It’s no secret, I love palm trees! My passion for all things palmy started at a very young age. In the 7th grade I bought my first Trachycarpus fortunei (windmill palm) off eBay, and in the 8th grade, I did an entire project on growing palm trees in New York City. It gave me the confidence to plant two palm trees outside in New York when I was in high school. It was an experiment on climate change, and an exciting opportunity to make my yard look a little more like the tropical climates I love to forecast in. It turns out, the experiment has been a success because, 12 years later, those same palms are thriving. Are you looking to grow palm trees in a cold climate? Hopefully this post will help! I’ll share how I selected this mild microclimate in my yard, the kind of protection these plants received, and the temperatures they’ve survived.

Why Windmill Palms?

When people ask what palm they should try to grow in cold climates, I always recommend Trachycarpus fortunei (Windmill Palms). It grows new fronds quickly, has a beautiful trunk, takes a long time to get very tall, is spineless, and can handle extreme cold and hot weather too. Trachycarpus fortunei are cold tolerant to 10F briefly without major damage. There’s no other palm that can handle that kind of cold and also provide a dense canopy of beautiful palm fronds overhead. Needle palms and Sabal minor are more cold tolerant by a few degrees, but stay short and more shrubby. Keep in mind, with any palm, duration of cold and wetness is so important to consider. Many palms die from winter rot in northern and wet climates if temperatures get close to their minimal tolerance. However, there are some palms coming back from 0F temperatures in Dallas after the disastrous freeze in 2021 because the duration of winter cold is short and the sun is strong in the south.

Some gardeners push palms beyond the plants’ typical climate of comfort by wrapping them. I’ve use frost cloths and Christmas lights, but in more extreme climates some palm enthusiasts build big boxes with insulation and light bulbs. This is all to keep the palm trees a few degrees warmer on nights that would otherwise be too cold. Trachycarpus fortunei are a easy to protect because of their manageable size. These palms also do fantastic in pots and can easily be rolled into the house, a garage, or even a warm crawl space during the wintertime.

An Aside: Growing palm trees is a sign of Climate Change

Climate change is making it easier to grow palm trees in climates like New York City. It may not come as a surprise. A warmer world means warmer temperatures, but arctic air still exists and will occasionally move in and wipe out a garden that is growing north of where it should be. However, it appears that the arctic outbreaks in New York City are not as strong as the past. Since 2000, 9 winters have been warm enough to grow Windmill Palms in New York City unprotected because temperatures stayed above 10°F. This is a recent warming trend not seen any other time in the past 150 years of record keeping in the city.

Central Park has reported 39 winters with sub-zero temperatures °F since 1871. That’s an average of 1 in every 4 years. However In the past 30 years, it’s only happened in 2 winters (1994 and 2016).

Interestingly, studies show New York City may be getting snowier because climate change is increasing the strength of Nor’easters. Six of the 10 biggest daily snowfalls in New York City’s Central Park have occurred since the year 2000. Snow itself is not a limiting factor for growing cold tolerant palm trees, but snow could give some New Yorker’s the perception that winters aren’t getting warmer. As contradictory as it sounds, more snow is likely a symptom of a warmer climate in New York’s case.

My experience with Windmill Palms

My two Trachycarpus fortunei (Windmill palms) have a pretty modest growth rate. When I planted them 12 years ago, their trunks were less than half a foot tall, and now their trunks are approaching 4 feet. They’ve had a few rough winters which I will detail in a picture collage below, but generally grow about 7-10 fronds each season so the damaged winter fronds are usually just a memory by the time autumn rolls around.

In March 2009 I selected the best microclimate I could find in my parents backyard (a sunny spot with a fence blocking the north wind) and started digging. I thought 4 feet apart would be enough distance for two trachycarpus, but if you’d like to keep the fronds from touching I recommend at least 6 feet apart or planting them at very different sizes so one is always taller than the other. They look great in groups, but for the pool area, I would have preferred to keep them a little farther apart so they both have some room to shine!

In December I wrap the fronds up with rope or garden twine and cover with C7 or C9 christmas lights. These lights get hot so use sparingly. LED christmas lights will not work because they don’t generate heat. When temperatures drop below 20F at night, I wrap my Trachycarpus with frost cloth, but I only turn the lights on if temperatures drop into the mid teens or colder. The lights go off as soon as temperatures begin to warm into the 20s. I don’t like to keep the lights on for long because it can pose a fire risk. Be careful if you use anything electric to heat your plants. Some northern gardeners have killed their outdoor palms from the heat!

