My female has dropped fruit twice and still going strong, and mine is only 2' across. Since there's huge specimens which must be way older than mine, there must be life after seed. Mine are about 4 or 5 years old. Give us more info about your soil, watering, etc. Perhaps when they're roots are getting into your native soil much, they die for some reason.

Gary

Coonties don't die after they produce seeds. I've had the same thing happen to a couple smaller coonties that I bought at a chain store. In both cases the tap root had rotted away. Large plants I bought from a private nursery faired much better and are now florishing. It may be that the plants from the chain stores are just not as healthy as the ones you get from private nurseries.

Kara

Hmm...I have never heard of Coontie Sudden Death Syndrome (CSDS for short).

Coonties, from my experience growing them and visiting many places that have them planted in TOUGH and demanding situations (i.e: Melbourne Beach on 192 and Sebastian Inlet) live for many many years.

Coonties do not require, essentially, any watering once they have been well-established. Do you water or irrigate? Is your soil well-draining or constantly wet? Have you taken any samples of your specimens to your nearby county extension Master Gardeners or nursery?

interesting. in all my outdoorsyness in fla, i have never seen a coontie in the wild. i'd started to doubt their 'native' status, but now cycadjungle has put that doubt to rest...

where do you find em in the wild?

I am not into telling people in public forums any exact location of any cycad species in the wild. If you were to e-mail me and tell me where you live, I could probably tell you the closest plants that I know of in your particular area. If you are on the east coast, most of them have been wiped out. In fact,New River in Ft. Lauderdale was known by the Seminoles as "coontie hatchee" because the whole area was covered in coontie. Even 20 years ago when I moved up here from Hollywood, you could barely find any single plants. There are more areas on the west coast though that haven't been wiped out. (I see you are 9a) For general maps on east coast and west coast distribution and a little more info, I wrote an article about 10 years ago on some of the different types of coonties. This should be interesting reading for any native Florida person.(I am included, you couldn't get me to live anywhere else)
http://cycadjungle.8m.com/cycadjungle/The%20Coontie%20of%20Florida.html

So maybe my coonties aren't really dead, they just dropped all of their leaves. I'll wait for spring for any new growth. They are planted in full sun and in a well-drained location.

They might be just fine. The way to tell now would be to dig down with your hands and see if the main stem, (or caudex)is hard or if it is mushy or rotted totally. If the stem is firm it is just fine. You would want to fertilize it with a decent fertilizer early March and you should get a good flush within the month.

I noticed that the coontie population at Fairchild Garden in Miami appears to be in serious decline as well. Where there were many, now there are few. No sign of the Atala Hairstreak butterfly. These plants were well established last year and looked good all year; now they look very bad. You might consider contacting Fairchild. They have cycad experts who may have ideas. I have lost half of my coontie plantings in Miami Beach in the same way. Perhaps conditions in the first two years are key to the survival of a newly planted specimen.

Sudden Death is ridiculous. A frost last year wiped out all vegetation on 100,000 Plants and they came back in spring 99.9%
Some folks water and bring on root rot.
Don't forget we are dealing with a Conifer, not a palm.
Zamia Floridana/Pumia is a fantastic and hardy plant.
I know, I look out at millions every single day!

King

Exactly same story here: Sudden Death within weeks. Bought mine at LOWE'S (~$22). Kept in an original pot for a couple weeks, did fine, then planted in the ground in spring. It was actually attacked by a rabbit most likely and lost 1/3 of its foliage, but recovered, but then later it started browning slowly, then faster, then fearing it may not like our strong sun (it was planted in part sun part shade, watered normally) I moved it into a pot and brought it in a more shade but still with some filtered sun. It kept on browning all leaves browned and all stems browned and dried. I'm not sure if its dead. At LOWE'S there were some with the round "root/body" (?) under soil level and some above soil level and others half way above/under. No one knew which way is the correct way. Mine was 1/2 under half above. Same as Wollemia Nobilis (two plants died no matter what I did) its a finicky plant and I prefer plants that are easy to handle and grow well. I would not remove it from the wild, but I would not buy another one either. Its being sold in Zone 7B to 8A as "hardy" and I am in a zone 8A or 8B or in between and it dies without even going through a winter, probably I got a sick plant from LOWE'S.
I like to buy from big stores, because the nurseries will not hold on to their one year warranty at all. An example is that now I have a dead Washingtonia Robusta and a majour nursery in Lexington, SC will not respect their one year warranty (that ends in a few days) and will not replace the dead one with a good one. What can I say after I spent over $5000 with them? They have a majour problem keeping their promises out here. I suppose Coontie "palm" should be handled by professionals only.

what is the most native if possible to buy? I would like to grow some but it seems that the ones to buy are from south America. Thanks

I have native coonties all over my property. I have never watered or fertilized them. I mow over them and they come right back. They are even in the median in DeLeon Springs and they get mowed down every year. The tops do freeze but come right back. They are about the most hardy plants I know of. The stores must be selling bad plants that aren't for Florida. They like to be dry and love our sandy soil. Also they don't care if it's sunny or shady. You can't ask for a better plant.

