Complete noob germinated my first ever palm seed - Dypsis minuta

[anotherworldterraria]

Hi, I'm new to the forum.  My name is Matthew, and I have a plant collection across many plant families and genera. I especially like rare plants and miniature species. Despite my plant experience, I have never grown a palm tree before, and I've never tried germinating a palm seed, until the story below...

A friend of mine sent me one Dypsis minuta berry. I had no clue what to do with it, so I did some research for a few hours and then decided to go for it. I cleaned and prepared the seed per my research, then planted it.

I knew palm seeds generally take quite a long time to germinate, but wasn't ready for it in reality. I waited and waited until I nearly went insane and wanted to dig it up to see if the seed was still alive, but I resisted. Finally, I decided the seed had died and I had failed with my one, sole chance. That said, I left the container and just forgot about it.

A few days ago, I was totally shocked to unexpectedly see the seedling popping up. It had been so long that I had to check the date it was sown, and discovered it took 13 months to germinate. I danced around like a fool and could barely contain myself, then sent messages to my plant friends about the news. In my years of growing plants, this may have been one of the most exciting successes.

I opened the container and put in some fertilizer and supplements.

I am considering moving the seedling into one of my rare plant grow tents.

At this point I'm going to learn more about palms. I'm especially interested in the smallest species which may be suitable for indoor culture.

 

[Kim]

Congratulations on the baby palm! Dypsis minuta is an understory palm, as you no doubt already know. I've never grown it myself and can't offer any advice except to think it must need high humidity and probably has a low tolerance to non-tropical temperatures. I'd expect it will need a warm greenhouse? Good luck and keep us informed as to your progress.  

[Harry’s Palms]

Welcome , there is something about seeing a sprout after a long wait. Harry

[anotherworldterraria]

16 minutes ago, Kim said:

Congratulations on the baby palm! Dypsis minuta is an understory palm, as you no doubt already know. I've never grown it myself and can't offer any advice except to think it must need high humidity and probably has a low tolerance to non-tropical temperatures. I'd expect it will need a warm greenhouse? Good luck and keep us informed as to your progress.  

Thank you! I grow all of my plants indoors, and 90% of them are in grow tents or plastic bins at tropical or subtropical temperatures and high humidity. I think one of my rare plant grow tents would be perfect for this species.  I'll share updates, which may be a while considering how slow these supposedly grow.

[happypalms]

You have a great green thumb starting into palms with one the best rare palms around I predict a great growing in the making you sir have a great amount of joy coming your way growing palms as a hobby 🌱

[happypalms]

7 hours ago, anotherworldterraria said:

Thank you! I grow all of my plants indoors, and 90% of them are in grow tents or plastic bins at tropical or subtropical temperatures and high humidity. I think one of my rare plant grow tents would be perfect for this species.  I'll share updates, which may be a while considering how slow these supposedly grow.

They are quite cold tolerant I have one growing great in my greenhouse in temperatures around 2 degrees Celsius 

[anotherworldterraria]

Everyone, thanks for the warm welcome and helpful info.

I was about to move the palm seedling from the current location, to one of my grow tents, but then I chickened out.

I think I'll wait till the plant is larger before moving it.

At this small and young age, I don't want to risk changing the conditions and light too much.

If I had more than one seedling, I'd be more comfortable moving one and then comparing the growth from one location to the other, but since I have only one, I don't want to take any chances.

[flplantguy]

You sound smart in your approach too.  Changing the location too fast is risky for sure, i have a rare critcally endangered seedling im slowly trying to acclimate to outdoors and its a bit stressful worrying about them so if its fine where it is then caution wont hurt. I hope you enjoy them, i went from orchids to palms and still grow orchids but now have even more species i just have to have (within reason of course!)

[PalmatierMeg]

Good luck with it. Don't rush to transplant/repot. I've tried this species a number of times because I really wanted to succeed with it. But I've never been able to keep larger ones alive more than a few weeks and have never obtained seeds. The palms all went into decline then died. It's a tricky little demon. Maybe my sweltering 7-month summers are just too hard for it to deal with. I don't keep plants indoors - all my palms stay outdoors unless temps fall below 40F.