is lightweight but doesn't have the 1000W hogging power of a plug in electric.

In the place I planted a Dypsis/Chrysalidocarpus Pembana (circled) about 5 feet from the AC unit, and transplanted a row of three White Bird of Paradise on the far side of the AC. 

[Merlyn]

This afternoon I finally got around to mulching the West side new plantings.  I put about 11 wheelbarrows there because I am REALLY tired of weeding...  This photo is from the other end of the house from the above ones, you can see 3 clusters of white bird of paradise, then two Caryota Mitis (from RPS "variegated" seed), then a Ptychosperma Macarthurii on the bottom right.  Between the Mitis is a clump of Burle Marx philodendron that used to climb a queen palm.  I thought it would burn to a crisp with no canopy, but it seems fine!  I also edited out a Cat palm (boring space filler) and a Dypsis Madagascariensis/Lucubensis that was just too ugly to keep.

Last weekend I planted out a big area near the trunking Encephalartos Ituriensis in the NW corner.  In the foreground is an Encephalartos Gratus seedling, then left to right is a Dioon Spinulosum double, a Cyphophoenix Alba, a Lepidozamia Peroffskyana seedling, a triple cluster of Licuala Aurantiaca/Paludosa, and a big character leaf from the Arenga Undulatifolia on the far right:

An a photo from the other side in the yard shows the edge plantings from left to right:  Gaussia Princeps, Zamia Inermis, Dypsis Cabadae, Arenga Pinnata, a Gaussia Princeps double, and then on the right a previously planted Archontophoenix Cunninghamiana.  Those seem to have adapted to full sun pretty well.  They burned for a few weeks but the new fronds are growing out pretty nice.  I need to mulch all of this asap before the weeds start taking over!

[Cindy Adair]

I just admired the entire saga! Really wonderful. 

I look forward to continuing updates of your amazing collection. 

[palmfriend]

Thank you for keep on going with this great documentation! 

Very interesting stuff you grow there and I envy you for how consequent you are doing the editing.

I know by myself that the day will come when I have to pull out the chainsaw but.......not yet. 😅

 

Lars

 

[RiverCityRichard]

On 9/8/2024 at 6:53 PM, Merlyn said:

This afternoon I finally got around to mulching the West side new plantings.  I put about 11 wheelbarrows there because I am REALLY tired of weeding...  This photo is from the other end of the house from the above ones, you can see 3 clusters of white bird of paradise, then two Caryota Mitis (from RPS "variegated" seed), then a Ptychosperma Macarthurii on the bottom right.  Between the Mitis is a clump of Burle Marx philodendron that used to climb a queen palm.  I thought it would burn to a crisp with no canopy, but it seems fine!  I also edited out a Cat palm (boring space filler) and a Dypsis Madagascariensis/Lucubensis that was just too ugly to keep.

Last weekend I planted out a big area near the trunking Encephalartos Ituriensis in the NW corner.  In the foreground is an Encephalartos Gratus seedling, then left to right is a Dioon Spinulosum double, a Cyphophoenix Alba, a Lepidozamia Peroffskyana seedling, a triple cluster of Licuala Aurantiaca/Paludosa, and a big character leaf from the Arenga Undulatifolia on the far right:

An a photo from the other side in the yard shows the edge plantings from left to right:  Gaussia Princeps, Zamia Inermis, Dypsis Cabadae, Arenga Pinnata, a Gaussia Princeps double, and then on the right a previously planted Archontophoenix Cunninghamiana.  Those seem to have adapted to full sun pretty well.  They burned for a few weeks but the new fronds are growing out pretty nice.  I need to mulch all of this asap before the weeds start taking over!

Looking great!

 

I just picked up a Gaussia Princeps from Caribbean Palms last week. Keep walking around looking for the right spot to plant it. What has been your experience with them here?