Help!! Trachycarpus Fortunei crown rot help

[Palmy Pal]

So last snowfall here in Nc my trachycarpus was right beside my greenhouse and under the gutters of it and i think what happened was some water poured into the crown and froze solid damaging the heart. The spear pulled a couple weeks ago or whatever and I poured hydrogen peroxide in it for a good week about every day. I cleaned some of the gunk out of it a few days back and came back to do it again today and found out it was even deeper than what I thought it was when I cleaned it out a few days ago. I’ve gone as deep as I can with the tweezers and the hole is deeper than what they can reach. You can see how deep that is in the picture attached. Should I cut the trunk back  until I see a solid core or what should I do? I’m worried if I wait any longer the palm will rot all the way down and I won’t be able to salvage any of it. So I want to do what will give it the best chance as I grew this palm from seed a long time ago and has been very special to me. Hope you can help! 

[Allen]

I'd spray it once all over with copper fungicide and keep it dry and water it mildly.

[Palmy Pal]

2 minutes ago, Allen said:

I'd spray it once all over with copper fungicide and keep it dry and water it mildly.

I don’t have any of that. I poured the peroxide in every day for a week and that didn’t seem to help. I don’t think it will be able to push any growth through that deep of a hole. I think the growth point may be dead so I guess cutting it back would be my best bet right? 

[ZPalms]

2 minutes ago, Palmy Pal said:

I don’t have any of that. I poured the peroxide in every day for a week and that didn’t seem to help. I don’t think it will be able to push any growth through that deep of a hole. I think the growth point may be dead so I guess cutting it back would be my best bet right? 

You can get some some lowes or home depot

[Palmy Pal]

31 minutes ago, ZPalms said:

You can get some some lowes or home depot

I heard peroxide works the same way. Might just cut it down to the trunk because I think it’s super deep. 

[BeyondTheGarden]

Peroxide turns into water.  It's not a whole lot different from just pouring water down the trunk.  Obviously not what you want.  Copper fungicide has a different mechanism of action and doesn't turn into water. 

[Jimhardy]

Just watch he next leaf and see if the blades start to close.if that

happens its time to cut it, a little at a time until you find (hopefully) live tissue.

[WSimpson]

I would cut it horizontally down a half inch at a time with very sharp hand pruners until you fine healthy growth  .

I just lost the first Trachy that volunteered from one of my female Trachy's in my yard that I potted  up a couple years ago .  I let it get too dry and mealy bugs got on it bad . I recently  cut down into it  and found the entire center rotten . If I had   cut it earlier I could've saved it . 

Good luck .

[Fallen Munk]

Pouring peroxide down the crown daily for a week is bad.  The main reason to do it is to dry the water out, like how you treat swimmers ear.  So you treat it once or twice and let it dry out.  Personally I would not cut it back unless a bunch of fronds start curling up.  If the remaining fronds look good, leave them alone and wait for the new spear.

[Palmy Pal]

31 minutes ago, Fallen Munk said:

Pouring peroxide down the crown daily for a week is bad.  The main reason to do it is to dry the water out, like how you treat swimmers ear.  So you treat it once or twice and let it dry out.  Personally I would not cut it back unless a bunch of fronds start curling up.  If the remaining fronds look good, leave them alone and wait for the new spear.

The hole is pretty deep. And the fronds are curled a bit but not much. I’m afraid that a spear won’t grow since the hole is so deep so that’s why I was thinking about cutting it. Like @Will Simpson said I don’t want it to be too late and lose the palm 

[Palmy Pal]

5 hours ago, Jimhardy said:

Just watch he next leaf and see if the blades start to close.if that

happens its time to cut it, a little at a time until you find (hopefully) live tissue.

They are closed a bit. But not all the way. I can try to take a pic when I get home. 

[Jimhardy]

A picture would help out -looking down from the top.

[WSimpson]

On my potted Trachy the spear and maybe another frond pulled  , and days later  later another group of fronds pulled . That's when I felt I better check all the way down to healthy growth . I stopped at about 2 inches of trunk and mainly saw a hole , but there still is a chance of the growth bud being alive way down at the soil level ? 

Your palm is much bigger than my potted one so you may not want to  cut too low but leave that fatter part at the base .

Will

Edited March 31, 2022 by Will Simpson

[Palmy Pal]

Yeah I’m not too sure how far down mine has rotted. I can only reach what is at the depth of the tweezers so my question is can it even recover from that without recovering? And can it recover from the rot and grow a new spear? Or will I be forced to cut?

 

[Palmy Pal]

2 hours ago, Jimhardy said:

A picture would help out -looking down from the top.

Here are the pics. Hope this helps 

[Jimhardy]

Hard to tell from pics

[Palmy Pal]

2 hours ago, Jimhardy said:

Hard to tell from pics

They are a little closed but not all the way. 

[Collectorpalms]

17 minutes ago, Palmy Pal said:

They are a little closed but not all the 

I wouldn’t trunk cut a palm that has green leaves. I cut many palms after the 2021 freeze, but they had no live tissue and dead spears that were in the way adding to rotting in the meristem area.

the bad sign is the curled leaves. It’s having issues transporting water to the leaves. That could be a sign it’s dead already. But maybe not. I would just wait. I had a spear pull on potted palms this year after a mild winter but with ice. One palm is already recovering and I didn’t do anything.

