Texas Palms

[RedRabbit]

18 minutes ago, Xenon said:

Houston queens aren't like sandy Florida queens 😝, must be something about the heavy gumbo clay. They love it! Only place I've seen consistently good queens in Florida is closer to Jacksonville. Queens love the New Orleans swamp too.  Not century level bulletproof in any of those places but "zone push" is ridiculous lol. 

Let's make queens the #1 by a landslide most common pinnate palm in Houston again. But on private property so the other people in this thread don't raise the pitchforks LOL

Yes here's your bimonthly dose of luxuriant Houston queens a la broken record😄 . This thread needs more positivity 🌴

Just my $0.02, but I’d prefer to see mules take off. They seem to be readily available and they’re more interesting palms than queens. The DOT has been planting them in Florida for about a decade so maybe they’ll become more commonplace in Texas too.

[fr8train]

edit: double post 

[fr8train]

2 minutes ago, Xenon said:

https://www.google.com/maps/@29.5907733,-95.2210229,3a,90y,203.54h,97.87t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sT8w9ENyX03z-MaEiMwgrqg!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D-7.865855985459646%26panoid%3DT8w9ENyX03z-MaEiMwgrqg%26yaw%3D203.5425490730724!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI0MTExMy4xIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

Thank you! That looks so cool. I wish I had a bigger yard, I'd try to mimic that. 

I love the way a lot of them lean. 

[Xenon]

7 minutes ago, RedRabbit said:

Just my $0.02, but I’d prefer to see mules take off. They seem to be readily available and they’re more interesting palms than queens. The DOT has been planting them in Florida for about a decade so maybe they’ll become more commonplace in Texas too.

Not that hard to find mules in the landscape or for sale. They'll never ever compete with queens though, you can't beat <50$ a palm for instant gratification.  I think the local chain has some huge 10 or 15 gallon queens for something ludicrous like $30 lol 

I get the end of season oversized 3 gallon queens for 7-11$ each. Just put them in the ground and watch them grow like weeds 

My $0.02 but I find the majority of mules to be uglier than both parents. They're too variable/crapshoot to get one with nice form. The nice ones are very nice though 

[NBTX11]

3 hours ago, fr8train said:

Nearly everything they sell here won't make it long term. I think people buy these palms, then get discouraged when they inevitably freeze. 

I'd be happy seeing Sabals everywhere as they'll make it through anything, but I never really see them for sale. It'd be cool if a nursery focused just on the palms that could make it here at a scale where those palms could be cheap, but it seems like most people just don't care. At least that's what I was told when I went to the John Fairey Gardens. It'd be awesome to see those silver sabals spread, but outside of palmtalk there isn't much interest.

San Antonio is a Filifera town. They should be planted more along all the roads. Sabals grow too slow to make a major difference, unless you ship in a bunch big ones to plant. 
 

if someone got their hands on thousands medium trunked hybrid Washingtonia seeds, grew them and planted them all over town we’d be set. 

[MarcusH]

4 hours ago, Xenon said:

Not that hard to find mules in the landscape or for sale. They'll never ever compete with queens though, you can't beat <50$ a palm for instant gratification.  I think the local chain has some huge 10 or 15 gallon queens for something ludicrous like $30 lol 

I get the end of season oversized 3 gallon queens for 7-11$ each. Just put them in the ground and watch them grow like weeds 

My $0.02 but I find the majority of mules to be uglier than both parents. They're too variable/crapshoot to get one with nice form. The nice ones are very nice though 

Now you open a can of worms my friend lol.  I've seen quite a few mule palms and a mature one in Pearsall,  just south of San Antonio.  That specimen is gigantic . The picture I'm going to show you but the picture doesn't do its justice.  It's taller this year and the trunk is just massive.  I love Queen palms too but they look best when properly cared for otherwise I've seen a lot of ratty looking ones in FL.  

[MarcusH]

2 minutes ago, MarcusH said:

Now you open a can of worms my friend lol.  I've seen quite a few mule palms and a mature one in Pearsall,  just south of San Antonio.  That specimen is gigantic . The picture I'm going to show you but the picture doesn't do its justice.  It's taller this year and the trunk is just massive.  I love Queen palms too but they look best when properly cared for otherwise I've seen a lot of ratty looking ones in FL.  

No Queen would recover as quick as a Mule palm. Pictures taken right after February 2021 a month later and June 2022. Also impressive cold hardy.  

