PUSHING THE BORDERS

I already posted a number of photos of my recent trip to to Florida on GOTE. My wife and I visited Disney World and also stayed at a friend’s house near Cape Canaveral. I personally would not have visited the parks by myself, but I knew there would be interesting plants to be seen there for sure. I was pleasantly surprised at actually enjoying the experience, and of course all the plants.

I was particularly interested to see what cycads were there. One species we saw fairly often was the Mexican Dioon spinulosum. These were all over the place in Animal Kingdom park, especially around the Dinoland section, but we also saw fruiting plants in Magic Kingdom in Tomorrowland. I mention all this in case you happen to visit there one day.

A mature specimen in Dinoland:



And a fruiting plant in Tomorrowland:



This plant is cold hardy down to just around freezing, but not much below, particularly during sustained cold periods. Of course Florida doesn't ever stay cold for very long (at most for a couple days), but Orlando occasionally experiences severe frost. My guess is these plants have not had to endure any serious frost for at least the last two decades, so they are thriving. In the 1980s Florida was hit with severe cold events, sending temperatures into the high teens F (below -7 C), and my guess is these guys would either have been set back badly by such temps, or even killed outright. In Japan I grow this plant in a pot, and any night it is forecast to go below freezing, I take them in. Otherwise they endure the relatively cold, wet conditions of southern Japan.

Other than my own,UC Berkeley is the only other spot where I've spotted one. Mine I have to keep in a pot as gophers go right for it. Before then it had been in ground and fast growing for a cycad. Nice with new blue green new leaves that then turn green as they age.
Dioon spinulosum. :)

Stan510 wrote: ↑Mon Mar 04, 2024 4:31 pm Other than my own,UC Berkeley is the only other spot where I've spotted one. Mine I have to keep in a pot as gophers go right for it. Before then it had been in ground and fast growing for a cycad. Nice with new blue green new leaves that then turn green as they age.

Yes, I've found them to be fairly fast growers, too. They are not quite hardy to Kyushu, needing an essentially frost free situation. That said, for a tropical cycad they are quite cold tolerant if you live in an otherwise warm climate like Florida. They are uncommon there as a garden subject, at least the places I've traveled. Before the Asian scale invaded, Cycas revoluta and C. circinalis (rumphii?) were hands down the most planted of the large growing cycads.

Stan510 wrote: ↑Mon Mar 04, 2024 4:31 pmDioon spinulosum. :)

Indeed. I really need to "truth" names before I just type them out and send them off. Hard to remember all those Latin suffixes... osa, osum, icum, ica... hell, most mornings I don't quite remember my own name straight off the bat :lol:

Never all that common in San Francisco Bay Area gardens, but they do seem to handle a few degrees of infrequent frost here without lasting harm. I don’t have one in my own garden, because my summers are a bit too cool to get Dioons to flush regularly, so I stick to Ceratozamia mexicana and Lepidozamia peroffskyana. The Dioon edule I also have seems to be in stasis by comparison.

David F wrote: ↑Tue Mar 05, 2024 2:41 pm Never all that common in San Francisco Bay Area gardens, but they do seem to handle a few degrees of infrequent frost here without lasting harm. I don’t have one in my own garden, because my summers are a bit too cool to get Dioons to flush regularly, so I stick to Ceratozamia mexicana and Lepidozamia peroffskyana. The Dioon edule I also have seems to be in stasis by comparison.

David, I can imagine that it is fairly slow in cool climates. As for D. edule, I've seen several grown in Florida, as well as plants I've grown here (under much cooler conditions overall), and it certainly is a slow plant even in warm climates. The exception would be the variety "Palma Sola", which grows considerably faster than any of the other forms, in particular the subspecies angustifolium. I knew of a Florida grown specimen of D. edule ssp. angustifolium that didn't flush for many years in a row, even with all that heat. Ceratozamia robusta often flushes late in the fall here, and continues growing even until the first frosts arrive. No other cycad does that in my experience. Lepidozamia peroffskyana flushes regularly once a year, usually around June-July. Bottom line, cycads like warmth, and only a few can tolerate cold conditions.

It's a very elegant plant.