Palm Tree Removal in Corpus Christi, TX

Palm tree removal is a different job from taking down an oak. A palm has no limbs to lower, but it has a heavy crown, a trunk that can be eighty feet tall, and, on a Canary Island date palm, sharp spines at the base of every frond. In Corpus Christi the most common reason we remove a palm is that it is dying, and the most common cause is lethal bronzing.

Lethal bronzing in Nueces County

Lethal bronzing is caused by a phytoplasma, a bacterium-like organism carried from palm to palm by the American palm cixiid, a small leafhopper-type insect. According to the Texas Department of Agriculture, many palms around Corpus Christi began to decline in 2001, the cause was identified in 2002, and the disease is now found in Nueces, Cameron, Hidalgo and Willacy counties and parts of Kleberg County. Canary Island date palms and other Phoenix palms are affected most often, and queen palms and cabbage palmettos can be infected too. AgriLife Extension calls it the only known phytoplasma disease of palms in Texas and a reportable, regulated condition.

The usual sequence is a mature palm suddenly dropping most of its fruit, then the oldest fronds turning reddish brown from the tips, then the central spear leaf dying. Roots decay until the trunk can sometimes be rocked. The palm generally dies within about a year. TDA's advice is to remove and destroy palms that test positive, so they stop serving as a source for neighboring trees, and to report confirmed cases. There is no cure for an infected palm.

Other reasons palms come out

Not every brown palm has lethal bronzing. Hard freezes damage queen palms and some others; Mexican fan palms tolerate about 18 degrees before they suffer. Very tall Mexican fan palms, which can reach about 80 feet, often outgrow their spot and lean over roofs or into service lines. Their dead fronds stay attached as a thick skirt that shelters rats, wasps and scorpions. Sometimes the right answer is removal; sometimes it is a thorough trim. We tell you which.