#arecaceae

If you want to grow palms from seed, there is one very important thing you need to know: is your species an adjacent or remote germinator? The first kind can be started in shallow pots, or, as in this case of the Dypsis onilahensis seedlings in the top picture, a plastic clamshell container filled with about an inch of damp perlite. They germinated very well over the winter, kept indoors under lights, with nothing more than the occasional spritzing of water to keep humidity up in the closed container. They were in there for months, and finally got moved to a pot today.

The second kind are trickier; they must have a sufficiently deep container to successfully germinate, because if the radicle hits the bottom too soon, it will twist and cease to develop. For the second species here, Sabinaria magnifica, I started the two seeds I had in damp sphagnum, and,then when germination had just begun, transferred them into separate 10 inch tall cymbidium pots, about 2 inches under the surface. Months passed. In February, I dug one up and discovered it was rotten. The other, however, had an eophyll up, pale under the soil. Unfortunately, I broke off the seed in the process, but it was evidently developed enough to survive without it. It’s been growing steadily ever since.