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wheelman1976

hardyjim wrote:I was not planning on covering anything this
year as I may be moving but I did cover some
stuff yesterday in 12F temps,we'll see if it was enough.

You planning on losing all of your palms?

wheelman1976

Great to see you got them covered in time. At some point do you think you will start to hurricane cut them(to a degree) to limit growth? That's certainly a thought... but at the rate mine go they only put up 5-8 fronds each year. I figure on my oldest and largest I can put another drum on the ...

wheelman1976

I see the views on the forum board, but boy has this place become a grave yard... Where is everyone who cars about growing palms outside of normal areas?

wheelman1976

Going on my second year of the drum protection method. These are the three I have left, I lost one that was not located by these which I think do well because they are by my pond which creates a micro-climate. I've got one 65 watt floodlight near the crown, fronds are wrapped in frost cloth and on ...

wheelman1976

Just a quick update, pulled everything out this past weekend. The three palms around my deck/pergola came out great but the one that is out by my shed lost all of it's fronds again (happened two years ago) Only thing I can figure is that it's out in the open with only the shed to it's northeast for ...

wheelman1976

Did you use some foam wrapping from a packaging store for some of those trees? what was under neath for heat?

wheelman1976

Just a quick update, pulled everything out this past weekend. The three palms around my deck/pergola came out great but the one that is out by my shed lost all of it's fronds again (happened two years ago) Only thing I can figure is that it's out in the open with only the shed to it's northeast for ...

wheelman1976

Have uncovered all of mine already BUT protection is close by as it's March and weather can change with little notice. Protection method I started using is super easy to put up and take down when we get a string of nice days. Not worried about providing heat now so all lights and cords have been ...

wheelman1976

I'll pull mine from my barrels sometime in April after I get back from vacation and I see lows in the lower 30s.

wheelman1976

Are you not using that little heater fan? I'm thinking I'll pick some of those up for next year. This past year I was using a couple spot lights and I'm noticing that my drums aren't warming up as much as I'd like. I think the crowns will be fine, and I may have some leaf burn but I've been looking ...

wheelman1976

The slits in the drums give a ton of ventilation. At the top I have the top slit horizontally half way around the top and it's only covered with a tarp. I guess the plus of the infrared is hopefully no blow outs, but I have the lights to know that things are working. I just can't figure with the ...

wheelman1976

Long story short. You've all seen my stacked barrels I am using for protection this year. Each barrel has a couple landscape stake lights inside, one in the ground facing up and one about three feet up near the crown and tied into a thermocube. All in I have 8 lights on one 20 amp circuit and that ...

wheelman1976

Photo from tonight. 3 of my drums I think need to have the thermocube moved closer to the lights. One is dialed in perfectly. The black vertical lines are the slits I cut up each barrel set to open up and wrap around the palms. Then there's 1/2 inch pipe insulation to help seal the opening once I ...

wheelman1976

Well it's all or nothing this winter. All four (lost my smallest one this past spring) of my palms are now "barreled up." I have two 150 watt heat lamps in each box, one near the crown and the other at the base facing up with the thermocube about 2 feet away from the lamp on the ground. So far this ...

wheelman1976

I just started enclosing mine here in Michigan tonight, I am using plastic barrels this year with flood lamp/heat lamps for heat. I have them still open and night pulled shut and lows are expected to be around 30's, but they're talking up to 5 inches of snow this weekend, so I'm at least getting ...

wheelman1976

I'm in west michigan and what has worked for me so far has been throwing a few bags of mulch around the base of my enclosures. Up until last winter I built wooden boxes roughly 3 foot x 4 foot. Last year I did one tree with 55 gallon drums stacked on top of eachother with bags of mulch around the ...

wheelman1976

This is what my other tree looked like last year. The trees that did this didn't put anything out this year. This may sound dumb, but I'm assuming they have to put something out in order for there to be pollination? The first tree pictured is the only one that put out inflorescence unfortunately. <a ...

wheelman1976

Finally the tree I had the longest decided to put out inflorescence. What it's putting out looks nothing like the inflorescence that my other two trees put out last spring. Is this one a male and the others (which had more stuff on them) female? <a href="http://s1204.photobucket.com/user ...

wheelman1976

Could try my stacked 55 gallon drum idea that I'll be using on mine next year.

wheelman1976

Next year I am looking at a 200watt heat lamp in a socket on a spike to stick in the ground and face upward in my barrel housings I'll be building. I've found I have no issues with freezing ground or the trunks getting damaged and it's all about keeping my foliage green and not letting those freeze ...

wheelman1976

No one thought of using a heat lamp in a socket on a stake in the ground pointing up?

wheelman1976

Barb, I got sick of unwrapping the lights that i had draped all around the tree and figured this was much easier. I think next year I will be looking at putting two heat lamps in two stakes in the ground facing up because I literally get about one year out of the c9 bulbs before they all blow. I'm ...

