Nice thread, great idea for a set of photos.
And I'm learning so much about trees and stuff here!

Can/Do Palm Trees grow in the Okanagan Valley??

yeah great idea for a thread for sure and well done.

i'm kind of ambivalent about it being they were brought in by real estate developers. but then again its not like buildngs are native to an area either lol!

not a great picture from earlier this summer, but the someone told me the palms they were putting in here at the redeveloped berkeley-carteret in asbury park, nj were $3K a pop!!!

http://i945.photobucket.com/albums/a...5/P1230108.jpg

Well, I would think that since the southern Okanagan is actually milder than southern Ontario throughout the winter (a few locations average highs stay above freezing even in January), and since a few forum members have said that there are a few palms planted in southern Ontario (which I would love to see pics of), it would definitely be possible. But, just like in other locations that are at the extreme fringe of such palm's viability, such as in southern eastern Canada and the northern east coast of the USA, they would likely have to be very well taken care of, and likely planted near the sides of buildings and / or warm air vents or in very sunny southern exposed slopes, and would probably need to be wrapped in the winter or at least heavily mulched. I have seen palms in Kelowna (in the central Okanagan) during the summer but they are in huge hidden planters and are taken to areas of shelter in the winter (I wonder if some of the palms seen in Eastern Canada are also cared for in the same way, and not truly planted outside year round, especially those not near large buildings / vents for radiated heat)

As one would guess, with the mildest climate in Canada, the south coast of BC is the easiest place to plant and grow such permanent exotics (with the widest variety, least intensive care and best results as well).

So I would not be surprised if some palms do start popping up in the Okanagan over the next few years, but again, I doubt they will be as lush and open as those in Vancouver / Victoria.

Again, while it may be possible to plant palms in other areas of Canada, such as the Okanagan and souther Ontario, only along the south coast of BC can you achieve such lush exotic gardens as this away from any shelter or building. All these trees are in the wide open in the middle of a square.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4130/...ccf6a2ce_b.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4081/...9c2bb001_b.jpg


And some are now getting really tall, such as this one:

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4104/...e67174ec_b.jpg


Also, only along the south coast of BC will the windmill palm's reproductive organs survive in Canada, since they die at a warmer temperatures than the tree itself. I have pictures of their seeds (they look like grapes) on the first page.

The best location for growing palms / exotics in all of Canada is in Victoria, and apparently in Oak Bay (a part of Victoria that is heavily into gardens and street scapes) there are over 3 000 palm trees. I have seen some pics and they are more varied than in Vancouver and have grown even larger and more lush. My goal is to take the ferry over sometime in the near future and spend the day photographing palms and other gardening plants in Oak Bay.


Also to mrnyc, 3K a tree! Holy shit! haha!

PS - Thanks for the feed back everyone!

I'm really impressed... thanks for sharing...

There are some palm trees around the casino in Windsor, along a median, and along the river, across from Detroit (or at least there were a couple years ago)...but they really seem out of place in Ontario. They just don't match the landscape or the architecture. They look better in BC.

I remember seeing a picture of the palm trees in Ontario. They were planted inthe sand in front of a bar at a beach community. The palm trees were more tropical than those in British Columbia. Because of this, they can't stand the cooler weather in Fall and obviously the snow in Winter and die, and then the bar plants new ones every Summer. (A couple places in Dewey Beach, Delaware, also do this, and also have to plant new ones every year.) Since the palm trees die and are replaced, I don't think that it can be said that there are palm trees in Ontario; they are more a temporary decoration than a planting (and likewise, these tropical palms can't be considered in Delaware either).

I've wondered a couple times if hearty palm trees would grow in the grape-growing areas in Ontario, such as in Grimsby and Niagara-On-The-Lake. Grapes can grow there because of the "milder weather/Winters", so what else would work there that wouldn't work in other Canadian areas or even in the northern US?

i think in the Okanagan they would plant them in containers and move em indoors for winter it can get to -30 some winters and it would kill em

but they do grow grapes there and thrive - grapes don't do as well in vancouver, a lot of fruit doesn't grow here but grows elsewhere in BC

:previous: Possibly fig trees, but again in the grape growing regions of Canada, such as southern Ontario and the Okanagan, they would have to be some what protected in the winter.

On the coast of BC we have fig trees in my yard and they require no protection in the winter.

The Okanagan and other southern interior valleys of BC and southern Ontario ( and the Montreal region) have the warmest summers in Canada by far, hence they are good for growing grapes, but the mildest climate in Canada year round is the south coast of BC (just like comparing Oregon to new York State).

While the winters in southern Ontario and the southern interior valleys of BC are indeed mild on Canadian standards, and are even milder than some major areas of the central and eastern USA, planting palms would still require intensive care in the winter, simply because the temperature still dips below -20 some what regularly (some winters they don't, but usually they do at least a few times in the winter year), and of course there is still the odd harsh winter where I think temps would become to lethal (about once every 10 years or so temps can dip near -30) and of course temps between -10 to -15 are very common in winter. Therefore any palm growing would indeed be very stressed during the winter without intensive care, especially given the duration of freezing temperatures.

Average winter temps along the south coast of BC are all above freezing, again, they are identical to those of Seattle. Victoria is actually the mildest of the three cities (Van, Seattle and Vic) in the area during the winter. Hence the southern BC coast of Canada is the one true place of year round gardening and where one can plant a windmill palm, forget about it and it will survive fine.

they can grow plums and peaches and cherries and apples up in the okanagan - which can be planted here but they just don't do as well - not on an orchard level anyway

I only saw last year that we grow Hazelnuts in the fraser valley - the only nut crop in BC apparently

Also in the Thompson valley they grow watermelons, which is pretty cool. They are in the super markets right now.

But yeah, i want to go to Oak Bay soon in Victoria and take pictures of al their palms, where apparently the largest and nicest ones in Canada are.

I also don't like the idea of palm trees in Canada.

Now, you guys can resume going apeshit again.

I don't see what the big deal is. If you don't like the idea, don't plant one. If you're not even from Canada, then why the heck does it matter to you? It's not like their planting them in Edmonton or Quebec City. That would be a little off.

As a bit of a palm tree enthusiast, I love this thread.
My brother and I were talking just a couple days ago about where we wanted to take our big summer vacation next year, and Vancouver is our early front-runner.

This is a cool thread, thanks for sharing it with us! There are different hardiness zones, and anyone can looks up a USDA hardiness map, thatpalms will grow in. Vancouver is in zone 8 which constitutes for pretty mild winters. St. George, Utah is also in zone 8 and there are pleny of fan palms there. One strange place that I've seen palms, is in my town, Salt Lake City. I have seen a few here, mostly windmill palms of course, but people have tried fan palms. Usually temps during an SLC winter don't get terribly cold, but they can drop to 0 degrees. That is why I prefer Joshua Trees and different kinds of cacti for Salt Lake. I guess thats aside the point! Awesome pics of Vancouver. I hope to visit a good friend of mine soon who lives there and I can see it all for myself!

:previous: Thanks for the feedback guys! I hope you and DruidCity make it to Vancouver in the near future (Best 2 months are July and August to come, but June and September are usually nice as well, and sometimes May and October). You can always ask myself or other Vancouver forum members for travel tips ;)

Anyways, I have some detailed hardness zone maps in my house and the eastern half of metro-Vancouver is in zone 8a, while the areas closer to the water are in the slightly milder winter zone of 8b. Most of the Gulf Islands, the Victoria area and parts of the western edge of Vancouver Island are actually in zone 9, which is an amazingly mild zone for Canada.

Thanks. Whether my brother and I make the trip depends on whether he gets an engineering research paper published at a conference the end of June.
We're extremely interested in the possibility, though.

I remember seeing some great palm photos from a garden on Salt Spring Island.

I noticed that when I passed through on my July visit to Zion National Park and the Grand Canyon.

here's some pics i took of palm trees in Tofino (Vancouver Island). i love palms :D
great pics Metro-One!

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4015/...86023091_z.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4029/...fca327fc_z.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4067/...24d6bce4_z.jpg

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2743/...5bd02aae_z.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3374/...807bbea9_z.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4068/...aa8b8ab7_z.jpg

and here's two from downtown vancouver
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4034/...21f5d0ed_z.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4015/...2a7bb99a_z.jpg
all photos by me

Thanks Delirium and nice pics yourself!

The palms fit perfectly at the surf board rental store.

A little trivia, many of the the surfing scenes in Point Break were filmed in Tofino.

I still think the people who say palms don't fit in Canada don't know much about BC and its biogeoclimate zones. Many of them are not of the typical Canadian stereotype.

As I pointed out in my Wild Wild West picture thread BC is where they filmed all the Mexico scenes in the new A-Team Movie (Ashcroft and Kamloops). BC is also where they filmed all the opening Africa scenes from the 13th Warrior, hehe. Not to mention Vancouver and Victoria are commonly used as stand ins for San Francisco in countless movies and TV shows. This is because the south coast of BC and the southern interior of BC have many biological and climatic similarities to that of central and northern California.

Anywhere that is in zone 8 or 9 in the world has palm trees planted (Central Japan, Northern and Central France, such as Paris, Southern England, Central Italy, Istanbul, etc...), so why is it wrong for Canada to do the same in our only areas that reach zone 8 to 9 hardiness? Again, it all comes down to pre conceived ideas of Canada. Southern Ontario also breaks many of the stereotypical images of Canada, as do other regions.

I have never seen a significant palm overwintering even in the mildest parts of Ontario despite the fact that I have friends who are into this sort of thing. I have seen attempts to grow very small palms (measured in inches and not feet) in very sheltered locations and although some have survived, I have yet to see one thrive. As I have said, the shrubby needle and sabal palms are better candidates for Ontario. The Chinese Fan Palm is considered hardy to brief exposures of 0F, so that eliminates all of Ontario for long-term survival. I have no doubt that a few people are trying Chinese Fan Palms in Ontario but it is unlikely that they will survive very long.

I know of a location where palms are planted on a Lake Erie beach in Ontario in front of beachside restaurant. Who knows, I could have been there when those pictures were taken and later posted on the Internet. I asked the restaurant owner about the palms and they are stored in large greenhouses each winter. They were certainly less hardy palms.

On the other hand, the hardy bananas that I mentioned can thrive and grow to significant sizes in Ontario if planted in the right location and with good fertilization. A ten foot banana tree is certainly possible in Ontario with huge leaves. I have a couple in my yard but I have poor soil so they have not grown to the size I was hoping for, at least not yet.