Trachycarpus fortunei

[SC FM]

Trachycarpus fortunei

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Here are pictures of Trachycarpus I grow here in Upstate SC. They are very hardy. they have seen 5F with little or no damage. IT is the best palm for this area of the Piedmont. Sorry, one ended up horizontal. The smaller one I grew from seed harvested here in the Upstte and it is now about 7 yers old form see. The larger one is about 9 years old and was planted from a bout a 10 gallon size. They grow very rapidly.

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[SC FM]

Sorry, second picture, I inadvertently posted a picture of a Sabal minor. OOPS!

[Spination]

It's one of my favorite palms, and for me, part of the appeal are the fan shaped leaves, and especially the "furry" trunk. We have about 40 of them, 35 of which are lined up in a row making a nice looking hedge of sorts. They were planted some years ago at the same time, and until the season before last when I installed a drip irrigation system giving them some extra with regular interval watering, they received very little care at all, other than trimming off lower dying leaves once a year. Interesting is the growth variation among them; a few have trunks of only about 3', most in the 5-6' range, with a few 8' and taller. I guess for whatever reason, even though only 8' apart from one to another, some had more optimal growing conditions that others. Seedlings are not very hardy (in pots), but once the plant reaches a trunk size of 6" to 1', they do much better. Although I've been digging up the odd seedling here and there over the years, last spring a particular tree's seeds decided to sprout big-time. I pulled up over 100 seedlings, and potted them up. One year later, about 50 are still doing fine and others still in the ground continue to grow as well. IMO, it's a whole lot less hassle digging seedlings out of the ground grown naturally than trying to germinate the seeds otherwise! (soaking, scarification, blah blah blah)
Also, once well established they are very cold hardy. Our lowest lows of 20 degrees 12/2013 didn't faze them at all.

They make nice looking "bonzai" style plants in small pots which restrict their growth

2013 04 12 Windmill Palm a X735.jpg (137.24 KiB) Viewed 2125 times

Bigger pot, faster growth...

2013 04 12 Windmill Palm b X735.jpg (217.15 KiB) Viewed 2125 times

Seedlings harvested last Spring, greatly reduced survival rate than those left in the ground.

2014 04 04 Trachycarpus fortunei a X735.jpg (183.13 KiB) Viewed 2125 times

2014 04 14 Trachycarpus fortuinei flowers X735.jpg (139.97 KiB) Viewed 2125 times

2015 01 06 Trachycarpus fortunei row a X735.jpg (125.12 KiB) Viewed 2125 times

Note the tree to the right only about 1/2 the size as the others in this pic

2015 01 06 Trachycarpus fortunei row b X735.jpg (97.72 KiB) Viewed 2125 times

One of my favorite individuals because of the stout trunk, giving the tree a more compact appearance

2015 01 06 Trachycarpus fortunei row b a.jpg (158.35 KiB) Viewed 2125 times

Loads of seeds...under this tree a significant number of seedlings

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1 year old seedlings left in the ground

2015 01 06 Trachycarpus fortunei seedlingss.jpg (207.03 KiB) Viewed 2125 times

Close up of flowers

[Jkwinston]

Wow! What a collection! I have one baby plant about two feet which was planted accidentally, and I have to move it into a pot. I don't have room for that kind of palm. Jkw

[NorthFlgrower]

Nice windmills.

[WhalesToungueAgave]

My Windmill grew to 6fT here in VA before 2014 winter did it in