On Tue, 23 Dec 2003 20:26:57 GMT, (M. Tiefert)
wrote:

In article , wrote:

A couple of weeks ago I noticed that we now have two flower stalks
developing from the side of the old crown. Each one is surrounded by
new green fronds and seems to be the start of a new crown.

Is this normal? What happens next? Maybe we should have tried to
collect seeds from the old, dried flower stalk.

I don't know about flower stalks, but old pony tails (you mean
Beaucarnea recurvata, right?)

I think that's what we have. The flower stalks come up from the middle
of each crown. They're light green, about 2cm diameter with a broken
surface. They get to about a metre high, gradually turning a lighter
green/almost white as the broken surface splits open to reveal lots of
mini-stalks about 4cm long growing from a central stem. The ends of
the mini-stalks are covered in light green/white flowers. Hmmmm. One
of these days I'll get a digital camera.

can put up multiple 'heads'. There are
several growing outdoors in San Diego, California, that are almost a
meter across at the base and have 3-4 stalks with crowns of leaves.

Good-o. Ours is about 30cm across at the base. Looks like we're doing
the right thing - whatever that is. I wasn't quite sure because we're
about 2,000 Km south of Noosa (where this thing came from) and that
makes a difference in climate. They're steamy tropical (pineapples,
bananas and sugar cane) whereas we're dryer and seasonal (lemons,
figs, nectarines) with some hot summer days (40C) and a light frost
in the winter every few years.

Regards,
Richard.