Spacing & sowing

Plant spacing

16 ft 5 in

In-row spacing

16 ft 5 in

Between rows

20 ft 6 in

Square-foot density

Not suited to SFG

Growing

Type

Tree · Perennial

Botanical family

Mixed / other

Sunlight

Full sun, and plenty of it.

Watering

Moderate, but more than most palms expect.

Feeding

A palm fertilizer in spring.

Frost tolerant

Yes

Flowering

May

Pruning

Take the dead fronds off in autumn.

Through the year

• Mar–May Bud Break
• May–Aug Flowering
• Aug–Nov Fruiting
• Nov–Dec Dormancy
• Jan–Mar Dormancy

Pests & problems

• Scale insects Scale insects on the fronds
• Vine weevil Palm weevil boring into the crown
• Verticillium & fusarium wilt Fusarium wilt
• Ganoderma butt rot at the base

Garden allies

Beneficial predators that hunt this plant's pests — grow their favourite flowers nearby to recruit them. ★ companion plant

• Beneficial nematodes Steinernema & Heterorhabditis spp.
  Hunts Vine weevil

  Microscopic worms watered onto damp soil that hunt down soil-dwelling grubs and release a bacterium that kills them within days. Timing is the whole thing: warm, damp soil and a small target grub, which means late summer for most of what they are used against.

• Frogs & toads Anura
  Hunts Vine weevil

  A resident toad works the beds every night for slugs, cutworms, and weevils. Recruit them with water — even a sunken basin pond — plus damp shade and an upturned-pot toad house; skip the slug pellets that poison their prey.

• Ground beetle Carabidae
  Hunts Vine weevil

  Fast, glossy night hunters that patrol the soil surface for slugs, cutworms, and root-fly larvae. Give them daytime cover — thick perennial edges, stepping stones, a log — and skip the tillage that wrecks their burrows.

  Plant nearby LavenderMintThyme
• Hedgehog Erinaceus europaeus
  Hunts Vine weevil

  A European animal, and worth saying so plainly: there are no hedgehogs in North America, and the ally that does the same night shift here is the toad, the opossum or the ground beetle. Where they do occur, cut a gap in the fence and skip the pellets.

• Hoverfly Syrphidae
  Hunts Scale insects

  Bee-mimicking flies whose legless larvae graze aphid colonies clean while the adults pollinate. A ribbon of shallow, nectar-rich flowers kept in bloom all season recruits wave after wave of them.

  Plant nearby CalendulaChamomileFennelFrench marigoldPhaceliaSweet alyssum
• Ladybird (lady beetle) Coccinellidae
  Hunts Scale insects

  The gardener’s favorite ally: adults and their alligator-shaped larvae each eat thousands of aphids, plus scale, mealybugs, and other soft-bodied sap-suckers. Grow flat, open flowers for the adults and never spray a colony that ladybird larvae are already working.

  Plant nearby CalendulaCilantroCosmosDillFennelYarrow