Syagrus stenopetala

[realarch]

Picked up the seed at Montgomery Botanic Garden way glaciated the Miami biennial. Could never remember the name so Mike Merritt helped me out. It’s been in the same pot for years, so time to plant or give it away. Nice habit though and supposed to be cold hardy. 

Might be a good plant for more marginal climates. Check it out on Palmpedia.

Tim

[Hilo Jason]

Tim was kind enough to give me this plant and I got it in the ground the following day. Had to dig quite the hole as the roots had strangled a sandbag that was under the 15 gallon pot. Had to dig about 30” deep to get it deep enough. Thankfully I have deep soil there!  

sorry for the bad lighting on this one:

thanks Tim! 

[JubaeaMan138]

I sprouted some of these and gave them a little to much sun . They fried . Gorgeous palm I need to try some more of these 

[realarch]

Good on you Jason getting that puppy in the ground ASAP. Glad it found a good home.

Tim

[iDesign]

I have one of these (in Southern CA) and could use a bit of guidance on placement 🤔

Here's a photo of mine. Was purchased at liner size approx 1.5 years ago, and it's grown very quickly. I'm putting a lot of my palms in the ground this Spring, and am toying with the idea of getting this guy in the ground.

----

The problem is that I'm not sure how large it's likely to get. Here are two very different-looking photos I found on Palmpedia...

- If it's likely to look like the first photo, I would place it along a pathway to be admired - and keep it trimmed up nice & tidy.

- If it's likely to look like the second photo, I would place it in a "neighbor blocking" position, and let it turn into the "monster" it appears to be.  Or perhaps sell/trade it... since I'm not sure how I could keep such a tall palm grouping tidy (I'm trying to avoid getting palms that will need frequent third-party cleaning services).

Any guess as to which of the above forms is more likely in my location?

[Tracy]

7 hours ago, iDesign said:

Any guess as to which of the above forms is more likely in my location?

I would use your experience on it's speed of growth in the last year and a half as an indicator.  It seems pretty fast, so I assume will go up quickly.  It really depends on how many trunks it develops or you allow it to develop after that.  Just speculation on my part based on the information you have provided as I have not grown this palm.

[ruskinPalms]

This seems like it should be in cultivation more, especially in 9B areas. I think there may be a lot of underutilized Syagrus species out there. Syagrus amicorum is another one I’d like to see in people’s front landscape beds instead of the endless Pygmy dates you see around here. 

[iDesign]

I re-read one of the (few) articles on this palm, and it sounds like it's very similar to a palm called Syragrus orinocensis, which unfortunately doesn't have a lot of published info either. Photos of orinocensis do seem to confirm that it's likely to be a tall, slender palm though (like the second photo above).

Here's a link to the article saying it's very similar to Syragrus orinocensis - https://palms.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/vol57n3p147-149.pdf (main difference appears to be that stenopetala tends to cluster, while orinocensis tends to stay solitary stem).

----

Does anyone happen to live near the Naples Botanical Garden and have a more recent photo of their specimen?
That's where the first photo above came from, and I'm really curious how it looks now (since that photo was taken a long time ago).

If not, I'll just be patient... and give it my best guess as to placement.

[richtrav]

They froze to the ground here in deep South Texas in Feb  ‘21 (~23F/-5C for about 3 hours), surgery might have saved the main trunk but so much of it stayed green for so long I thought it would be ok. I operated on the more tender Syagrus coronata right after the freeze and it pulled through. At any rate they’ll come back from the roots if it gets too cold and upper 20s should be no problem. It’s less hardy than cardenasii/yungasensis or romanzoffiana but hardier than most other cultivated Syagrus. Cearensis seemed to do about as well as stenopetala. 

[96720]

@iDesignstick with crown shafted palms they will clean themselves up!!

[oliver]

Richard, my main trunk died in Feb '21 but the suckers have picked up the slack, and a few are now also showing a few inches of trunk. This recent freeze (29 in my front yard, for an hour or two) has not affected them so far. To the folks wondering how fast they grow, in my experience and climate, not very fast. The ones with multiple tall trunks are likely quite old (30 or 40 years at least)

[iDesign]

On 1/10/2023 at 7:17 PM, Hilo Jason said:

Tim was kind enough to give me this plant and I got it in the ground the following day. Had to dig quite the hole as the roots had strangled a sandbag that was under the 15 gallon pot. Had to dig about 30” deep to get it deep enough. Thankfully I have deep soil there!  

sorry for the bad lighting on this one:

thanks Tim! 

Any updated photos of this one Jason? Looking at Hawaiian grown palms is super-helpful to us Californians, due to your faster growth rate. Helps us make better predictions.

[Bigfish]

Here’s one in Gizella Kopsick in St. Pete.

[iDesign]

3 hours ago, Bigfish said:

Here’s one in Gizella Kopsick in St. Pete.

Nice! Of course the next question is about how old it is (which you likely don't know). It's clear these palms eventually grow super-tall... just not sure what time period we're looking at. But whether fast or slow, these are stunning!

[Fusca]

Here's mine grown from seed.  Maybe it'll make its way into the garden in February...

[Hilo Jason]

8 hours ago, iDesign said:

Any updated photos of this one Jason? Looking at Hawaiian grown palms is super-helpful to us Californians, due to your faster growth rate. Helps us make better predictions.

Hi Stacy! I’m out of town but will be back tomorrow night and will get a picture the following morning on my garden walk. 

[Hilo Jason]

On 11/25/2024 at 6:33 AM, iDesign said:

Any updated photos of this one Jason? Looking at Hawaiian grown palms is super-helpful to us Californians, due to your faster growth rate. Helps us make better predictions.

Here’s an updated photo of mine. Starting to get going now:

[iDesign]

42 minutes ago, Hilo Jason said:

Here’s an updated photo of mine. Starting to get going now:

Gotta love that HI growth rate.  🚀

Super helpful data point... thank you. 🙏