Spring 2024: What did you plant this week?

[Xenon]

The polar vortex is old news, it's time to plant 😄. Put in two new queens this weekend

[kinzyjr]

@Xenon The optimism in spite of all of the challenges the last couple of years is appreciated.

Haven't planted anything yet, but currently making a shopping list.  Looking into getting more of the cold-tolerant desert species this year.  Some of the Brahea species seem to handle the area well, so that will be the starting point.  Brahea armata is first on the list.

[RFun]

1 hour ago, Xenon said:

The polar vortex is old news, it's time to plant 😄. Put in two new queens this weekend

Looks like you can plant in Katy around 360 days per year lol.  Not bad.  That's a lot of planting days.

Edited January 21, 2024 by RFun

[Xenon]

5 minutes ago, RFun said:

Looks like you can plant in Katy around 360 days per year lol.  Not bad.  That's a lot of planting days.

Per the new USDA map, I'm just inside 9B. Maybe it's too soon to aspire for 9B after the past few 8B winters but I'm definitely going to shoot for at least 9A 😆. But yes, it's zone 10 here except for 2-5 days a year. 

[RFun]

1 minute ago, Xenon said:

Per the new USDA map, I'm just inside 9B. Maybe it's too soon to aspire for 9B after the past few 8B winters but I'm definitely going to shoot for at least 9A 😆. But yes, it's zone 10 here except for 2-5 days a year. 

That's not bad considering there are simple methods of adding protection.

[Chester B]

I bought some Houston Garden Center Washingtonia yesterday.  Heading back to get more today.  $35 for 6 foot Washingtonia is a great deal.  The queens are the same price but they're more like 12'.  Trying to figure out the best way to get them home.

Stopped in at JRN nursery to look at the fruit trees.  I'll be heading back for an Arctic frost satsuma, Meyer lemon and Key lime.

[Banana Belt]

4 hours ago, Xenon said:

Put in two new queens this weekend

Looks like you also planted an Orange tree.

Edited January 21, 2024 by Banana Belt

[Xenon]

4 minutes ago, Banana Belt said:

Looks like you also planted an Orange tree.

It's an Orange Frost satsuma hybrid and it was planted last October. Seems to have taken one night at 18F and the next night 20F + zillion hours below freezing unprotected with fairly minimal damage. So far not even tip dieback. It performed better than I thought it would, especially considering you think it's newly planted 😛

[Banana Belt]

26 minutes ago, Chester B said:

Arctic frost satsuma, Meyer lemon and Key lime.

What is an Arctic frost Satsuma?  I have never heard of it.  Pictured below is a 45 year old Owari Satsuma on Flying Dragon Tripholiat root stock.  We are just now getting mandarins in winter.  I presume the Meyer lemon will be going outdoors in warm spot but the Key lime indoors. 

Our weather down here has been rain, then more rain and even more rain since?  I am not sure how long its been, seems like many months.   Flooding, wash outs, landslides, debris flows and saturated ground everywhere.  Temperatures have been very warm, mostly in the 50's even in early morning, but ridiculously wet.

Edited January 21, 2024 by Banana Belt

[Banana Belt]

8 minutes ago, Xenon said:

Orange Frost satsuma hybrid

That is another new Citrus I am unfamiliar with.   Posted picture of Owari Satsuma on Flying dragon root stock which has been very tough through 45 winters.  Lost most of its leaves several winters, but always came back.  Slow growing on the Dragon root stock, but in our super wet winter climates the Dragon root stock provides extra protection from soil diseases.

[Xenon]

13 minutes ago, Banana Belt said:

What is an Arctic frost Satsuma?  I have never heard of it.  Pictured below is a 45 year old Owari Satsuma on Flying Dragon Tripholiat root stock.  We are just now getting mandarins in winter.  I presume the Meyer lemon will be going outdoors in warm spot but the Key lime indoors. 

Our weather down here has been rain, then more rain and even more rain since?  I am not sure how long its been, seems like many months.   Flooding, wash outs, landslides, debris flows and saturated ground everywhere.  Temperatures have been very warm, mostly in the 50's even in early morning, but ridiculously wet.

Arctic Frost and Orange Frost are both patented satsuma x Changsha mandarin hybrids, supposedly more hardy than satsuma but the verdict is still out on that. 

