Date palm Identification Queensland Australia

[LOONEY]

Good Morning Fellow Palm Enthusiasts.

I'm Looney from Australia. I don't have much of a green thumb, but love my palms and have been lovingly tending to what I thought were 2 Canary Island Date Palms for the last 3 years.

I live on the Gold Coast in Australia, so we have a sub tropical climate, with essentially warm weather year round. The trees are planted on the northern side of my house so receive full sun all day, and because we are sub tropical we receive over 1250mm of rain (that's 50 Inches for those in the USA).

I purchased these trees as a matching set 3 years ago in 100l pots, and have now planted them, fertilising 4 times a year and providing regular water top up's as well. however after this 3 year period, 1 of the trees is looking fantastic with a 1.5-2 foot wide trunk and >50 solid fronds. The fronds are solid and seem heafty with large hard spikes.

The other tree however seems to be looking somewhat different. It has a seemingly narrower trunk, the fronds seem less robust, these are more thin and wobbly, and there are probably only 25 fronds.  The spines are much finer (and sharper :/) This tree also seems to be flowering 12-15 bunches of dates each year.

Is it just a difference between a male & female tree? or is it possible I have 2 different species of tree here? I'm asking, as if the smaller tree is of a different type, I'd rather transplant it out now before it gets too big, and replace it with an appropriately matching CIDP.

 

Pics below (i have a wide and close shot of each tree)

 

PS: Please excuse the poor excuse for a lawn around them, i cant seem to get anything to grow in the shadow's at the moment.

Thanks in advance.

 

 

[Xerarch]

Hello and welcome to the forum! You have a great palm growing climate there on the Gold Coast, you have lots of cool options there.  I am at a very similar latitude here in Corpus Christi, TX, USA but my options are more limited due to occasional hard freezes.  CIDP among many other things do great here though.  I'd say your top photo looks like a traditional CIDP, the bottom photo looks quite CIDP-like but one of the problems with date palm ID is that thy hybridize readily.  This one could be crossed with something else, or even these can be multi-generational, complex crosses.  Maybe that one involves some P. theophrastii with those nasty thorns, hard to say.  

I haven't known male CIDP's to look that different from female.  The thing I always notice about the males is that the shape of the crown is different, they have this flat-top looking haircut while the females have a more rounded crown, just my observation.  

[DCA_Palm_Fan]

Phoenix canariensis ( Canary Island Date Palm / CIDP)    Welcome to PalmTalk! 

[LOONEY]

Thanks for the response Xerarch,

The hybridised version is a concern I had also, so I'm wary that the pair will in turn not match.

Do you by any chance know whether it is possible that the smaller tree may just not be as mature and may change its appearance with time? or if by its current size it is very indicative of it's overall form factor (for its fronds)?

As the window for removing this tree and placing another gets smaller every day closer i get to the growing season.

[Xerarch]

11 hours ago, LOONEY said:

Thanks for the response Xerarch,

The hybridised version is a concern I had also, so I'm wary that the pair will in turn not match.

Do you by any chance know whether it is possible that the smaller tree may just not be as mature and may change its appearance with time? or if by its current size it is very indicative of it's overall form factor (for its fronds)?

As the window for removing this tree and placing another gets smaller every day closer i get to the growing season.

To me pure CIDP looks like pure CIDP whether large or small, I don't think that one will change appearance to look more like the other one.  Having said that it looks like it will be a nice specimen in it's own right regardless, it just won't match, which seems like what you are worried about.  Looks like it's decision time, good luck!

[LOONEY]

Yes thanks again for responding Xerarch,

The need for them to match is based around the fact that they are on either side of my driveway, and I'm worried it may look strange if i have 2 feature trees to frame my driveway that appear different.

but its the second day of Spring now, so I'll make up my mind in the next few weeks if i can find myself another CIDP somewhere.

[ZPalms]

I hope you keep it! Looks awesome!