Parajubaea cocoides

[Jadd Correia]

Seed collected in early March of this year from the Oakland Lakeside Palmetum. Super excited to see my first germination! 

[bruce Steele]

Jadd,  Perido was kind enough to give me some Parajubaea Cocoides seeds from his tree in Grover Beach and as it turns out I had one germinate a couple days ago also. So we can compare notes on palm starts of a similar age. I potted it up yesterday in a peat / perlite mix that was more petite than peat. I will try to keep it on the dry side as I hear they damp off easily. 
 There is another Cocoides growing at Ventura College and I collected some old seed from the ground but no luck with those seeds yet. The Cocoides at VC is looking rather bad even after the nice rain season we just got this year, I hope it pulls out of it. 
 I have two Parajubaea Torallyi planted out for a year now. They went through a 24 degree freeze this winter with no serious damage. One of them did show some browning on the petioles but continued to grow . The other one had no issues . It is the more vigorous of the two and is now about seven feet tall. 

[bruce Steele]

Perito , excuse my misspelling your moniker. 

[Tassie_Troy1971]

My parajubaea cocoides was grown from seed in 2010 seed from Darold Petty garden San Francisco.

Once it developed fully pinnate leaves the growth rate increased exponentially

[Jadd Correia]

Thank you for the response Bruce. I went ahead and potted my seedling up just like you in a mix of perlite and peat, and will try to keep it dryer like you mentioned. Fingers crossed they both take off and get large like Tassie's in Tasmania. Such a beautiful palm, and its great to see how much growth you have had in 13+ years.

I've noticed some very mature cocoides palms near the entrance to Golden Gate Park Botanical Garden as well that are full of seed. I will try to collect from those as well to get some genetic diversity going.

I have the fortune of working pretty close to Darold's place so I really enjoy stopping in an seeing his mature garden in all its glory. Take care and happy Saturday.

[Darold Petty]

Here is what you can anticipate,  sadly this one was killed by some sort of root disease, my first loss of a major palm.   

[Darold Petty]

One final note,   if you have a older Patrick Shafer hybrid with Parajubaea cocoides, this tree was the pollen donor.   The image was taken in March, 2010.

[bruce Steele]

[bruce Steele]

Here is Perito’s Parajubaea Cocoides . Today I was lucky to get a few more seeds to clean and put into my starter Tupperware. 
Thanks Perito!
 

[Eric33]

You are lucky to be able to get seeds 🤑

Éric

[bruce Steele]

There are Parajubaea Torallyi and Sunka palms available at Calif. nurseries but Cocoides aren’t currently for sale. Cocoides  seem less tolerant of frost than the other two. I am lucky that growers like Darold and Perito planted young trees twenty or thirty years ago. It seems seed availability has gone down over the years and it is good growers in Australia got seed when they did. Parajubaea in general seem to only grow well in a few select spots and even the native stand found in Northern Peru consists of older palms. 
 It would be interesting to hear about how growers got their seed , or young palms, twenty years ago. Perito seemed happy I got one of his seeds to germinate. I have been working at cleaning twenty more seeds for germination. It takes some time and effort with a pocket knife. Recommendations on how to get good germination is contradictory so I am happy at least one is started , much patience required I think. I have read some Parajubaea seeds have taken over ten years to start. 
 A nursery called Jungle Music has young Sunka and Torallyi and Perito has some fifteen gallon Torralyi. San Francisco seems good habitat for these palms  and maybe some of the nurseries there will have Cocoides available again because seed is still available there. 

[Darold Petty]

My deceased P. cocoides was a seed collection by my palm mentor, the late Garrin Fullington, in the mid 1970's from a tree in downtown Quito, Ecuador.

[bruce Steele]

I found this YouTube video about Tabaconos Peru where Parajubaea Cocoides were found in native habitats. At minute 2:00 in the plaza Fiesta Patronal there appears to be several young Parajubaea planted. 

[Darold Petty]

There are adult P. cocoides all over the colonial district in Quito, they look shockingly like coconuts. 

Here are some images from the market town of Otavalo, two Parajubaea, a regular Jubaea,  a nice couple who sell handmade fabrics, and my favorite method of travel in-country!       

[Tyrone]

6 hours ago, bruce Steele said:

There are Parajubaea Torallyi and Sunka palms available at Calif. nurseries but Cocoides aren’t currently for sale. Cocoides  seem less tolerant of frost than the other two. I am lucky that growers like Darold and Perito planted young trees twenty or thirty years ago. It seems seed availability has gone down over the years and it is good growers in Australia got seed when they did. Parajubaea in general seem to only grow well in a few select spots and even the native stand found in Northern Peru consists of older palms. 
 It would be interesting to hear about how growers got their seed , or young palms, twenty years ago.

