Will coconut palms create too much shade?

sodoff – posted 08 August 2004 22:30

I’m planning on re-sodding my yard with a hybrid bermuda. Even though it seems like coconut palms wouldn’t create too much shade for the direct sun-loving bermuda, I’d love to hear from anybody with some personal experience with bermuda and palms. My coconut palms (green malayans) are grouped in 2’s and 3’s with roughly 10 feet between the individual trees in each grouping. The groupings are at least 40-50 feet apart from each other.

BaHateIt – posted 09 August 2004 13:04

The parts of my yard where the bermuda has done best at taking over the Bahia and grown the fastest is in spots that don’t have full sun all day. Such as along a fence where the sun hits it directly in the morning but not pat 2pm or so and also in the back of the house where the sun hits it directly after 3 or 4 pm. I guess the soil doesn’t dry out aws quickly. Of course it’s summertime and we’re pretty close to the equator here.

I would be very surprised if any palm tree shaded out bermuda though. You would have a problem with a real large shade tree like a ficus, but even if you did, you could probably use something else there if you wanted or better yet mulch around the area.