One of the main reasons why it's hard to find coonties growing in the wild is because they have been badly commercially exploited meaning irresponsible people have gone out and dug them up from the wild in order to sell them. I imagine that this is why cycadjungle will not list where he's seen them growing. Another problem is that developers will come in and completely clear property of all native vegitation whether or not it is a plant that is threatened or endangered. I believe that the native coontie is on the threatened list. The only places I've seen coonties growing wild is in areas that are difficult to access or are kept behind locked gates.

One of the coontie clumps I have growing on my property came from a private home owners property that I had gone to to pick up a load of rocks from. While I was moving the rocks I noticed a large coontie growing out from under the pile. When I mentioned it to the property owner he told me that I could take it otherwise he would just throw it away. The plants are now growing quite happily in my back yard under the edge of a large oak.

In order to increase your chances of getting a true native coontie I would suggest going to a native plant nursery to buy coonties if there is such a nursery near you. Since I have yet to find a native plant nursery in my area I can tell you that I've bought coonties from walmart that are currently thriving in my garden.

I know exactly what killed mine after growing it for more than two years. It is about 50, yes 50 Atala butterfly caterpillars. I saw it just this morning, from a distance it looked like the plant was turning brown and dying when it was so lush and green last week. I did not inspect everyday however and to my pleasant surprise today I did....they are eating it to death. Oh well, after all that's why I planted it, for the butterflies which were almost extinct. I would imagine many of you inspected it and found no caterpillars? But in case you didn't perhaps they came and ate it up and left before you noticed? I will have to go out now and buy some more :)

Interesting - I didn't know about coonties and the atala butterfly. I found an article about them on the University of Florida website (linked below). It says:

...the atala larvae inflict only minimal and temporary damage to the coontie plant. The plants will quickly recover.

From the article, it doesn't sound like atala kill coonties under normal conditions. I hope yours recovers.

Carol in Jacksonville

Here is a link that might be useful: UF IFAS - Florida Coonties and Atala Butterflies

Not sure you would call it "in the wild", but some of the older houses/gardens in deland have huge amounts of it. Some of it has to be from the 20's, or so, as is the house is that old and the clumps are massive. Noticed the main problem at the big box stores is scale........

I've been in Florida since 1981 & have always loved the beautiful lush Coontie plants but never knew the name of the plant or had much of a green thumb. I was a working single mom & when the plants died I'd just go buy new ones. Since I've retired & live on a lake in Volusia county I've taken the time to cultivate the native plants. Well, today I drove to the local convenience store and for the first time I saw the beautiful coonties growing along the side of the building. I did a little investigating & found that there were hundreds of beautiful orange seed pods all over the ground so I immediately ask the manager if he minded if I gathered them up and took them home. Needless to say I filled 4 shoe boxes with these babies. Now I will clean, dry & germinate them & in a few years I'll have so many I'll feel like I'm living in a botanical garden. I'm so happy!!!

Lin

Good going lluck. I love these things, and I also admire the "cardboard palm". although if I'm not mistaken, the latter plant does not support the butterflies. Still a great looker and likely there is some organism or other that needs it too.

Lin,

You may have already discovered this website, but in case not, Plantsman56 is a world-renown expert on cycads and has written some fantastic articles, including coontie seed germination, on his website, The Cycad Jungle. It has a wealth of great information!

Carol in Jacksonville

Thank you Carol

You're welcome, Lin! Hope that now, one year later, some of your seeds germinated?

I have been growing Coonties for roughly 16 years. My oldest and largest clump is my original plant. It has never been moved and is fairly huge. Next to it I have (had) a Belinda's Dream and a white knock out rose bush, a few Penta's and some liriope. The rose bushes have always been highly admired by the neighborhood walkers and always full of blooms. About 2 months ago I noticed my roses were not putting out new buds. Fairly quickly they began to die back. Then the Pentas, Then I realized that side of the huge mound of Coonties was all brown as well. One of the rose bushes has died, and the huge Belinda's Dream is all but dead, all my Penta's are dead, and now I notice the liriope is actually dying back. That side of the Coontie is not returning, altho the other side has all it's beautiful new green leaves. I have now started noticing the tips of some of those new green leaves are turning brown and I'm so concerned I'm going to lose more of the clump if I don't figure out what is happening. I don't know of ANYthing that will kill that variety of plants, and in the way it has happened. I'm not even sure undiluted Roundup would do that to my roses, and I can't imagine anyone would want to kill something so many love. But I have no other ideas. Any ideas out there would be much appreciated!