Palm Trees – Species with Cold Tolerance Thresholds
Cold Hardy Palm Trees species with cold tolerance thresholds:
Date Palm (left), and Needle Palm
Date Palm – Phoenix dactylifera – Date Palms are cold hardy to 18 degrees
Needle Palm – Rhapidophyllum hystrix – Bush type palm cold hardy to -10 degrees, zones 5-10.
Canary Island Date Palm (left) and Texas Sabal Palm (photo by Bruce Sorrie)
Canary Island Date Palm – Phoenix canariensis – Canary Island Palms are cold hardy to 15 – 18 degrees.
Texas Sabal Palm – Sabal texana, mexicana – Texas Sabal Palms are cold hardy to 16 – 18 degrees
Mediterranean (European) Fan Palm (left), California Fan Palm
Mediterranean (European) Fan Palm – Chamaerops humilis – Mediterranean Fan Palms are cold hardy to 5 – 15 degrees
California Fan Palm – Washingtonia filifera – California Fan Palms are cold hardy to 15 degrees
Windmill Palm (left), Pindo Palm
Windmill Palm – Trachycarpus fortunei – Windmill Palms are cold hardy to 5 degrees
Pindo Palm – Butia capitata – Beautiful blue-green palms are cold hardy to 12 – 15 degrees
Mexican Fan Palm (left), Queen Palm
Mexican Fan Palm – Washingtonia robusta – Mexican Fan Palms are cold hardy to 18 degrees Don’t plant above zone 9 without special protection. W. filifera (California Fan Palm, above) is more cold hardy.
Queen Palm – Syagrus romanzoffiana – Queen Palms are cold hardy to 20 degrees
The temperatures listed above are estimates.The organic program gives plants 4-5 degrees additional protection in many cases, plus preventative measures for cold protection can be used giving palms and other trees more cold protection.
Q: I have a variety of palms and they took a hard hit with the hard freezes recently. I had the trunks wrapped before the first hard freeze and they are still wrapped. When should they be unwrapped and what about pruning and fertilizer to bring them back?
A: The hardy palms don’t have to be wrapped at all. In your case, I would probably remove the wrapping because it really doesn’t protect the tropical palms anyway.
March is the time to apply organic fertilizer and any of the locally available choices will be fine. Cut the brown leaves off, they are dead and won’t come back. Hopefully your plants aren’t damaged too much. If you have to replant, the choices that didn’t even have cosmetic damage include sabal, Pindo, needle, Japanese windmill and Mediterranean palms.