[Jimhardy]

You may just have to follow your own instincts on this palm....

trunk cutting won't hurt the palm, you just lose the leaves that you

have but the issue is if you wait to long....one nice thing about cutting

is that(once cut) the infection is done, unless it runs down into the trunk....but once

its opened up the light air and sun will not really allow for any more spread

of the infection whereas closed up, its the perfect environment.

[Palmy Pal]

14 minutes ago, Jimhardy said:

You may just have to follow your own instincts on this palm....

trunk cutting won't hurt the palm, you just lose the leaves that you

have but the issue is if you wait to long....one nice thing about cutting

is that(once cut) the infection is done, unless it runs down into the trunk....but once

its opened up the light air and sun will not really allow for any more spread

of the infection whereas closed up, its the perfect environment.

Yeah that’s what I was thinking. But the hole in the crown is so deep I’m worried it can’t get dry enough in there to stop the rot spread. Im worried light and air can’t get into the infected area to dry 

[Swolte]

I would not trunk cut any live tissue or add any more peroxide. The palm is struggling and it can still pull nutrients from the green (or yellow!) fronds. If you cut it now, you may actually decrease its changes of survival. Once every few days, spray a little fungicide in the hole and make sure to keep the soil lightly moist (not wet!!) by watering it. Make sure the palm receives some sun and has high-overhead protection so no rain can get into the hole. Get a thin and straight stick and make a mark with a permanent marker where you hit the bottom. Wait till the weather warms up and check every week if there is some movement. 

Fingers crossed! 

Edited April 2, 2022 by Swolte

[Jimhardy]

Keep in mind that by the time you see the petioles/leaves dying that its already to late

because the tissue that supported them was dead for a while and takes a bit to see in

the leaves....there is nothing to worry about(as far as) trunk cutting goes except waiting

to long....and one other issue is that you have to make sure when/if you do operate

that you don't pull on the trunk to much and damage the roots-the trunk can be tough to cut through.

[Palmy Pal]

It is pushing!!! I put the palm in my greenhouse about a week ago because I thought it would help it considering it stays very dry in there and there’s a lot of heat. And today I noticed it’s pushing through the top as you can see in the picture below. So I’m assuming I can expect to see a new spear soon and that it should recover? @Jimhardy @Swolte

Edited April 16, 2022 by Palmy Pal

[Jimhardy]

Thats a good sign for sure....haha you left out the part where you have a  warm dry greenhouse to put it in(just kidding)

...thats the way to go, dry and warm are the best conditions for them to come back. Always good to see a palm

recover and not have to trunk cut and as long as the roots are healthy it should make a speedy recovery...NICE!

[Palmy Pal]

3 hours ago, Jimhardy said:

Thats a good sign for sure....haha you left out the part where you have a  warm dry greenhouse to put it in(just kidding)

...thats the way to go, dry and warm are the best conditions for them to come back. Always good to see a palm

recover and not have to trunk cut and as long as the roots are healthy it should make a speedy recovery...NICE!

LOL I know i didn’t really think about it until later on. But thanks for the help! And wish this little guy luck for a good recovery! 

[Swolte]

Excellent, I think you made the right call here.  I think this palm will be fine. Trachy's are known for having spear pulls and recovering (especially when young). Its been pushing over an inch a week and that is quite decent! Keep it warm (between 60-85F) and let it do its thing. 

[Palmy Pal]

Just thought I’d do a little update on the trachy that had crown rot. I’d say it’s fully recovered from it now! It is pushing out two spears and growing like a champ! 

[Jimhardy]

Always interesting when they push up, you can

see where it was severed from the cold/rot ...in this case

it lost the leaf blades but the petiole made it through.

[Palmy Pal]

Yeah it is really interesting. I’m just glad it survived. I’ve never had this happen before because it doesn’t get cold enough here for trachys to spear pull from the cold. So it has been an experience for sure 

[Allen]

2 hours ago, Palmy Pal said:

Yeah it is really interesting. I’m just glad it survived. I’ve never had this happen before because it doesn’t get cold enough here for trachys to spear pull from the cold. So it has been an experience for sure 

Small Trachy can spear pull at temps under 21F.  

[Palmy Pal]

1 hour ago, Allen said:

Small Trachy can spear pull at temps under 21F.  

Yes I know. It almost never gets that cold here and when it does it doesn’t last for more than up to a couple hours. 

[ZPalms]

Haha, your and my trachy have one same bald petiole

Edited May 1, 2022 by ZPalms

[Jimhardy]

I had some small-in ground- ones pull during the summer from

watering them with the hose and getting water in the crowns

we were having a heat wave...they did bounce back quick.

[Palmy Pal]

On 5/1/2022 at 5:29 PM, ZPalms said:

Haha, your and my trachy have one same bald petiole

LOL! Did yours spear pull too? 

[ZPalms]

4 hours ago, Palmy Pal said:

LOL! Did yours spear pull too? 

It didnt spear pull but it got some rot on the top part of the new spear that I had to clip off and treat so now its just bald