They absolutely love to be dry. If you think its too wet, its not dry enough! They are much less moisture tolerant than robustas which is why they arent seen much in the southeast unlike robustas, but if you can keep them dry they will prove slightly more cold tolerant than a robusta. The secret ingredient to a palms survival in a cold zone is definately to keep them dry, but filferas dont even like summer moisture much if its not in very good draining soil.

Good luck!

One tip I have for filiferas just water the root area not the leaves or trunk. pure filifera will get black mold spots on the leaves from to much humidity.

Hmm, I probably won't bother with them then if they're that finicky.

It's amazing how the two are so different considering that they are both "desert palms". I have seen W.robusta growing in areas with compacted soil and standing water around here, they don't seem to mind it at all.

Robusta is more tolerant of moisture than Filifera.
Neither will tolerate it in winter-

i would probably stay away from filiferas. robustas would be your best bet for your area, but like you said alabamatree hugger they get really tall & skinny trunks! but i have to give it to them they are pretty hardy palms! when the big storm hit the west coast like 3 days ago temps. drop to 20 or 21*F after some rain & snow! i thought for sure the leafs were toast but my robustas are perfectly fine! hope this helps

In Georgia where I live they sell both robustas,filiferas. Everything I have read says the filiferas wont take the humid summers or wet winters we have here.The Mediterranean Fan Palms I have,I planted them on the side of a hill so when It does rain most of the water runs off instead of soaking in the ground.This works for me in winter,in summer I water them with a soaker hose.I never water from a overhead water source,because if you do they will get some kind of Disease.Something like this might work for you.Its all acording to how bad do you want them.I hope this helps in your choice.

The literature only lists W.robusta as being hardy to 20F, but I know it got down to 16F a few years ago and the only damage I saw on the local ones was a little leaf tip burn, nothing bad enough to kill them.

After midnight till sunrise is when it typically dips into the teens here, so I'm sure that's not as bad as 16F all day long.

Butiaman, I missed your post. I don't see how I could avoid overhead watering with something like a Washingtonia, eventually it would outgrow any cover I made for it. I thought the moisture issues with filifera was mostly with the roots, I didn't know it was the foliage that gets damaged too.

I dont think it would have a problem with a typical rainstorm at all, just try not to keep the crow consistenty moist, but that goes for most palms. It gives the leaves black spots. It happened to my areca and my windmill palm last june with all the rain we got (12 inches total) but july was drier and the palms were fine.

good luck!

Its true there is no way to protect the growing bud or fronds once it gets so big.What I was trying to say is that the fronds will get black spot or just look plain bad if planted to close to something.As TZ7 is saying a good rain in summer wont hurt them,they just cant stay wet because the bud can get rot.My Meds. or on the side of a hill,In full sun,so when it does rain they can dry out good being in full sun and with plenty of air cirulation.They dont wont to be planted up to close to a house or building.Alot of plants besides palms will get black spot or rust if there isnt good air movement around them.With dry climate palms good air cirulation is key.Even though my Meds. or in these conditions the old fronds tend to get little brown spots on them.The only thing I think that helps them from our humid summers and wet winters is good air movement around the plants.Sorry If I dident explain it good enough the frist time.Good luck with your plantings.People told me you cant grow this or that here and I proved them wrong.If you want the palms enough Its not that hard to mimic the conditions from where they come from to some degree.

Well I have both robusta and filifera seeds, so I think I'm going to have to start both come spring and do my own side by side comparison ;)

Thats good that your going to try both.To me thats part of the fun in gardening.I will be doing my own testing next spring.I will be trying a Phoenix Sylvestris,Its rated at zone 8b were you are.Is there any of these palms growing near you?I plan on planting it In a raised bed with sand and on the south side of my house.The front of my house faceses south,so the house will block the north wind.If there is any growing nere you,do you know how low of Temps.they have taken and still doing good?

There are some date palms growing at the 'Wharf' in Orange Beach, but I was told they were "true" date palms, I'm not sure. It got down to about 16F here at my house a few years ago and I'm 50 miles inland, so it probably got down to about 23F in Orange Beach (it's usually about a 5 degree difference).

Click on the link below and you can navigate around and see what they look like... (notice the burn on the pygmy dates).

Here is a link that might be useful: Orange Beach - StreetView

Here are some Washingtonia robustas growing at a Chevron station about 20 miles inland, they probably have got down to about 19F. These were pretty small when they planted them about ten years ago, and now they're approaching 40ft tall.

Here is a link that might be useful: Washingtonias

I forgot to add, I have a potted robusta palm that for some reason really declined last year, and hasnt done well since. I decided to leave it out in this cold spell and see how it does. It says it cant handle lower than 20, but mine went to 20 (no portection in a pot) without damage). With protection they are pretty good palms for cold hardy palm growers because of there fast growth.

Butiaman...
I think its a great Idea to start date palms by you. You are definately in a warmer zone 7 than me, and date palms are very tolerant of alot not to mention very slow growers especially in areas with cold winters. They will probably never get to a point where they can survive a winter with absolutely no protection, but with the right protection they can survive.

Good luck!

I find diffrent info. on Phoenix palms,some say the Canary Island Date Palm is the most cold hardiest,and others say Medjool Date Palm(true date palm) is and others say Sylvester Date is.If I had the money I would like to buy one of each kind and find out for myself.Oh ATH I will also be getting both kinds of Washingtonias to try also.Thanks for the info.

Let us know how well it goes!

Well we had record breaking rainfall here yesterday (12 inches), we normally don't even get this much for the whole month of December. Houses and cars are flooded everywhere and my yard is a soupy mess! This brings me back into reality and kinda ends my hopes of growing W.filifera. I'm thinking this might be too moist, LOL ;)

The Sagos next door were under 3ft of swift moving water all night last night, so we'll see how they pull through.

I know how you feel we had a five year drought and we made up for it in one summer.I think that we now are something like 11inches over for what we normaly have for fall.It seems like we now have more cloudy,rainy,cold days than sunny days.The temps. have been below normal all this year,whats going on?I just hope we dont have a colder winter than normal.I just planted 4 new 3 gallon palms in my yard this past spring.

Wow, the south is getting a lot of really bad rain this fall! I expected it with this pattern, but wet and cold dont go to well with palm trees (fortunately in the south real cold is rare and short, but the cold over here is very stubborn so far this month, and much below what it should be).

Hope that sago makes it through, but as long as the water isnt sitting there for long it should be fine.

good luck.