Texas Palms

[NBTX11]

New Braunfels canary island date palms today. 

[Ben G.]

2 hours ago, NBTX11 said:

New Braunfels canary island date palms today. 

Looking pretty nice. I hope this quick hard freeze we getting this week doesn't damage anything. Most palms in the area are looking pretty good. I would hate for a late winter blast to knock anything back now.

[palmnut-fry]

Not what comes to mind when i heard of New Braunfels but we'll take the view. Damn, these are so tall they are survivors considering these past few winters! Must be very old to be this big, chunky.   

[Swolte]

20 hours ago, Ben G. said:

I hope this quick hard freeze we getting this week doesn't damage anything. Most palms in the area are looking pretty good. I would hate for a late winter blast to knock anything back now.

Yeah, I am probably going to hit the high teens again on Wednesday/Thursday. The following week temps are in the 80s... 🤠

[flplantguy]

How easy would it be to build a home that has the capacity to be a tall north wall of a protection style attached greenhouse?  Imagine having a frame or structure you could enclose for the one night of 20s a year in south texas, or flip a switch periodically to drop the cover if your in Houston and want tropicals year round. If the roofline can be done at 30 feet thats a lot of palms and plants that would fit. The house wall would gather heat as well and block the north wind from pulling so much away.  I had that thought after seeing south padre island after 2021, and seeing how some palms survived in south facing yards with taller homes due to the surge codes.  They had less damage just from windbreak wall protection, so a full enclosure would be an amazing result i think. Depends on local laws and codes though.

[NBTX11]

16 hours ago, palmnut-fry said:

Not what comes to mind when i heard of New Braunfels but we'll take the view. Damn, these are so tall they are survivors considering these past few winters! Must be very old to be this big, chunky.   

There are plenty of tall palms in NB.  A lot died in 2021, mainly Robusta, We're only 30 min from downtown San Antonio.  There are quite a few canary island date palms.  The long term survivors are W. Filifera, CIDP, Sabals, and Washingtonia hybrids,  There are some Robusta survivors as well, but most died in 2021.  

[DreaminAboutPalms]

6 hours ago, NBTX11 said:

There are plenty of tall palms in NB.  A lot died in 2021, mainly Robusta, We're only 30 min from downtown San Antonio.  There are quite a few canary island date palms.  The long term survivors are W. Filifera, CIDP, Sabals, and Washingtonia hybrids,  There are some Robusta survivors as well, but most died in 2021.  

There is a considerable difference between NB and Austin in terms of Palm survival. There are no CIDP that height in Austin that I’ve ever seen.

[NBTX11]

14 hours ago, DreaminAboutPalms said:

There is a considerable difference between NB and Austin in terms of Palm survival. There are no CIDP that height in Austin that I’ve ever seen.

I saw one in South Austin, south of downtown several years back that was quite tall. No idea if it survived 2021. 

[Sabal_Louisiana]

On 2/17/2025 at 12:59 PM, flplantguy said:

How easy would it be to build a home that has the capacity to be a tall north wall of a protection style attached greenhouse?  Imagine having a frame or structure you could enclose for the one night of 20s a year in south texas, or flip a switch periodically to drop the cover if your in Houston and want tropicals year round. If the roofline can be done at 30 feet thats a lot of palms and plants that would fit. The house wall would gather heat as well and block the north wind from pulling so much away.  I had that thought after seeing south padre island after 2021, and seeing how some palms survived in south facing yards with taller homes due to the surge codes.  They had less damage just from windbreak wall protection, so a full enclosure would be an amazing result i think. Depends on local laws and codes though.

If there's a will, there's a way. Courtyards in New Orleans surrounded by buildings offer a microclimate to grow bananas.