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maggie_burnworth

Palm suddenly not doing well!

8 years ago



I've had this plant for several years, but it's suddenly struggling. I see a stem of little pods growing, and several leaves are brown. What should I do?

Comments (12)

  • 8 years ago

    Those are flowers! Dunno what's going on with the brown leaves. Are the stems with brown leaves the same stems that are producing the flowers?

  • 8 years ago

    I think so, yes

  • 8 years ago

    I think the flowers are taking energies from the leaves and causing them to die. Whether that's a cause for worry, more knowledgeable folks will know.

  • 8 years ago

    Thank you so much for your time and effort!!!

  • 8 years ago

    Do you think I need to split some of the plants? Also could you tell me how to decide on the size of a pot? Thank you!

  • 8 years ago

    The only problem with trying to split up the plants is that the roots will be all tangled together and likely be damaged during separation. It's easier to do with younger/smaller plants, with older plants it's riskier. They're a slow growing plant so in repotting you'd only need something a bit larger than the root ball

  • 8 years ago

    I


    separated my palm 2 weeks ago very carefully. Now I have two pots and 4 palm trees in each pot. Notice how big the difference is in stems thickness.

  • 8 years ago

    What kind of fertilizer is recommended? Is there a certain way to replant them (certain containers, rocks in bottom, etc.)?

  • PRO
    8 years ago

    If it has warmed up the first thing I would do is give it a good spray with water outside and place in the patio or balcony (Shade). This will help dislodge any topical pests. I would also cut all the dead folliage and make sure the trunks are not rotting on any of them. Remove all dead material. Lastly I would thin them out and repot. A quality well draining soil will do. Tuija's picture illustrates how nice they look when thinned out.

  • 8 years ago

    Maggie Burnworth No rocks are needed. Replant in fresh soil in larger pot after removing about 25% of the old soil. The fertilizer I use for these is Miracle Grow 30-10-10. They like morning sun. Mid day or afternoon sun can burn them.

  • 8 years ago

    Maggie: silly question, did it get cold? C. Elegans are very tough but if it got super cold they can react like that. Ditto if it suddenly got a lot of direct sun, but that's less likely.

    But there is a lot of healthy foliage in there, so job #1 is cut out all the dead foliage (which is a very fiddly job with Chamys). You know you are in real trouble with these when every leaf develops brown tips, but here it seems to be only parts that are affected, and generally the more exposed leaves. It won't be watering either. The tips I mentioned would be overwatering, underwatering causes loss of the smallest, lowest leaves.

    The production of flower stems (which usually are separate stems, from memory) doesn't normally cause the rest of the flower to deteriorate this quickly, hence me thinking it's something environmental. I used to look after a veritable hedge of these at London Heathrow Airport in a sunny position and they seemed to never stopped producing the flowers.


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