Pleasant PM

Nice today. In the high 70s. Squinty and I sat outside most of the afternoon and watched as a bunch of guys with a crane truck removed a Canary Island date palm from a neighbor's front lawn. It is a nice palm--one that will likely retail for $2,500 or so--and removing it was quite an operation. First they dug all around it by hand to remove the sod and first foot or so of soil. Then they used a mechanical shovel to root-prune it all around. Next, they lifted it out of the ground and held it aloft while they wrapped the root ball with something like heavy-duty saran wrap, then they laid the palm over at about a 30-degree to-the-ground angle while they chain-sawed off all but a few fronds around the crownshaft. Finally, they tied the crownshaft fronds together into a bundle and tied the bundle to a long 2-by-6 laid parallel to the palm's trunk to keep the crown from drooping, and loaded it onto a trailer with a padded cradle.
I don't know why the neighbor sold the palm. He's a snowbird and has been trying to sell his house for 2 years, whenever he and his wife are here, but without success. Maybe he's decided to sell the place one piece at a time. 

Island Jim
Southwest Florida
27.1 N, 82.4 W
Hardiness Zone 10
Heat Zone 10
Minimum 30 F [-1 C]
Maximum 100 F [38 C]

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off this list, send email to majordomo@hort.net with the
message text UNSUBSCRIBE GARDENCHAT
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index