Well First I would stay away from Queens, they are the dirtest palms I know! I like fox tails, but there hundreds of types.

Where are you located? That will make a difference. We are in Pinellas County and last nights freezing temperatures played havoc on some of my tropical plants and palms. Do a search because I remember posting to this type of question over the summer. Someone wrote about Christmas palms and how they never did well for her and she was looking for some other tropical plants/palms to put around her pool. She lived in Hillsborough County. Do you know how to search, its at the bottom of the posting page. Good luck.

I am located in Houston
So we have occasional freezes and clay/sand for soil
Thanks

There's not a lot of options for palm trees in Houston. And there's even fewer options that won't get so tall in your small yard that they will eventually be totally out of scale with your landscape. You will want a variety of short palm trees that won't dwarf everything else in your yard. Your idea of palm trees providing shade/privacy is probably optimistic. Palm trees only stay one hight for so long, so they will probably be too short for this purpose at first, and then eventually too tall. My recommendation would be a combination of the following:

Windmill Palms
Mediterranian Fan Palms
Pygmy Date Palms
Sago Palms (although not a palm, it looks like one)
and maybe one Chinese Fan Palm or Pindo Palm since they're bigger.

You can get any of these at your local Houston Garden Center.

Here is a link that might be useful: Houston Garden Center Palm Trees

I"m in the Houston area too.
Here are some of the palms from my house.

Canary Dates

Mediterranian Fan Palms

Cocus Pindo left, tall Med fan right, Sago low right, lots of short Med fans down low for thick foliage.

Another view of the Cous Pindo planter

A half dozen Fan palms with two large Sago's

Sago left, tall Med fan right

A Texas Sabol that was so big my machine couldn't get it to the back yard.

You can place any of these in the middle of your 5' to 7' areas. Place them closer towards the fence, not towards the pool and pool piping. I've got lots of more palms around my house and pool and have never had problems with them in our climate. However, last year I did lose some awesome Foxtails to that freak Ice storm we had.
Houston Gardens does have a big selection but their retail price is always high. The best time to purchse from them is when they have 50 to 70 percent off. On FM 1488 north of Houston west of I45 is Palms Plus, they have everyday prices on palms that are half of Houston Gardens retail prices. There are many other palm tree only nurseries around town too.

See ya,
Kelly

Thanks for the help and the extra source for palms.

I dont dare show my wife your pool pics though, Kelly

Hey GK5040! I actually live in Pasco County and replaced the Christmas Palms with Chinese Fans (that are taking FOREVER to grow by the way). I looked up the post we started a while back. All the Christmas Palms in the area here really froze bad a few weeks ago with that hard freeze we had. I think it got down to 19 degrees!

Here is a link that might be useful: Best Palms for around the pool

Hey Dischnell....I remember you. Long time no post:) I couldnt remember who from the group of us posters this summer had written that post. We got the same freeze....all my new plants look sad. The arecas on the side of the pool took a beating, but they are not dead....I am curious to see how the brown limbs come off. The tops are so brown....they will be half their size when they lose those fronds. I was told not to touch them and its killing me to leave half the plant brown. All my pink ixoras have no leaves....they were so beautiful. I have a Christmas palm in a pot by the pool. I wheeled it real close to the house under the lanai for 4 days and it looks fine. The heat from the house saved it! Several neighbors have extensive damage. The yard behind and next to me make my yard look fabulous compared to theirs. They had damage to everything including robellinis. One neighbor said he suffered so much damage because his sprinklers went off while it was freezing. Its amazing how some yards had no damage and others look awful. I actually believe those who constantly water, look better because their plants were so hydrated. This is just speculation to explain the severe differences....otherwise the wind blew harder around some houses. People like me who conserve water and stick to the winter watering schedule got hit worse. I keep hoping it will all recover quickly, it stinks that it might take 6 months for it to look good again. We got down to around 32. I had a thermometer set back about 8 feet from the house. I kept waking up all night to see what it read. It wasnt close enough to see from the slider (so I had to keep going out in the cold) but might have been too close to the house to not give an accurate reading. Those thermometers only got as low as 36, but my husband said his car said 33 at 5:30 am. Your chinese fans should be fine, they can go below freezing. My chinese fans, robellinis, foxtail, and queens look fine. You are right, the chinese fans are slow growers. How big did you buy them? Dont forget to regularly fertilized them as I am sure that will help them stay healthy and might help them grow a little faster.

