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How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

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Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#51

Post by dylan604 »

importantbrian wrote: post #47
spc476 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hurricanes I can deal with (I live in South Florida). You get days of notice so you can prepare the property (and/or get out of the area). Tornados scare me more---they can just pop up and if you are lucky, you may get a few minutes warning. Perhaps it's just what you get used to growing up (never experienced an earthquake, and they scare me more than tornados).

I have lived in places where I've had to deal with both and it's the long notice involved with hurricanes that make them worse to me. Tornados are over and done with. There's no prep and the area they cover is small so you're unlikely to be directly effected by them. But with hurricanes there's so much prep to do, shortages to deal with, etc. and even if you don't take a direct hit there's often a ton of clean up and…

I love reading someone else's "comfort" with a tornado as meh that I have. However, we do know a lot about them, and can hear a warning, check out the location and then decide if we need to go hide or not. Simple info like if the danger zone is east of you, you're okay. If the danger zone is southwest-ish of you, then start paying closer attention. The fact that they can zoom in to the doppler images and see the circulation, provide the warning up to 15 mins in advance, see the debris to determine if it is on the ground or not, etc is absolutely fascinating and life saving abilities. Plus, they can extrapolate the path and tell people by street intersection that you're directly in the path. Hurricane predictions are like "well, we've told you for 3+ days to get the hell outta here in a wide swath of predicitions, but you didn't so...good luck!" There's no it's already passed us, so now we just hope to avoid the hail. Hurricanes pass, then you have the potential of bonus tornados, storm surge, and oh, the storm may just park directly on top of you and drop 40" of rain over the next couple of days.

Yeah, I'll take a good ol' spring thunderstorm any day.

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#52

Post by green-salt »

JustSomeNobody wrote: post #10

Because they bend. During a storm they'll just go with the wind. One of the sickest, saddest sounds during a storm is when a pine or oak snaps. Oaks especially will creak and moan during a storm. Right before the wet snap of it breaking it will sometimes moan/creak loud as if it knows it's fate.

I heard this after a ice storm then high winds. Creepy sound when it creaks all the way into the crack sound.

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#53

Post by stemlord »

importantbrian wrote: post #46
dylan604 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It's hard to convey the destructiveness of Andrew to folks who weren't there I grew up with tornados, and know first hand their destructive potential. However, hurricanes scare the shit out of me as not only do you get the destructive winds, it's the flooding on top of that pain that's just truly devastating.

I grew up in a place with tornados and now live in a place with hurricanes. I'll take tornados over hurricanes any day. Not because of any difference in destruction, but because of the massive difference in inconvenience. With tornados, you know there is a system moving through a day or two before. There's no real prep to do. Once the storm gets to you you hunker down for a few hours and assuming you don't get hit yo…

I absolutely hated hurricanes growing up as a child (aside from getting to miss school) but I once got to experience the eye and it was incredible. The calmness feels extra calm after days of storm.

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#54

Post by DelaneyM »

markdown wrote: post #50
DelaneyM wrote: post #26

We have a dense line of palm trees protecting our shoreline on our property (South Caribbean), and ours is the only house on a long coast which hasn't lost metres of land to oceans over the past decade. (Our neighbours have prioritised private beaches, I like my farmland.) It's easily visible on Google Maps satellite view, but I'm not sure I want to post a link to my house... Because they're all that's holding the pr…

Eventually even coconut trees don't help. I, along with extended family, own a large coconut plantation in Fiji with over 1km of beachfront. Wave erosion has been so bad that in some places it's gone past the first row of trees so that they're detached from the beach and stand alone out at sea at high tide.

Absolutely true. We have a reef about 200m offshore that's doing the heavy lifting blocking waves for us, though it's at risk to reef death (SCTLD - Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease).