[ahosey01]

5 hours ago, MarcusH said:

No Queen would recover as quick as a Mule palm. Pictures taken right after February 2021 a month later and June 2022. Also impressive cold hardy.  

Interestingly enough these do awful in Brownsville.  I've only ever seen a couple and they look terrible.  I think it is the heavy, low-permeability soil - Butia also look really bad down here until you get north of Los Fresnos where the soil is more sandy or loamy.  There are some 20ft+ monsters at Tad Dyer's place in Weslaco that are beautiful and @Fusca up in Rio Hondo has a Butia that grows faster than his Washingtonia.  But down here... puke.

In these soil conditions like at my house, queens look fantastic and so do S. schizophylla x S. romanzoffiana crosses ("coco queen").  They like the heavy soil.

[ahosey01]

9 hours ago, NBTX11 said:

San Antonio is a Filifera town. They should be planted more along all the roads. Sabals grow too slow to make a major difference, unless you ship in a bunch big ones to plant. 
 

if someone got their hands on thousands medium trunked hybrid Washingtonia seeds, grew them and planted them all over town we’d be set. 

I think Livistona saribus with the green petioles would also be a good contender for up there.  Super hardy.

[Xenon]

5 hours ago, MarcusH said:

No Queen would recover as quick as a Mule palm. 

I've seen queens make rapid recovery, once they start pushing they can be pretty fast. This queen in West Houston actually survived 2021 but was taken out by Dec 2022. 

[Xenon]

Here's a nice mule at Moody in Galveston about 10 years ago. It was removed sometime in the late 2010s. Sorry for the potato quality photos 

[Robert Cade Ross]

10 hours ago, fr8train said:

@Xenon Where was that apartment complex that had all of those butia I think you posted a while back? I might be in Houston next weekend and I wanted to see it if I had time. 

A few of them have died randomly but there is at least 30 alive lol 

[Robert Cade Ross]

10 hours ago, RedRabbit said:

Just my $0.02, but I’d prefer to see mules take off. They seem to be readily available and they’re more interesting palms than queens. The DOT has been planting them in Florida for about a decade so maybe they’ll become more commonplace in Texas too.

A Mule with heavy queen genetics looks 10x more tropical/ coconuty than a queen and it’s hardy longterm  for HTX 

[Robert Cade Ross]

2 minutes ago, Xenon said:

Here's a nice mule at Moody in Galveston about 10 years ago. It was removed sometime in the late 2010s. Sorry for the potato quality photos 

95% of the mules were cut down due to a lady being “hit by a frond “ . Who then sued  moody gardens causing them to all be removed 🤣🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️ ….. at least we can look forward to all the new dactys that will be planted there shortly to replace dead ones .

[Fusca]

13 hours ago, fr8train said:

Found it:

https://maps.app.goo.gl/Uw5jTRnw6HFbT1n26

Nice!  There's a couple of Butia near me a bit taller but they don't look good (not photogenic).  They are underutilized here and in SA probably because of alkaline soils.  It's really hit or miss - there's some that do really well (like mine) while others look bad.

13 hours ago, fr8train said:

Nearly everything they sell here won't make it long term. I think people buy these palms, then get discouraged when they inevitably freeze. 

I'd be happy seeing Sabals everywhere as they'll make it through anything, but I never really see them for sale. It'd be cool if a nursery focused just on the palms that could make it here at a scale where those palms could be cheap, but it seems like most people just don't care. At least that's what I was told when I went to the John Fairey Gardens. It'd be awesome to see those silver sabals spread, but outside of palmtalk there isn't much interest.

Unfortunate truth - if it doesn't grow fast and able to make $ quickly it's not grown/sold.  Most people would balk at a $40 1-gal Sabal when there's a $20 3-gal Washingtonia available.  Palmtalkers would feel differently (I hope).

[ahosey01]

8 minutes ago, Fusca said:

Nice!  There's a couple of Butia near me a bit taller but they don't look good (not photogenic).  They are underutilized here and in SA probably because of alkaline soils.  It's really hit or miss - there's some that do really well (like mine) while others look bad.

Unfortunate truth - if it doesn't grow fast and able to make $ quickly it's not grown/sold.  Most people would balk at a $40 1-gal Sabal when there's a $20 3-gal Washingtonia available.  Palmtalkers would feel differently (I hope).

