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Quillaguna is town in the Atacama desert that has very similar seasonal temperatures to L.A (referring to 1-2 miles from the coast) except it doesn't have the cold winter rain that L.A can get some years (that can destroy the Coco Palms roots). It's also inland so it gets more sunshine than the coastal locations of the Atacama which Coco Palms love. I couldn't find all time record lows but I'm assuming that they are above freezing since the Atacama gets little standard deviation. Assuming that you can water them all you want (but no artificial heating), how do you think Coco Palms would do there?
the winter temps wouldn't be so much of a problem if the summers were warmer. there was a fairly decent sized coconut palm (20+ ft.) in St. Augustine for a long time, which has similar winter average temperatures. the coconut palm died but it wasn't because of average winter temperatures but because of frost due to an arctic cold front that brought nighttime temperatures down to the mid/upper 20's F, 20° below the average lows. it was actually a fairly healthy looking coconut palm until the very end, thanks to the hot and humid summers. if it wasn't for those cold snaps it would still be alive today.
I don't think the temperatures are so much of a problem (though summers could be warmer) but the almost total lack of rainfall & very low humidity would be a bigger problem, you could water one, but the very dry air would probably do it in or at the very least make it look a crispy mess...
Even the cited (in imperial units) rainfall average is too high - 0.05" is about 1mm, whereas a total of just 4 rainfall events over 50 years (including one of 4mm last year) has produced only about 8 mm all told, giving a 50-year mean of lest than 0.2mm.
yea i don't know of any plants that crave or require salt. there are salt tolerant and not salt tolerant...
don't coconut palms need humidity? is Quillagua close enough to the coast to sustain decent levels of humidity?
No.
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