PlantFiles: Pindo Palm, Wine Palm, Jelly Palm
Butia capitata

Pindo palm grows well throughout Las Vegas and can be found from residential landscapes down through the "Strip."
Grows much better than a queen palm with fewer problems for desert gardening. One of the few pinnate (feather) type fronds hardy in Las Vegas besides most types of phoenix date palm.

Pindos are one of the most popular palms here in Gulf Coast Alabama, since they handle our occasional light freezes very well with no damage to the fronds. Mine is planted in full sun and has a nice silver-green tint.

I had an old Jelly Palm in my front yard in Green Cove Springs, FL. I found the fruit to be very delicious despite being very smelly. It tastes like a combination of orange, pineapple and banana. It is very drought tolerant, and easy to care for. The only down side is that it retains its leaf bases for a LONG time, and they can become infested with carpenter ants. They don't appear to harm the tree, but having a nest close to your house is never good.

One other use this palm isn't given credit for is that it's a great container palm. Easy to grow in a manageable sized pot for decades,looking something like a big pineapple as it ages. A hardy potted palm too-immune to any amount of California cold.In sun the fronds are short,curved, and can be grey-to silvery.That very same palm can have lacy,green,glossy fronds in shade. And very forgiving of a missed watering or two,-or three-ha.

A great palm, but more variable than most: some are completely green and others are silvery; some are short and squat, while others are more slender with sharply recurved leaves. The fruit is very sweet and makes good jelly, but a healthy tree will produce about 100lbs. a year in my area. In sand, the seed will germinate like ryegrass.

Hello I love this palm! Your probably saying in Chicago yeah right! I have several palms in my yard Micro climate without protection is z7. With protection its zone 8. This palm has been in the ground working on year 2. Never had any cold damage what so ever, likes to be completely dry all winter. I do this with a simple clear plastic cover all winter to keep rain and wind and snow out.

What a beautiful Palm. I have 10 plants about 5- 7 feet tall. Very cold hardy. We got down to the high teens this winter in Northern California and there was NO sign of any damage. A very slooooow growing palm here but I love it.... The blue color on my really stand out..

Abundant and highly popular for landscapes in North Florida but it is outnumbered by the cabbage palmetto. They have lots of the orange fruit which people claim is edible. The leaves appear to have a bluish tint which makes the jelly palm stand out from other palms.

I was glad to see many plantings of the Jelly in southern Georgia and northern Florida. It seems to be very popular throughout the deep south. There are hundreds of markets throughout the south that sell the fruit of Butia capitata as fruits of jellies. It seems to be popular because it is the most cold hardy of pinnate leafed palms. It provides another palm tree for the south besides Sabal palmetto. I always enjoy seeing this beautiful specimen, which is very cold hardy!

This palm is also popular in the Southwest and Texas, as well as Florida, where it is commonly grown along avenues and in landscaping. It makes a unique specimen plant due to its blue-green leaves that are strongly recurving. Though it is not a fast palm, it is one of the fastest growing palms for Southern California. It is also an easy palm to dig and move, handling abuse quite well. This species is also commonly hybridized with several other species of palm, notably the Chilean Wine Palm (Jubaea chilensis) and the Queen palm (Syagrus romanzoffiana) creating very hardy and ornamental palms. It is one of the few species of palm that seems to grow equally well on the east coast as it does on the west coast... probably the hardiest of all the pinnate leaved (feather-leaved) palms.

This palm is very cold hardy and can handle temps in the mid to upper teens (14 F min. temp). The seeds are yellow to brownish red in color. The fruit has a sweet tart flavor and can be used to make jelly hince the name jelly palm. The seed can also be used to make an imitation of coffee. I am attempting to germinate seed now with pete moss and vermiculite. They are very popular on the central west coast of Florida where I like. USDA zone 9a.