Palmtalkers would buy both.

[Chester B]

I know when I was at Palm Professionals in Sugarland, they said they were really pushing the mules now.  They had a huge number of them on the lot, but the prices were eye watering, at least to me.   I got 4 of the strap leaf mules back in Feb or March, and all are pinnate now, so at least they grow fast.  I'll be planting them in March, when I figure out where I want them.

On the whole Sabal uresana thing, I agree if there were more big ones around there would be an increased demand.  There are a lot of people with deep pockets here in Houston.

[Xenon]

3 minutes ago, ahosey01 said:

Palmtalkers would buy both.

I also think Sabal causiarum is underrated. It's massive, cold hardy, and seemingly MUCH faster than S. mexicana or S. palmetto. 

[MarcusH]

13 minutes ago, Robert Cade Ross said:

A Mule with heavy queen genetics looks 10x more tropical/ coconuty than a queen and it’s hardy longterm  for HTX 

Come on @Xenon Jonathan. Look at it ,just look at it  lol.  You sure you want to replace the yard with Queens? I think that's a no brainer 

[Xenon]

1 minute ago, Chester B said:

 

On the whole Sabal uresana thing, I agree if there were more big ones around there would be an increased demand.  There are a lot of people with deep pockets here in Houston.

Tad in the Valley used to install landscape ready S. uresana in the Houston Area. I don't know specifically where they went but I'm sure they're still around somewhere in the concrete jungle. 

[MarcusH]

1 minute ago, Xenon said:

I also think Sabal causiarum is underrated. It's massive, cold hardy, and seemingly MUCH faster than S. mexicana or S. palmetto. 

And I followed your advice and growing one myself 

[MarcusH]

CIDP in our neighborhood.  Thought I'm going to take a picture before the fronds get fried again.  Would be nice to have a mild winter again.  

[ahosey01]

2 minutes ago, MarcusH said:

And I followed your advice and growing one myself 

Grow Livistona saribus also I can tell you where to find a 15g.

[Xenon]

1 minute ago, MarcusH said:

Come on @Xenon Jonathan. Look at it ,just look at it  lol.  You sure you want to replace the yard with Queens? I think that's a no brainer 

That pic is a no from me. I like the softer more relaxed looking mules and then you have to win the lottery again to get the petioles to hold upright but not too upright. 

Came across this one a few months ago in Sugar Land, I think it might have potential😝 

[Xenon]

2 minutes ago, ahosey01 said:

Grow Livistona saribus also I can tell you where to find a 15g.

It's still going to be crispy at 17-18F 😆 

 

C'mon TXDOT bring back Livistona decora along the freeways 

[MarcusH]

1 minute ago, Xenon said:

It's still going to be crispy at 17-18F 😆

I'll pass. Wouldn't be a good choice for San Antonio.  It gets too cold .Beautiful looking palm though .

[ahosey01]

4 minutes ago, Xenon said:

It's still going to be crispy at 17-18F 😆 

 

C'mon TXDOT bring back Livistona decora along the freeways 

The owners of the few I know of have all said no burn whatsoever in 2021.  Even the chinensis had leaf tips get scorched.

Can't speak to 17F though.

I agree to this decora planting also.  I don't know why they wouldn't do it down here.  I have been told these things lived through '83 and '89, at least some of them.

[MarcusH]

5 minutes ago, Xenon said:

That pic is a no from me. I like the softer more relaxed looking mules and then you have to win the lottery again to get the petioles to hold upright but not too upright. 

Came across this one a few months ago in Sugar Land, I think it might have potential😝 

I do like the way it looks. I like both the curved and upright fronds . I'm not a picky person I appreciate every palm I can see.  I don't know I might replace one mule with a Filifera in the backyard that's still tiny.  I'm thinking about it. 

[Xenon]

1 minute ago, ahosey01 said:

The owners of the few I know of have all said no burn whatsoever in 2021.  Even the chinensis had leaf tips get scorched.

 

😂🤣🤣 Now you're just humble bragging to all the poor folks in Houston Siberia and San Antonio North Pole 

[ahosey01]

10 minutes ago, Xenon said:

😂🤣🤣 Now you're just humble bragging to all the poor folks in Houston Siberia and San Antonio North Pole 

It was an accident lol

[MarcusH]

26 minutes ago, Xenon said:

😂🤣🤣 Now you're just humble bragging to all the poor folks in Houston Siberia and San Antonio North Pole 

Lol hey at least we can grow "some" palms for at least a century.  Most folks in the U.S. have to build structures and wrap their palms in miles of Xmas lights. We're just spoiled in Houston and San Antonio we just want more varieties which is understandable lol. 

