Considered by many palm experts as the hardiest of all the palm species, this suckering, branching fan palm is native to forbidden environments such as Iran, Iraq, Arabia, Afghanistan and Pakistan. As adult plants, these are very drought, wind, heat and cold tolerant, able to deal with cold temps into the teens (F) but also thrive in humid climates with high rainfalls (eg. Miami). As very young palms they are a lot more fastidious and tend to dampen off if not coddled a bit (at least here in California). They don't particularly like growing as seedlings in heavy, sloggy clay soils, or excessively dry soils, nor to they like being moved about/transplanted much. Their cold hardiness does not seem to be nearly as pronounced as small seedlings, though heat tolerance and full sun tolerance is still excellent. This plant grows easily in Florida, Thailand, inland deserts of California as well as its coastal regions.
These palms vary from a moderately flat, deep green to a nearly sky blue. Some forms have very stiff leaves while others have droopy leaflets. With age, most plants develop a cottony, rust colored layer of fiber near the base of the newer leaves, adding to its ornamental appeal. It is a branching species, but also a monocarpic-like ones, so as each branch flowers, that branch dies, leaving the rest of the plant untouched. Though it is written that palms can grow up to 18' tall, with extreme age, trunks become recumbent and some can grow nearly to 30' in length and 2 feet in diameter. There is a remarkable specimen in the Otro Botanico in Italy that is immense and takes up 40' or more in all directions with several long, huge meandering trunks and dozens of suckering younger, upright trunks. The leaves themselves have a thin waxy coating which may have something to do with their hardiness.
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