Over the last couple of years the palm has become steadily more miserable looking; its leaves have lost their gorgeous green sheen and taken on more of a yellow hue instead.
Many years ago I planted a palm in a pot and popped it on the newly constructed steps by our outdoor seating area. It looked great, for a while. The palm was a good size, and so was the pot.
But the palm has grown and, sadly, the pot hasn't. Over the last couple of years the palm has become steadily more miserable looking; its leaves have lost their gorgeous green sheen and taken on more of a yellow hue instead. And it's practically stopped growing.
Finally I grasped the nettle (actually, the serrated leaf stalks were pretty hard to handle) and my son and I heaved the pot onto the lawn to repot the palm. The deal was that, in return for his muscle power, he would have the old pot to grow his banana palm in.
We only just managed to move it onto the grass. But then followed hours of turmoil. We pulled and squeezed at the plant, we even tried to loosen the compost with a bread knife. But the palm wouldn't budge. Eventually, we called in the bigger man of the house. Big toys for big boys; the answer according to Dad, was a tractor and a Land Rover.
We attached the potted palm to the forks of the tractor with a rope and secured the other end to the rear of the Land Rover. The result was one taught rope and one near-strangled palm still firmly in its pot.
When we finally removed the palm from its pot (with the aid of a hammer) we found that inside it there was a rim, about two inches from the base, that the roots had grown under. When I planted it all those years ago I had filled the section beneath the rim with stones and other crocks, but over time the roots had infiltrated it.
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