[SeanK]

12 hours ago, fr8train said:

A part of me honestly likes that. I'm not a fan of overregulation. But I would think as a business, home, or just land owner you'd want to maintain your property of your own free will. 

Like it costs money to plant palms and landscape, it also costs money and time to cut them down and remove them. I can understand if the owners really can't afford it, but a lot of them are on business property. Rent a chainsaw and do it yourself if you have to, I can't imagine it's that expensive. 

A good reason to avoid robustas and queens. 

[Chester B]

1 hour ago, Xenon said:

I also think Sabal causiarum is underrated. It's massive, cold hardy, and seemingly MUCH faster than S. mexicana or S. palmetto. 

I agree causiarum is very cold hardy.  I've seen two giant Sabals driving around that could've been Causiarum.  One was in Nassau bay, not sure if it's a causiarum or just a pretty big mexicana.  Note the Sabal palmetto to the left of it and the difference in size.  Looks bigger in person.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/XXmteAeXuyNvtipw6

 

[Chester B]

Picture of the above palm I took in February.  This is one palm that really stood out to me.

[PA-TX2024]

1 hour ago, MarcusH said:

CIDP in our neighborhood.  Thought I'm going to take a picture before the fronds get fried again.  Would be nice to have a mild winter again.  

I believe Texas is gonna have an above average winter. A LA Nina is expected.

[Chester B]

18 minutes ago, PA-TX2024 said:

I believe Texas is gonna have an above average winter. A LA Nina is expected.

That's what they are saying, but all we need is one strong Canadian front to move down and ruin it.  2 bad days and the party is over.

[Xenon]

Some of the biggest freezes in TX history (most of the 80s) occurred during La Niña😆. But then again, there are some super mild La Niña years too. In other words, get ready for the nail biting ride!

If the winter low is more than 5 degrees below the 30 year average this winter, I think I'll finally throw in the towel. 3 out of the last 4 winters with lows 8-10+ degrees below the average is demoralizing enough. Can't take anymore! 

 

 

[MarcusH]

48 minutes ago, Chester B said:

That's what they are saying, but all we need is one strong Canadian front to move down and ruin it.  2 bad days and the party is over.

We shall see.  I'm optimistic.  We're in a 1980s lite version . It hasn't been that cold to kill all palms. Most palms survived even in the 1980s. Washies and Sabals are tough as nails. You have to face the winter with a different mindset.  Winters becoming more normal to Texas just look at the temperature charts before the 1980s.  We were at least a half zone colder on average with occasional dips into 7b winter.  The new hardiness zone rating doesn't reflect reality it's pushed . They should update every 5 to 10 years.  So realistically Houston is mild 9A and San Antonio mild 8b.  It isn't just Texas . 

[jwitt]

51 minutes ago, MarcusH said:

We shall see.  I'm optimistic.  We're in a 1980s lite version . It hasn't been that cold to kill all palms. Most palms survived even in the 1980s. Washies and Sabals are tough as nails. You have to face the winter with a different mindset.  Winters becoming more normal to Texas just look at the temperature charts before the 1980s.  We were at least a half zone colder on average with occasional dips into 7b winter.  The new hardiness zone rating doesn't reflect reality it's pushed . They should update every 5 to 10 years.  So realistically Houston is mild 9A and San Antonio mild 8b.  It isn't just Texas . 

In the computer age you would think they would use the latest 30 years for the hardiness map.

Not conveniently leave the last 3 off. 

Unless ...

[MarcusH]

4 minutes ago, jwitt said:

In the computer age you would think they would use the latest 30 years for the hardiness map.

Not conveniently leave the last 3 off. 

Unless ...

I look at the whole picture like the last 100 years.  I'm only interested in the lows and the record lows get milder .  Not even in South Florida have temperatures been steadily warm( 10a/b).  It snowed in Miami in 1977.  SFLA experienced temperatures in the upper 20s in the 1980s enough to kill a good amount of Coconuts.  It isn't only Texas that gets beaten up by those Canadian storms. The God of the Arctic plays Russian Roulette every year. Which region am I going to pick ? Buckle up and enjoy the ride.