Trachycarpus fortunei cannot survive in New York City long term without protection (at least not in its current climate). They will survive mild winters unprotected, sometimes with ease. In New York these palms are typically undamaged by winter if low temperatures stay above 15F. They can return from 10F in New York, but are very borderline with temperatures that drop below that. Every windmill palm I know of that was not protected in the New York area, died when temperatures dropped into the lower single digits in 2018.

Lowest Annual Winter Temperatures

There are more years where Trachycarpus fortunei can survive in the New York City metro than there are years where it cannot. However, it just takes one cold night to destroy a palm that has grown effortlessly for years. We see this time and time again with other cities across the country. Even in warm climates like Florida, every 10-30 years a hard freeze will kill tender tropical palms in much of the state (while native palm species remain entirely unharmed).

Swipe to see how the palms were damaged after the winter of 2019.

If there was a synonym for the month of March, it’d have something to do with see-saws and rollercoasters. Winter starts to lose its grip across the country, and at times it may seem spring has arrived for good, but freezing temperatures almost always make a comeback after these warm spells. Most spring blooming shrubs and trees can handle brief drops below freezing and sail through light freezes, but tender summer crops like tomatoes, squash, basil, and so many others will wilt and die at the first signs of frost. The magic number is 32F and a single degree could make the difference between life or death, regardless of how warm the weather was prior. With this blog post, I’ll share a few helpful ways to determine the frost and freeze risk for your home garden so you never have to deal with an unexpected spring frost again.

Average Last Freeze Dates aren’t always useful

It takes just one night below freezing to ruin an entire summer garden, and that’s why the average last freeze date is one of the most important things gardeners pay attention to. Contrary to belief, the average last freeze date is not considered the “safe date” for planting tender plants. The last freeze date is a 30 year average. Even in “normal” years (whatever that means!) the last freeze of the season can fall before or after the average date. The last freeze of winter will vary year after year, and forecast numbers are only accurate for a few days out. Fortunately, weather does follow a “pattern” and that can give an idea of the risk for a future freeze beyond the 7 day forecast.

Dry and warm weather patterns are one of the most risky in early spring for early plants. Long spells of dry weather comes with a lot of sunshine. This can give warm weather plants a great start to the growing season during the daytime, but calm winds and clear skies at night can drop temperatures very quickly. In this scenario garden temperatures may drop dangerously close to that devastating 32-degree Fahrenheit reading. March 2017 was my first spring in North Florida. We had 3 days reach 89F, but the coldest morning of the month was a bone chilling 25F. That temperature came 2 weeks after the average last freeze. The dry weather was the reason for the huge temperature swing – we saw less than an inch of rain for the whole month. Anyone who has spent time in Florida knows rain is the state’s specialty!

March is no calmer at my new home in Columbia, SC where temperatures have historically ranged from a balmy 94F to an unbelievable 4F. While record high temperatures are challenged much more frequently in this warmer world than record cold, anything is possible in spring. The average last freeze date is March 23rd, but 30% of years in Columbia experience at or below freezing temperatures in April. I started tomatoes and eggplant in late March last year because the weather pattern appeared mild into April (and it was!), but I knew there was still a risk.

I suggest never placing tender plants in their garden spots permanently until about 2 weeks after the average last freeze. This way gardeners can keep an eye on temperature trends before committing to planting cold sensitive crops in the ground. Typically the first week of April is a safe time to plant for summer in Columbia, but it’s important to keep the long term forecast in mind because freezing temperatures in mid-April are not unheard of.

What can you plant before the average last freeze?

Gandy’s Garden at WLTX is filled with so many greens this time of the year. It’s easy to start fast maturing greens like spinach, lettuce, arugula, radishes, turnips, and snow peas from seed now. These make fantastic potted plants. They’re beautiful, tasty, and hardy! Broccoli, Cauliflower, Kale, brussels sprouts, parsley, and cilantro can be planted nearly assoon as the ground thaws out. They easily survive 25F temperatures without damage, but will not grow until afternoon temperatures are regularly in the 50sF. Most of these plants overwintered for me here in South Carolina, but my mom in New York City just sent me a picture of her parsley that survived the entire winter outside in New York City. It was buried under 2 feet of snow at one point!

Spring in the southeast can quickly become too hot for cool loving greens. I consider March to be too late to plant broccoli, cauliflower, kale, brussels sprouts, parsley, and cilantro from seeds in South Carolina because there’s only about 8-10 weeks left before our temperatures regularly reach the 90sF. window. Once warm weather arrives in May, it will force these greens into bloom and they’ll lose their flavors. These longer lived cold loving greens can be started from seedlings in the southeast in March and reach full maturity before the blazing heat of summer arrives.