All sweet citrus (oranges, mandarins, grapefruits, pummelos) and Meyer lemon usually do fine here. Lemons and limes are more iffy and can freeze to the ground or below the graft in bad winters. Citrus grew here for over 30 years until the wipeout freeze in 2021. Huge trees were super common in every neighborhood loaded with fruit. There were even some limited commercial/u-pick operations. Things are slowly starting to be replanted but the recent bad freezes are not helping. 

Edited January 21, 2024 by Xenon

[Xenon]

32 minutes ago, Chester B said:

 

Stopped in at JRN nursery to look at the fruit trees.  I'll be heading back for an Arctic frost satsuma, Meyer lemon and Key lime.

I think the general consensus is that Arctic Frost is not a very good tasting fruit. I've heard Orange Frost is a lot better but harder to come by. Honestly I think you'd be better off with one of the standard old-time satsumas like 'Owari' or 'Brown Select'. 'Xie Shan' is also said to be very good and is extra early, ripe in September-October. Personally, I think 'Page' is by far the best tasting early (before xmas) mandarin. 'Cara Cara' orange is also excellent and ready in December. 

[Banana Belt]

2 minutes ago, Xenon said:

Citrus grew here for over 30 years

I did not know that, thank you.  Here on South Coast Oregon, Satsuma's, lemons and Persian type Limes do well   Not many frosts but lack of summer heat makes many of the Sweet Citrus very dificult.  Few mile east of the coast is different where Oranges and other sweet citrus perform well because of higher summer temperatures.

The Arctic Frost or Orange frost mandarins sound very appealling.  However I would have to build another big soil mound to grow it in as our flat lying area has groundwater at the surface for many months every year.

[DTS]

I planted nothing 😂

[Xenon]

4 minutes ago, Banana Belt said:

I did not know that, thank you.  Here on South Coast Oregon, Satsuma's, lemons and Persian type Limes do well   Not many frosts but lack of summer heat makes many of the Sweet Citrus very dificult.  Few mile east of the coast is different where Oranges and other sweet citrus perform well because of higher summer temperatures.

The Arctic Frost or Orange frost mandarins sound very appealling.  However I would have to build another big soil mound to grow it in as our flat lying area has groundwater at the surface for many months every year.

No problem with lack of heat here, we just get that one big freeze every few decades 😭

There even used to be a u-pick pummelo (supposedly the most "tender" sweet citrus) orchard just north of Houston. All dead, decades of growth and production down the drain. Vid has no english but only the visuals are important

 

[Matthew92]

47 minutes ago, Banana Belt said:

What is an Arctic frost Satsuma?  I have never heard of it.  Pictured below is a 45 year old Owari Satsuma on Flying Dragon Tripholiat root stock.  We are just now getting mandarins in winter.  I presume the Meyer lemon will be going outdoors in warm spot but the Key lime indoors. 

Our weather down here has been rain, then more rain and even more rain since?  I am not sure how long its been, seems like many months.   Flooding, wash outs, landslides, debris flows and saturated ground everywhere.  Temperatures have been very warm, mostly in the 50's even in early morning, but ridiculously wet.

Wow, I was not aware such a warm microclimate spot in Oregon existed. How cold has it gotten for you this winter so far? Ultimate low since you've lived there?

[Banana Belt]

6 minutes ago, Matthew92 said:

Ultimate low since you've lived there?

The coldest it ever got here on the Harbor Bench, Oregon, was 18 F in 1988 for about 6 hours.  We have had temps in the 20's several times all in the last century.  This Century the coldest it has gotten was maybe 29 or 30 F for just an hour or so in morning.  Last decade or so the coldest was in the low 40's with a few frosts on the tips of grass. 

USDA mapped a 10a in about 1/2 square mile area up until last couple years before they extended the 10a to over 30 square miles around Brookings, Oregon.  Summer temps are mild being in the 70's during most of May to October.  The cold water of the Pacific Ocean keeps our area both cool in the hottest summers and mild during coldest winters.   Temps inland not more than 10 miles east during summer can be in the 100's for months during summer, and freezing for months during winter, but Brookings stays in the 50 to 70's year around.  Wet winters, and dry summers, very temperate.

[amh]

1 hour ago, Xenon said:

Arctic Frost and Orange Frost are both patented satsuma x Changsha mandarin hybrids, supposedly more hardy than satsuma but the verdict is still out on that. 