I’ve got all the Parajubaeas growing well here. My largest cocoides came from seed Darold sent me from his tree. It’s not as far advanced as Troys tree in Tassie because for 4 years it sat in a pot in a climate that was too warm for it in Perth. My P tvts are really taking off now and my sunkha is pushing a flower spathe that’s getting fatter. I’m hoping to eventually be a Parajubaea seed source down here. 

[DoomsDave]

Keep the parajubes on the dry side in the summer. If you don't they get rot and die. Bummer.

Try them, let us know how they do!

[bruce Steele]

[bruce Steele]

Jadd, One more P. Cocoides has started. Background Dragon tree starts and Butia Odorata seedlings.  I put ten of the fresh Cocoides seeds into the refrigerator and put the other ten into starter tubs. 

[Jadd Correia]

Thank you Dave for the heads up on keeping the seedling on the dryer side (I have it under a table outside right now to avoid our current rain).

 

Bruce- Super exciting to get more germination success. I am a believer in fresh seeds being the best bet to get solid germination regardless of the palm species. Keep me posted on how yours do going into the warmer months here in CA.

Cool side note- I was able to get fresh Archontophoenix seeds to germinate in 6 days! Can't believe germination could be that fast!

Seed was collected from the center palm (largest).

Edited May 6, 2023 by Jadd Correia

[bruce Steele]

I have a young parajubaea cocoides recently potted up out of the community bed in my greenhouse. Also have four new sprouts in window warmth but no bottom heat. 

[Marius]

I received 20 Parajubaea cocoides seeds from rarepalmseeds about two months ago. I was away for the weekend and saw the first one had germinated while I was away. 
I am going to plant it in a large pot tomorrow and put it somewhere outside where it will get some morning sun. 
 

[bruce Steele]

Marius, I have five Cocoides germinated in tall pots and one into second leaf. I potted the five germinated seeds six weeks ago , it takes awhile till you see anything green . I keep some sphagnum moss on them and blue lids in a south facing window, bottom heat at 85F.
but they seem to germinate in cooler temperatures ~75F

[Leelanau Palms]

Is it helpful overall to cover the soil in potted palms with sphagnum? Pros and cons?

[bruce Steele]

I am using a small amount to filter light for the Cocoides seeds but keep the sphagnum kinda dry. I have tried germinating Jubaeopsis Caffra seed with a couple inches of damp sphagnum on top and got a couple to pop but then they didn’t make it.  I am no expert , and try different treatments for different seed. The Jubaeopsis is very difficult for me so far. Getting better at figuring out Parajubaea germination , with Jubaea taking some time but kinda easy in comparison. 
 I think you can have years of failure with some seeds and never know exactly why. So I use sphagnum to tweak conditions for seeds that elude my efforts to grow them by another method. 

 

 

[Marius]

4 hours ago, bruce Steele said:

Marius, I have five Cocoides germinated in tall pots and one into second leaf. I potted the five germinated seeds six weeks ago , it takes awhile till you see anything green . I keep some sphagnum moss on them and blue lids in a south facing window, bottom heat at 85F.
but they seem to germinate in cooler temperatures ~75F

Hi Bruce. Mine are in a sun room that gets morning sun. It is quite warm and humid in there. 
I have planted the 20 seeds in different ways. The one that germinated is on top of ordinary garden soil in a smallish pot. I put cling wrap over the top of the pot. 
I have other seeds on top of a mixture of river sand and succulent mix , some planted on top op river sand covered with sphagnum moss and some in pelite covered with sphagnum moss. 
I turned the bottom heat off as the room seemed warm enough. 
Other palm seeds in at the same time are:  Brahea dulcis , Brahea sarukhani, Brahea salvadorensis, nannorhops richiana ( one seedling so far), Phoenix rupicola, Livistona drudei.
 

[happypalms]

On 4/20/2023 at 7:47 PM, Tassie_Troy1971 said:

My parajubaea cocoides was grown from seed in 2010 seed from Darold Petty garden San Francisco.

Once it developed fully pinnate leaves the growth rate increased exponentially

Now you are teasing me that quality palm 

[Marius]

On 1/14/2024 at 7:37 PM, Marius said:

I received 20 Parajubaea cocoides seeds from rarepalmseeds about two months ago. I was away for the weekend and saw the first one had germinated while I was away. 
I am going to plant it in a large pot tomorrow and put it somewhere outside where it will get some morning sun. 
 

This one is now planted in a big pot and there are another two this morning. They germinated from the batch in perlite covered with a little bit of sphagnum moss. 

[Tassie_Troy1971]

Here is an update on my Parajubaea cocoides planted from seed collected from Darold petty tree in 2010.

Here is Darold petty story of the palm 

[Tassie_Troy1971]

My parajubaea cocoides 

[bruce Steele]