HOUSE & HOME/STYLE DESK

Palms That Wave Their Needles in Winter's Icy Teeth

By ANNE RAVER (NYT) 269 words

The hardy fan palm, Trachycarpus takil, is native to northern India and grows in the Himalayas, 8,000 feet up. ''It can survive to minus 5 degrees,'' said Dennis Schrader, who has one growing outside Landcraft Environments, the wholesale nursery he owns with Bill White in Mattituck, N.Y. It will grow to about 12 feet, with fanlike leaves up to three feet across.

David A. Francko explains how to push the limits in any zone in his new book, ''Palms Won't Grow Here and Other Myths: Warm-Climate Plants for Cooler Areas'' (Timber Press, $28). A botanist at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, he grows dwarf palmettos, needle palms, cabbage palms and Chinese windmill palms in temperatures that can hover just above zero. He plants them in south-facing protected areas and mulches them with leaves. He also piles leaves on their canopies to direct icy precipitation away from the crowns.

For more on how to grow palms in cool climates, the Pacific Northwest Palm and Exotic Plant Society, a chapter of the International Palm Society, publishes a quarterly journal, Hardy Palm International; (604) 271-9524, or www.palms.org
/pacific. ANNE RAVER