windmill palm

15 years ago

Hello,

Last year I planted a windmill palm on my roof in NYC. It was helathy when I received it, but it arrived on one of the hottest days of the summer. Very quickly, it went downhill. It was planted in a large container and watered heavily, due to 100 degree weather- but the tips of the leaves dried out, and eventually the whole frond died. New leaves growing in initally looked good, but also soon died. This happened repeatedly, and then the plant was gone. I was sent a replacement, which arrived a few days ago. The same thing appears to be happening, even before I planted it (it's been too cold upstairs, so I've been watering it in my living room.) Any advice about how to keep this one alive? The ends of the leaves are drying out, on the outer fronds, but the inner ones look fine. It is a 4 foot plant- The root ball is about a foot tall and 10 inches wide. I'm wondering how large a container is necessary, what mix of soil, how much to water, etc. Will it survive a NY winter, or a very hot summer?

Thanks for any advice

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Comments (3)

mike-jaramillo
15 years ago
If Its a tachycarpus you need to keep it cool. Sun on a roof in a pot would fry the roots and shock the palm. If the palm drys it out and if its in a black pot on a roof top, thats a bad combination. Do you have a picture ?
mike-jaramillo
15 years ago
Sorry about that last post I tried to delete part of it and ended up sounding drunk lol.
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User
15 years ago
It is mild enough for it to be on the roof (minimum temps have not been lower than mid 40's for a while). Problem is roofs can be very inhospitable environments for plants, and in NYC (esp. Manhattan), all the buildings can make it VERY windy and HOT in the summer. Then, you have the Winter problem. Containers DO NOT offer nearly the same degree as insulation from cold as mulched, in-ground locations. Trachys are also NOT the most heat tolerant palms--they resent excessive heat and will shut down in it. You might be quite surprised to see what the temp actually gets to on a NYC roof in summer! Perhaps if the container were large enough and you used some burlap around it, it might work (building is generating some heat up there after all). Not sure why it suffering now though. (You have it in the house still?) They don't like it too dry--what's your watering like?)