Ponytail Palm – An Interesting Addition to Your Green Corner

If you are looking for an easy to grow and maintain cactus or succulent, for your home or garden, Ponytail Palm can be your ideal choice. Yes, this versatile plant can be an indoor plant as well as an outdoor plant or landscape plant. You may be surprised to read its name ‘palm’ but it’s because it looks like a palm but it is actually a succulent plant and is perfectly suitable to your cactus garden if you wish to expand your succulent collection. It belongs to the genus Beaucarnea or Nolina and is not a true palm. It’s native to Mexico, Guatemala and Belize. Its botanical name is Beaucarnea recurvata (or Nolina recurvata). It’s a popular plant grown in temperate or dry and warm climates of zones 9 and 10 as it’s low maintenance. You’ll enjoy growing this baby even as an outdoor plant because it can grow up to 30 feet tall, although in containers it grows much shorter. It has a globose caudex i.e. it has a flared, enlarged base, resembling an elephant’s foot. The width of the caudex can even reach up to 12 feet. The swollen trunk stores water and helps the plant survive droughts for prolonged periods. Although it has a single stem initially, it branches with age or after flowering. It also branches if cut or broken off when its diameter is less than 6” (15.2 cm).

Ponytail palm can be very long-lived and can easily outlive its owners. However, its big size and weight with age can be challenging to manage.

Why is it called so?

Beaucarnea recurvata is called a palm due to its single trunk that has leaves on its top. Other than ponytail palm, it’s also called Bottle Palm and Elephant’s Foot.

Is it easy to care for?

Ponytail palm is ideal for those who have very little time to care for their plants or who travel a lot. This plant will be happy even if watered every couple of weeks or left alone in the sun for several days.

Is it a good indoor plant?

Ponytail palm is one of the easiest of small indoor trees. When grown indoors in shallow pots it grows a tuft of strappy green leaves that emerges from a bulbous stem (due to which it is called elephant’s foot) seemingly erupting from the soil. But when given time and the right outdoor conditions, this plant can grow even up to 6 feet (1.82 m) or more in height. In short, it is ideal for both, indoor as well as outdoor planting.

Does Ponytail Palm Flower?

Yes, but only large ponytail palm trees flower and produce large upright branched panicles with numerous but small creamy-white to green or pinkish flowers that are extremely attractive to bees. Ponytail palms are dioecious i.e. only female plants produce seed. Sometimes small offsets may also develop on the caudex. If you wish to have a single-trunked plant, you can cut these offsets off flush from the trunk surface. Otherwise, you can leave them to grow into branches. However, they won’t root to produce new plants. Sometimes variegated forms are also seen.

After flowering female ponytail palm trees may bear fruit, but only if there are male flowering ponytail palm trees nearby. There are papery capsules on the ponytail palm flower spikes which contain tan seeds which resemble peppercorns in size and shape.

Once flowering and fruiting is complete, the flower spikes dry up and wither. Cut them off to maintain the beauty of the plant.

How to Grow and Care for?

Ponytail palm is an overall easy to grow and care for plant, but it’s a slow grower, so, you’ll have to be very patient during its growth. Here its care requirements.

Soil

If you plant ponytail palm outdoors, plant it in a sandy, well-draining but organically rich soil. While planting it indoors, plant it in a cactus-succulent potting mix. Add sharp sand and/or small gravel to the potting mix to improve drainage.

Light

Ponytail palm loves full sun or bright indirect light. While growing it indoors, ensure that you plant it in the brightest point in your home where it can get lots of direct sun or indirect light.

Water

When planted indoors, you can water ponytail palm every 7 to 14 days during its growing season. Its bulbous stem has a lot of stored water; so, be careful not to overwater. During the winter season, reduce watering to monthly.

For an outdoor ponytail palm in an area where it regularly rains, watering is hardly needed. However, if the area is dry, or during the periods of drought, watering every 2 weeks is adequate.

Temperature

Ponytail palm loves, dry, warm climate, preferably above 60-degree F (15.55-degree C). It can bear lower temperatures up to 50-degree F (10-degree C); however, lower temperatures should not be low for prolonged periods.

Fertilizers

You should feed your ponytail palm with liquid fertilizer during the growing season. You can even use a slow-release pellet fertilizer during the spring. Follow the instructions on the label carefully. Reduce feeding in the winter.

Pruning

You should trim off the tips of damaged leaves back to healthy tissue. If the pups (offsets) grow secondary shoots, prune them away to maintain a central trunk and tree-like classic look. However, a multi-stemmed tree is usually popular and several growers love these secondary shoots.

Potting and Repotting

While planting a ponytail palm indoors in a container, choose a small container filled with a cactus/succulent potting mix mixed with some peat. Repot as required in the spring. If you wish to grow a large palm tree, repot your plant every year with fresh potting mix, every time. But repot it every 2-3 years, if you wish to keep it smaller. Ponytail palm flourishes if you slightly underpot it in a container that limits its root growth.

Propagation

You can propagate a ponytail palm with seeds and offsets. However, propagation with offsets is a challenging task because of lack of roots on the offsets.

Once you notice offsets on the plant’s base, remove them and pot them individually. Once it develops roots cut it off from the plant with a clean knife and let it dry out for a day, but prevent rot. Use a rooting hormone to promote root growth on the pup. Then plant the pup in its own pot around 1/3 of the way down. Secure it with soil or rocks.

You can get high-quality ponytail palm seeds on UnusualSeeds.net. Sow seeds in spring with a minimum temperature of 20-degree C (68-deree F). They should germinate quickly without any special treatment.

Common Pests and Diseases

Common pests that infest ponytail palms, like any other houseplant, are scale, mealybugs and spider mites. You can use horticultural soaps and oils to control them naturally.

Diseases in ponytail palms are rare. Some potential ones are stem rots, bacterial leaf streak and leaf spots. The most common cause of stem rot and fungal diseases is overwatering, so, you should avoid it.

Conclusion

If you wish to newly grow a cactus or have an interesting addition to your cactus collection, ponytail palm can be a good choice. It’s attractive to look at and easy to grow and maintain and barely needs any attention. Its requirements are also quite low and it survives a variety of conditions. Most importantly it’s versatile enough to become your cute, tiny indoor plant or a big garden tree. If you love flowers, it can produce flowers too. All in all, you should try this plant as a beginner or as a new member of your green corner. If you do, don’t forget to share how your experience was in the comments below. Also, read other interesting and informative articles on this website about various cacti and succulent species.