2025 freeze south mississippi

[OutpostPalms]

Just wanted to share how my palms made out.

I have 2 Bismarkias, 2 jelly palm, 4 medium sized Washington robusta, and 8 young robustas. 
 

In January 2025 we set an all time record low temperature of 15 degrees F (-9C) here along the Mississippi coast. It was also accompanied by the first significant snow in a generation as 7 inches fell on us. This was preceded and followed by a couple nights of 20-25F temps. 
 

In a pinch I realized I need to try and protect some of the trees. For the bismarkias I took 2 stakes and put them in the ground and then double trash bagged them with Christmas lights going inside. For the larger robustas they were fully exposed but I set a gallon or so bucket of water next each one. The small ones were totally unprotected as were the jelly palms. 
 

During the 15 degree night the gfi outlet tripped causing the Xmas lights to turn off for some period of time. I feared the worst for the bismarkias. Meanwhile the buckets of water froze solid next to the robustas. 
 

3 months later here is what happened to each of them. 
 

All of the bismarkias fronds died except the center spear. They each have 1 frond out now and a new spear. 
the larger robustas had major damage but areas covered in snow mostly survived and each one had a frond resting on the bucket of water which survived. The spear also survived. Each of these have also grown a new frond and spear since then. 
both jelly palms survived and acted like nothing even happened. 
7 of 8 small robustas died. Only the one located near my septic tanks survived and it might have been because of warmth from us using hot water and such in the house and that going into the underground tanks by the tree keeping it locally warmer there. 
 

For this spring I’m replacing some of the dead small robustas with some bigger ones and also getting some more jelly palms since they did so well. And I already added one Sylvester date palm to my collection this year as well. 
 

 

[kinzyjr]

@OutpostPalms Thank you for posting the results and welcome to PalmTalk!

[OutpostPalms]

Got a small update here on the small robustas. All the ones that appeared to be dead I cut off about 3” from the ground and 1 of them is pushing new growth so it’s looking like 2 of them may actually survive.