Some hyperlinks which might provide assistance:
www.floridata.com
www.seedman.com
www.seedman.com/coldhard.htm (cold hardy Palms & Bananas)
www.toptropicals.com
http://www.toptropicals.com/cgi-bin/...atalog/cat.cgi (cold hardy plants)
You'd be amazed how many "cold hardy" Palms there really are!
I don't know about the bug thing; I've lived in Florida before, specifically Key West and Miami, as far as I can tell there are bugs all over Florida 1rnfl I remember the first time I saw a Palmetto bug. I said, "Holy S _ _ _, that's the biggest Cock Roach I've ever seen!!!" and my host replied, "No dear that's a "Palmetto Bug", well as you might imagine my response was, "Well you can call it whatever you want to but it's still just a giant cock roach to me!"
Now about snakes :yikes: I can only say this; when I lived in the California desert I was all excited at seeing my first Oasis. My friends knowing of my "Snake phobia" quickly informed me that Oases are known for harboring snakes so from that point on I admired Oases from afar.
Reality; I obviously have lived around palms; my Mother-in-law has a tall, stately stand of Areca Palms along the fence between her property and the neighboring house and once a year we thin them and clean up all the dead palm fronds, etc. So far I've never seen a snake..... in the palms that is lol, but I do remember the lawn guy saying that he'd seen a snake wriggling away from the lawn mower and into the AC housing :yikes: in her back yard. I was hoping perhaps that the compressor fan might chop the thing up as it was identified it as a poisonous one :yikes: :yikes: :yikes: