Poor Rafael

[Moose]

Poor Rafael - Firstly I planted this croton in too much sun. Next, although planted out of the reach of my royal palm, I thought ...

I came home about a month ago with 4 huge green 15+ Ft. heavy royal palm fronds laying on top of this croton. Extracation began imediately and I was ill as to what was found. Well it has made a bit of a comeback. It was looking real good before and will take about a year to get it back to where it was. This cultivar is not very fast in my opinion.

 

[Phil Stager]

Moose -
Royal palms and crotons under them - here's some more of what happens...

1. This was a 4 ft tall Eleanor Roosevelt last fall. That's about 3/4" diam of wood in the pic. At least this one broke off fairly cleanly so I got a load of cuttings to root.

2 & 3. A nice Sybil Griffin got nailed about two weeks ago. No clean break on this one but instead an 18" long tear along the trunk. *&^%$#@! Two more cuttings off this one.

Royals and crotons means you going to have a few unplanned broken branches and squashed plants.

 

[Phil Stager]

..and here's a pic of what was sold to me as Raphael. Leaves are about 6" long.

 

[Jeff Searle]

..and here's a pic of what was sold to me as Raphael. Leaves are about 6" long.

Yea, that's no Raphael. You got jipped on the colors.

Ron, sorry to see the damage, but it's to be expected if it's under a massive Royal palm. About 6 months ago, my one year old dog decided to chew a couple of crotons where he was laying right down to the ground. From 3-4', to about 6" in one afternoon. S**t happens....

 

[Crazy for Crotons]

If the last plant has some pink on the older leaves, it's Rubens.

 

[Phil Stager]

That's it! memory does not improve with aging... besides Raphael was Italian and Rubens was Dutch...

 

[Moose]

The royal was planted 16 years ago. The croton was planted away from the palm. In all the time the palm has been there, I have never picked up a frond from this area. We got some weird rain event where a cell hit this royal and sheared 4 green fronds off that were no where near to being ready to shead. The fronds unfortunately found their way on top of Poor Rafael.

Same event - Bismarckia frong hit my Diane and Red Eburnum. Diane is so fast and the damage was minor. Red Eburnum got wacked pretty good especially on the airlayer I had going. At least these cultivars will recover faster than the Rafael.

 

[Moose]

Rafael is looking much better...

 

[ScotTi]

Ron, The Royal can be hard on anything planted in its strike zone. I plant nothing important near my Royal.

 

[Phil Stager]

...and here's another reaon why Royal Palm fronds and crotons do not mix. Disaster averted by about 6 inches. Otherwise the Three Toes, ens Beauty, and others would be sticks - and then consigned to the bag house to get rooted alongwith some other casualties.

 

[Crazy for Crotons]

Phil, that Three Toes is too new to be flattened yet LOL.

 

[Moose]

I moved Poor Rafael out of the falling Royal Palm strike zone. At least so I thought. This past summer it got nailed in its new location. Never seen a fronds land this far out, must have been some pretty heavy wind. Poor Rafael can't catch a break.

It took until now for his recovery to be well under way.

 

[Moose]

oh - found another photo from about a week ago