[renielarson]

Originally Posted by Ron's Landscaping Inc.

It's possible it could be "Ganoderma" but usually you will see a conk on the side of the trunk where it is rotting if it's that. A conk looks kind of like a mushroom growing on the side of the trunk where it is rutting. It starts out just white, and as it matures it will have a reddish brown color on top and white under the surface.

I have seen Queen Palms rotting from the inside out the last 2 years. What I have seen is from the hard freeze we had in 2010, it takes 1 to 2 years for it to show up depending on the temp during the freeze. The temperature was at 17 degrees for a few hours the one night and we were close to loosing all the Queens in The Villages. I have seen it happen several times, where you didn't see a Queen Palm alive until you got south of Tampa.

I made a post on this months ago, a Queen Palm retains a lot of water in its trunk and when we have a hard freeze below 20 degrees it actually freezes the water inside the trunk, this kills the tissue inside the trunk and it starts to rot from the inside out, and it will not show up for some time.

Also if your irrigation happens to run during the freeze, and you happen to have an irrigation head hitting the trunk, you just created even more of a problem by icing up the trunk. I tell all our customers when I talk to them about a landscaping job what plants and trees will work in this area.

If you look around when you are driving here in The Villages, you will never see a Queen Palm planted anywhere on their property. In the 30 years I have been in this business I have seen it happen 3 times. Some people just like the looks of a Queen so much, they will roll the dice and plant them anyway even though I have told them what might happen. To each their own, it's their money and their home, all I can do is guide them.

How do Pindo Palms do here? We have a large one in our front yard so am wondering.