All sweet citrus (oranges, mandarins, grapefruits, pummelos) and Meyer lemon usually do fine here. Lemons and limes are more iffy and can freeze to the ground or below the graft in bad winters. Citrus grew here for over 30 years until the wipeout freeze in 2021. Huge trees were super common in every neighborhood loaded with fruit. There were even some limited commercial/u-pick operations. Things are slowly starting to be replanted but the recent bad freezes are not helping. 

Do you know if anyone in Texas has Changsha mandarin plants or seeds for sale? I used to have a few plants that originated from the Beck orchard, but they were wiped out during the 2006/07 winter.  I recall that the taste was good, but the fruit was full of seeds, which I don't mind.

[Chester B]

Not in the ground yet, but real soon. $35 each. 44”-60” tall measuring from the soil line. 

[Las Palmas Norte]

Can't beat that price @Chester B . I'd imagine a W. filifera will eventually work it's way into your landscape as well?

[Chester B]

25 minutes ago, Las Palmas Norte said:

Can't beat that price @Chester B . I'd imagine a W. filifera will eventually work it's way into your landscape as well?

A couple of them have more filifera traits to them, so we'll see what happens.  I did harvest some seed from a filifera in Phoenix so plan on germinating them.  I very much so prefer filifera over robusta but getting a pure one seems to be a tall order.  These are more of "filler palms" to give me something of size relatively quickly while my slower Sabals and hybrids will be slowly chugging along.

[Chester B]

2 hours ago, Xenon said:

I think the general consensus is that Arctic Frost is not a very good tasting fruit. I've heard Orange Frost is a lot better but harder to come by. Honestly I think you'd be better off with one of the standard old-time satsumas like 'Owari' or 'Brown Select'. 'Xie Shan' is also said to be very good and is extra early, ripe in September-October. Personally, I think 'Page' is by far the best tasting early (before xmas) mandarin. 'Cara Cara' orange is also excellent and ready in December. 

Okay, good to know.  Thanks for the info - as usual!

[Banana Belt]

2 hours ago, Banana Belt said:

low 40's

Low 30's, not 40s.  Finger mistake.

[thyerr01]

@Chester B If you're shopping for citrus I'd suggest checking out John Panzarella's stock (email/call to confirm anything). Not sure how things fared down there in the freeze, but he has some interesting citrus at decent prices. If you make the drive, ask him to show you some of his personal plants. Limes are going to struggle with normal winters here. A big surprise after the freeze is how good my recently planted calamondin looks. It was surrounded by a cone of foil insulation, but had no supplemental heat.

A yuzu and ujukitsu will go in the ground on March 1st.

Edited January 22, 2024 by thyerr01

[Xenon]

@Chester B another place for citrus especially (and pretty close to you) is Plantas n Plants, they will run a big citrus sale in Feb-March and stock practically every citrus variety that is legally available in the Houston quarantine area (Brazos is the wholesaler) 

[Chester B]

31 minutes ago, thyerr01 said:

@Chester B If you're shopping for citrus I'd suggest checking out John Panzarella's stock (email/call to confirm anything). Not sure how things fared down there in the freeze, but he has some interesting citrus at decent prices. If you make the drive, ask him to show you some of his personal plants. Limes are going to struggle with normal winters here. A big surprise after the freeze is how good my recently planted calamondin looks. It was surrounded by a cone of foil insulation, but had no supplemental heat.

A yuzu and ujukitsu will go in the ground on March 1st.

Thanks for the lead.  That guy seems to be a valuable resource, I will definitely be in contact with him.

 

7 minutes ago, Xenon said:

@Chester B another place for citrus especially (and pretty close to you) is Plantas n Plants, they will run a big citrus sale in Feb-March and stock practically every citrus variety that is legally available in the Houston quarantine area (Brazos is the wholesaler) 

Another good lead, and not far at all.  I'll have to remember to keep an eye out.

[JLM]

Is it too early to plant sylvestris or washies? I’m starting to get that urge to plant again and I have some young seed grown palms that are ITCHING to get into the ground

[Dwarf Fan]

I have a smaller sized Chamaedorea Microspadix coming that will be going in ground soon along with 2 small P. roebelenii x P. reclinata as well as some P. reclinata x Mystery Phoenix (Canariensis???) seedlings that will eventually be going in ground as well.

Then I will be germinating some P. roebelenii x P. theophrasthi seeds assuming they make it here from Europe. 

