It’s going to be rather difficult to get much gardening content into this issue of “Dallying.” I spent the last week on the beach in Cancun Mexico and my garden froze solid in some very cold weather back home. I do notice horticultural things even when sitting in a deck chair sipping Pina Coladas. The resort and much of the surrounding area was heavily planted to Coconut Palms. They grow quickly, have large impressive fronds and, of course, those amazing clusters of large Coconuts hanging down. Many years ago when I was wandering around the nurseries of Southern Florida, there was great concern about “Lethal Yellows” a disease of Coconut Palms that was spreading rapidly through that state. The spread of that disease made me wonder why they were so heavily planted in the Cancun area. The disease is caused by a bacterium, phytoplasma, transmitted by a planthopper. A little research indicates that the dwarf Malayan and Panama tall varieties and their interspecific hybrids, exhibit some resistance to the disease and that it is somewhat confined to certain geographic areas. The planthopper’s nymph stage lives on the roots of certain turf grasses and the elimination of those grasses in Coconut growing areas also greatly reduces the occurrence of the disease. The shorter yellow fruited trees I observed were of the Malayan dwarf type. Mystery solved, sort of. Back to the Pina Coladas.




We took a couple of excursions during the week. One was a return to the Mayan ruins at Chichen Itza. We last saw them about 12 years ago. They are still incredible but much more commercialized. Many more ruins have been uncovered since our last visit but many more restrictions have been added.