I've been around here, looking more than posting. I've been really lurking around the home decorating forum more now, but still around just not posting lately.

I wasn't worried about my chinese fans. They just aren't growing as fast as I'd like. We got them about 7-8 ft tall and very full, multiple trunks. My plants in the back didn't get it too bad. My crynum lilies must have gotten warmth from the ligustrum trees that are around them. All my crotons and other plants in the pool planter must have kept warm from the heat off the water because they did wonderful without being covered. We covered the robellini out front and it was fine. My ixoras out front were a little brown up top, but look okay now. My poor hibiscus are bald now and my firecracker plants are frozen with droopy leaves. On the bright side, they all end up coming back and looking fine come spring. My yard will just look sick until then unfortunately, but nothing fatal. I gave some plants a trim in the back yard and they are already sprouting new leaves. It is the ones that are green and yellow and have a circular group of leaves that grow to resemble a flower. I forgot what they are called, but they needed to be trimmed and it was long overdue. I left everything else alone for now.

I forgot about those plants...yes I have them too and the top flowers did get brown. The lawn guys trimmed them and they look fine now. I think, but not sure, that they are variegated pittisporum. Its funny, I was thinking of you the night of the frost....wondering what you had replaced the christmas palms with....as I dragged my potted christmas palm under the covered lanai area:) I thought you were in Hillsborough. Were you the one who lived or almost bought in Lansbrook?

I do a lot of lurking too. I never went on the home decorating forum. I should have. Right before we redid the pool we redid the kitchen/family room. New cabinets, tore up the white tile flooring and installed wood floors. This weekend the reverse osmosis leaked in the middle of the night and ruined an area of my floors. Its still drying out but I dont think its going to be ok. I am sick over it. We are still waiting to hear form the floor store if they can get more wood...then we have to make sure it will match:( Between that and the sad looking yard, I am ready to start a new year!

Kelly, WOW your pool and landscaping look AWESOME!! I was born in Houston and lived there until I transplanted to Dallas in '85. I miss seeing that kind of tropical landscaping, wish we could do it here! What are the wood posts, are you going to be building a covered patio?

Kelly, fantastic....love the tropical look and what you did with the long waterfall area....always wondered how a pool builder would build thier own pool. Are you afraid of tree roots messing up any part of the pool? You have a lot of tropical plantings. We are new to Florida and palm trees....recently I tried to add some plants and flowers under a plam....I couldnt dig past 2 inches the roots were so bad. My neighbor told me that is a common problem....extra shrubs need to be added before the plam is established because of the aggressive roots. Did you research which trees should not be planted near pools? Just curious, it goes back to this original post? Since your in the business, do you have customers who call you with root problems around their pools? If so, which type of trees are the worst?

Thanks for the compliments.
Tres, yes those posts are now the base of my pavilion. I built it a year after I built the pool. Here are some during construction pics and of the new outdoor pool table I bought last year.

One of these days, when I'm completely finished, I'll do a post in the photo gallery and put in a bunch of finished pic's.

gk,
I do get calls from people who didn't listen to the advice of moving the palms or native trees back closer to the fence and away from the pool piping. Palms trees roots aren't terribly invasive because it's just a big bundle of spaghetti noodles, but they'll raise the level of the dirt and bow the pipes. The pipes have a lot of elasticity and will bend but if there's a coupling, elbow, or tee they'll break the fitting.

See ya,
Kelly

Looks like a great setup...cant wait to see it when your done.