I am working on getting up to 50 species in total by the end of ‘24 and I would like to have a balance of about half or around 25 Cold Hardy pinnate species to compliment the palmate species.
 

 

 

[Dwarf Fan]

4 hours ago, Chester B said:

Not in the ground yet, but real soon. $35 each. 44”-60” tall measuring from the soil line. 

What are the smaller pinnate Palms off to the side in the pics?

[ChicagoPalma]

11 hours ago, Xenon said:

The polar vortex is old news, it's time to plant 😄. Put in two new queens this weekend

Woah buddy, me and @DTS1 are not even close to planting, only thing I'll be planting is our weather station in the backyard and the tornado protection for the palm tree in march. Planting time starts during heatwave in first week of April, where we get 90s for a week and then we hit straight 30s rockbottom. 

Edited January 22, 2024 by ChicagoPalma

[JLM]

2 minutes ago, ChicagoPalma said:

Woah buddy, me and @DTS1 are not even close to planting, only thing I'll be planting is our weather station in the backyard and the tornado protection for the palm tree. Planting time starts during heatwave in first week of April, where we get 90s for a week and then we hit straight 30s rockbottom. 

Tornado protection? Please elaborate.

[Xenon]

59 minutes ago, JLM said:

Is it too early to plant sylvestris or washies? I’m starting to get that urge to plant again and I have some young seed grown palms that are ITCHING to get into the ground

Just do it! If you just can't handle any risk, wait another 5 weeks (ugh the agony) 😛

[JLM]

Just now, Xenon said:

Just do it! If you just can't handle any risk, wait another 5 weeks (ugh the agony) 😛

Well, I guess a funny thing might happen when I move my potted stuff back outside tomorrow. My parents would generally be happier with less potted plants in their living room on cold nights LOL

[ChicagoPalma]

14 minutes ago, JLM said:

Tornado protection? Please elaborate.

Boy oh boy, we had a magnolia planted when I was a little kid, one massive storm came while I was in poland visiting my grandparents, my grandma that was watching over our dog at the time while me and my family was gone, a tornado came through chicagoland, while it didnt hit us, the winds were so bad it ripped out our magnolia tree!

[JLM]

1 minute ago, ChicagoPalma said:

Boy oh boy, we had a magnolia planted when I was a little kid, one massive storm came while I was in poland visiting my grandparents, my grandma that was watching over our dog at the time while me and my family was gone, a tornado came through chicagoland, while it didnt hit us, the winds were so bad it ripped out our magnolia tree!

So it should generally go without saying that it would be quite hard to impossible to protect a tree from a tornado

[ChicagoPalma]

10 minutes ago, JLM said:

So it should generally go without saying that it would be quite hard to impossible to protect a tree from a tornado

Well my palm is not fully established and our wind storm last summer kept it wobbling. So I shouldn't have said tornado protection but more like wind protection to keep it from wobbling and possibly de-rooting itself.

[JLM]

3 minutes ago, ChicagoPalma said:

Well my palm is not fully established and our wind storm last summer kept it wobbling. So I shouldn't have said tornado protection but more like wind protection to keep it from wobbling and possibly de-rooting itself.

Winter can be quite windy for sure. Stake it in place and leave it staked for a few months or more. I had to stake my Queen following Hurricane Sally, luckily it re-established itself rather quickly.

[RFun]

16 hours ago, Banana Belt said:

I did not know that, thank you.  Here on South Coast Oregon, Satsuma's, lemons and Persian type Limes do well   Not many frosts but lack of summer heat makes many of the Sweet Citrus very dificult.  Few mile east of the coast is different where Oranges and other sweet citrus perform well because of higher summer temperatures.

The Arctic Frost or Orange frost mandarins sound very appealling.  However I would have to build another big soil mound to grow it in as our flat lying area has groundwater at the surface for many months every year.

That's what happened in some areas of the country before an epic event took those trees out.  They used to have orange groves on Jekyll Island.

[Chester B]

10 hours ago, Dwarf Fan said:

What are the smaller pinnate Palms off to the side in the pics?

Two Butia yatay x Jubaea and 2 Butia yatay x Parajubaea sunkha

[Dwarf Fan]

1 minute ago, Chester B said:

Two Butia yatay x Jubaea and 2 Butia yatay x Parajubaea sunkha

Are they from Patrix?