Haha, I like the CA and Florida joke... I have been through this one for years and years. Both in the nursery environment and in the landscape design/installation. The way I see it, there are 2 real alternatives to Queen Palms: Phoenix Dactylifera and Mexican Fans. Dactylifera are very pricey to get some with any size but they are very reliable, elegant, and fit much better to the desert. Mexican Fans are a lot less expensive but will not stop growing ! They also don't have quite the canopy of Queens or Date palms. Queens are just a bit risk. Besides just the nutrients, excessive water usage, etc. they get a fungus which spread through neighborhoods and is a real pain to distinguish. Also, Queen Palms only have a healthy life expectancy of 15-25 years in most cases. If you are looking long term and want some nice shady palms, it may be worth investing in the Date Palms. Bismark Palms are great, we use them a lot, but they take a while to get the lazy/shady size and lack the greenery look that people are going for with the Queens . If you calculate the cost of a few Dactylifera over 10-20 years - and the QUeens. With all the water costs and fertilizers, and replacements, fungacides, etc etc. It makes a lot more sense here in the desert. Here is a link that might be useful: arizona landscaping blog

Welcome to AZ and to the forum. We sure hope you post often. It sounds like you've gotten the information you need from mangled--great information as usual. Despite swearing I'd never buy queen palms since they don't LOVE it here the way so many other palms do, I did purchase some awhile back and they've done well. Mine at only about 9 feet tall and they get ten gallons of water twice a week, plus palm fertilizer in early spring, late spring, and then mid-summer. That *should* help keep the yellow fronds away but you never know. They are not the easiest palm to keep happy here (the way Mexican and California/Desert and date and pygmy palms are) but they sure are lovely when happy. I would never recommend them to friends who like super low maintenance plants, but I do a lot of things I wouldn't recommend. :) Good luck and keep us posted! Take care, Grant

From what I understand, Queen palms in their native habitat are supposed to have very large palms, much larger then we are used to seeing. In native hab, they get 200 inches per year of water. One of my queens at my house, has outstandingly large palms, that palm gets allot of water because the sprinkler leaks in that location. I do not fix it, the tree looks great. :) Don't fix what really isn't THAT broken. :) Your palm that was replanted, might actually have become more vigorous as johnjsr said they were planted to deep. Falling over may have resolved some issues for that tree. Lastly, because of the damage done by the weed whacker, good chance those palms will not live long unless you mulch around them and keep the grass away from the trunk. This is how many palms become diseased is from weed whacker damage. Palms are not like other trees they do not repair themselves.

We've got three Queens behind our pool... No problems w/invasive roots, so far, after three years (that was one of the more MAJOR items on the "Wish List"/Criteria when selecting trees for the pool). The only problem we ran into - when building the pool, re-establishing the lawn, etc. was drainage... Unfortunately, there's a slope on the lawn - that runs towards the pool. We have drains built into the concrete, but we did have an area of "pooling" where one of the palms was s'posed to go. I'd bought three 8' Queens, and was all set to plant them (spring before last), but when I dug one of the holes, I found a MAJOR puddle! Ended up having to put in a french drain... Two years later... We've got the three Queens along the backside of our pool, and they're doing very well. But they're all living in somewhat "different" conditions. The one on the far left (over the french drain) is now the fullest. The one to the right of the pool is in a pretty "wet" zone, and is planted directly above some of the pool pipes. She's surviving, but not going nuts or anything. The one on the far right is probably doing the best (in terms of the 'grade' in the yard, this one's the highest-up - and also planted directly above pool pipes) - she has no "drainage issues" and is definitely thriving. Unfortunately, I don't have any recent pics posted - but I will add them to my website - possibly tomorrow (weather-permitting!) And if I do, I'll post the URL :-) Anyway, they're all within 3-4' of the pool and haven't caused any problems so far... HTH -Nancy