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#55

Post by hansthehorse »

js2 wrote: post #21

A palm tree, speared by a piece of lumber during Hurricane Andrew: https://imgur.com/a/3f77mEa I was in Miami for Andrew. My dad owned a one-hour photo lab. After the storm, there were tons of insurance adjusters needing their photos developed. My dad and I got his lab open the day after Andrew and ran it on a portable generator for two weeks till the power came back. This was one of the photos we printed during that…

My sister lived across from the zoo and evacuated for Andrew. I went with her back the house after the storm and the neighborhood looked like a disorganized lumber yard. Nothing was standing.

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#56

Post by lijogdfljk »

DelaneyM wrote: post #43
thorncorona wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does that work when they send a letter telling you how to landscape your land?

In this case I laugh to myself and ask my lawyers to reply. It's a bit more nuanced than I make it sound ( https://www.ogierproperty.ky/publications/public-access-righ... ), but it's hard to make the argument that I've intentionally extended my property to block the beach when the original property lines are maintained and the trees doing the work are 20 years old. Due to erosion of artificial beaches and our access…

> I can't wait for their reaction when I get my chicken coop...

Those are my goals too :)

Hope yours goes well. I'm trying to buy land for privacy trees and small farm. Hopefully, one day..

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#57

Post by quickthrower2 »

spookthesunset wrote: post #31
irrational wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I grew up in south Florida where all the streets were lined with palm trees. I never heard of a person or car being hurt/damaged by falling palm leaves. It has probably happened, but must be exceedingly rare. Then again, I never saw downed leaves along the roads or any city trucks doing pick up, so now I wonder how and when they were picked up.

Any time I visit areas with palm trees there seems to be a small army of gardeners that maintain all but the “wild” palm trees. Also pretty sure there is a cottage industry of people who harvest the coconuts.

Coconuts? Most palms don't.

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#58

Post by js2 »

User23 wrote: post #44
dylan604 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It's hard to convey the destructiveness of Andrew to folks who weren't there I grew up with tornados, and know first hand their destructive potential. However, hurricanes scare the shit out of me as not only do you get the destructive winds, it's the flooding on top of that pain that's just truly devastating.

The surprise aspect of tornadoes can be dangerous too, especially at night. At least hurricanes are relatively predictable.

I live in NC now. Tornadoes in the summer are not uncommon. One of the first things I purchased was a weather alert radio we keep in our bedroom. I have all of the alerts disabled except for tornado warnings.

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#59

Post by c_o_n_v_e_x »

spc476 wrote: post #45
dylan604 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It's hard to convey the destructiveness of Andrew to folks who weren't there I grew up with tornados, and know first hand their destructive potential. However, hurricanes scare the shit out of me as not only do you get the destructive winds, it's the flooding on top of that pain that's just truly devastating.

Hurricanes I can deal with (I live in South Florida). You get days of notice so you can prepare the property (and/or get out of the area). Tornados scare me more---they can just pop up and if you are lucky, you may get a few minutes warning. Perhaps it's just what you get used to growing up (never experienced an earthquake, and they scare me more than tornados).

I grew up with both hurricanes and tornadoes. Tornadoes freak me out.. I remember watching The Wizard of Oz.. the tornado scene with the funnel in background really freaked me out as a kid. Also, read Night of the Twisters in the early 90's.

The one thing that freaks me out about hurricanes is the human element leading up to, during, and the days/weeks after the storm... all kinds of people come out of the woodwork and law enforcement usually has their hands full. I had a friend get a gun pulled on him for "buying too much gas" leading up to a storm. Issues with theft, roving bands of people, etc.

Re: How do palm trees survive hurricanes? (2017)

#60

Post by frupert52 »

quickthrower2 wrote: post #4
ethbr0 wrote: post #3

As someone who recently moved to a part of the US with native palms, a few discoveries that surprised me... 1) Large palms are tough . As in, serious-work-to-pole-saw-through tough. They may looks wispy in the wind, but all of those components (leaves, fruit pods, fruit stalks, leaf shealths) are beyond the strength of an average human to simply pull (tension) apart. 2) Once dried, palm parts are effectively made out…

Have a couple of palms near the back yard fence and yeah would not want that debris to hit me on the head. From 10m high could be a KO!

Those are quite tall palm trees you have there
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