wheelman1976

Here's an update on things. I uncovered 3 of my 5 tonight. Let's just say the drums were 10x easier to remove and drag behind my shed for storage this summer vs the solid core doors! Also, I have to say that the palm covered with the drums (uninsulated by the way) is in better shape than the other ...

wheelman1976

Where are you located? Care to show pics of your winterizing method step by step on what you do? I'm in Oklahoma. I don't think I have a step by step photo essay, and I've already unwrapped everything except my musa basjoo. My trachies protection is pretty much what you described, I bundle the ...

wheelman1976

doesn't seem like a good idea to me. These barrels take up a lot of room, my intent will be to throw them out behind my shed during the summer time for storage. I have 5 6-8 foot tall palms that I have to box up each winter. If you want to monkey with batting, you might as well wrap the palm in ...

wheelman1976

How bout if you used the barrels, split down the middle, but glued fiberglass house insulation inside them? Like R13 or R19 fiberglass and 3M spray adhesive to hold it in place? Those cans of Great Stuff expanding foam would get expensive and the foam doesn't hold up to mechanical shock very well ...

wheelman1976

I will be taking down my barrel enclosure I used on a 6-7 foot windmill this past winter. It was not insulated so I will be curious to see how healthy the tree is. It was my oldest and healthiest trees so I figured that it was the best one to run the test. I had three barrels stacked on top of ...

wheelman1976

Not that anyone wants to take my advice, but I never open my boxes thru the winter. Being michigan we can get times of thawing for weeks at a time and I'm sure it gets quite warm in them, but I never open them up. What I do though is I build the boxes not very tight so that air can pass through. So ...

wheelman1976

Man! and I thought I went overboard on mine.... everything is so tidy you make my slapped together wood boxes look rickety....

I got so lazy this year I didn't even spread the lights out, they're all connected in their plastic shipping frame and just hung on a old boot that sticks out far enough....

wheelman1976

Doug, I'm guessing that the slab wood of the doors is a better insulator against cold than 1/4 inch thick plastic. Barb I don't disagree, but as my trees get taller I have to figure something out that will grow with them and building wooden boxes over 10 feet tall starts to get dangerous. I will ...

wheelman1976

So far it seems the lights are on more in the drum set up test than in the wooden boxes..... We'll see what damage I'm looking at when it gets really cold for the season. So far we things have warmed and they're talking like we will get an El nino winter which means warmer than normal.

wheelman1976

What temps does the heat tape thermostat turn on/off at? Does the tape warm up the air around the tree enough to trigger itself off or is the built in thermostat triggering off based on the temp of the tape itself? I guess I'm having a hard time figuring how much the the tape affects the enclosed ...

wheelman1976

Beny, So when you're dealing with a thermocube and heat tape, you're basically letting the thermocube only cycle on and off based on the air temps outside correct? The heat tape doesn't warm the inside enough to trigger the cube off does it? For me with my c-9 lights I have them cycling on and off ...

wheelman1976

Wheel, well, will do some good. You'll just get foliage damage where frond tips touch the outer surface. The palms themselves should be fine. So, how cold is it there now? Snow? expecting 2-5 inches thursday, heading into freezing as we speak. I had to build my boxes this past friday and monday ...

wheelman1976

avoid if possible any leaves to touch very cold enclosure. Beny's bang-on with that advice. Fronds cannot touch the cold surface at all. Barb So the frost cloth between the fronds and the drums won't do me a bit of good? If so.... darnit.... I have everything on and the upper portion covered with ...

wheelman1976

I am testing one of my oldest palms this winter with my 55 gallon plastic drum method. I covered the foliage with frost cloth, one layer, I'm thinking once I positioned the drums over the palm that some of the cloth will be touching the fabric, I'm wondering if I'll have issues with damage to the ...

wheelman1976

I have purposely kept things not air tight with my boxes and have had no issues with fungus. Obviously the barrels will be a bit more air tight, I just need to figure out how I want to work with them this winter.

wheelman1976

sashaeffer wrote:I think anything you can do to insulate, yet not trap moisture will be a good thing.

Those ideas seem to be in competition with each other.

wheelman1976

I would think you'd need to be warmer than that. I don't think majesty palms like any amount of cold, much less prolonged cold.

I'd guess 50 degrees would at least need to be maintained.

wheelman1976

I think this year I'm going to use the drums on the palm that lost all of it's fronds last season. It put out 6-8 fronds this summer, but it'll be much easier to inclose that than the fuller trees. I'm thinking Frost Cloth wrapped around the fronds 4-5 times, does this sound right? Then wrap a ...

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Got them enclosed just in time today.

Need some helpful advice

This tree male or female?