PlantFiles: Japanese Sago Palm, King Sago Palm, Sago Cycas, Sago Palm
Cycas revoluta

Smedland, I'm so sorry to hear about your loss. ;-( There was mention of the toxicity a few comments down from yours. I read this when I purchased the plant, (thank goodness) and the sago is my bedroom, rather than the main living area for that reason.

I have always wanted one of these beauties and am very pleased with it so far. I'm planning on keeping it on the smaller side, indoors.

WARNING!!! This plant is HIGHLY TOXIC TO DOGS!! If you have any doubts, just Google "Sago Palm, Poison, Dog." Also, the ASPCA jsut came out with an alert re Sago Palm poisonings on August 1, 2008. In that alert, they state that incidents of 'reported' dog poisonings from Sagos have increased 200% since 2003 and, in 50-75% of those cases, the dog died. Our family learned the hard way. Our 1 yr old German Shepherd got into a plant I had just purchased from Costco. That was around 9:30pm. I had no idea of the toxicity of this plant and put her to bed. When I woke the next morning at 7am, she had labored breathing, couldn't walk, her eyes were fixed and dialated, and she had lock jaw. I rushed her to our Vet (who was unaware if of this plant's toxicity - ditto for the Emergency Vet he sent us to after trying to treat her). Less than 26 hrs after eating this plant, she was dead, but not without suffering an incredibly horrible death. Had I known what her prognosis was when I originally brought her to the Vet, I never would have put her through all the unnecessary suffering. Had I known in advance about this plant, I never would have purchased it in the first place.Also, I came across some postings on the internet that even brushing up against this plant can cause serious skin reactions in humans. (FYI - if you only Google "Sago Palm", all you'll read it how wonderful this plant is. I have yet to read a posting by a grower, nursery, or other landscape-related professional, about this plant's dangers. Also, very few Vets are knowledgeable of it's toxicity).

Really a unique plant for which there is no substitute. I haven't had a scale problem since last summer after 2 treatments with horticultural oil (which is pretty expensive). I sprayed again in April just in case. My 40 year-old sago in partial sun grew very little after pulling out the infested fronds last year, but this summer it responded beautifully to Scotts Bonus-S lawn fertilizer and a sprinkle of manganese sulfate, which I learned about on these forums.

I have had my cycad now for 7 years . Living in NJ I have to bring it in the house in the winter I keep it in my "Sun" room which has a south facing bay window and two large skylights that I can vent. The temp. in this room is around 68 in the winter. I keep the cycad dry only watering once a month as I had killed and earlier plant by watering to much in the winter. In the spring around the end of May I put the plant outside for the Summer I place it in full sun on the south side of my house. It always does well there. Sagos only grow a new flush of leaves from the center of the trunk ( which looks like a large pine cone) once a year. When I see this growth I start watering, in the warm weather it can take a lot of water but again let the soil dry out before watering again soggy roots will be the death of this plant.I fertilize my cycad once a month with miracle grow during thr growing season. When the leaves first come out, they are very soft and prone to damange so keep away from high traffic areas the leaves will harden after a week or so. The Sago Palm is one of my favorite plants. Just as a point of interest this plant has not changed in Millions of years! It is one of the oldest known plants on the Earth. For the first time I was pleased to see that my plant this year is growing it's first off shoot! It looks like three little leaves growing next to the parent plant. One must have patience when growing this plant, everything about it is SLOW!! However it is a thing of beauty and is very rewarding to watch your Cycad respond well to your efforts! One word of caution, all parts of the Sago Plam is highly toxic! Please keep this plant away from small Children and Pets who like to chew houseplants!

The colder your winter the hotter your summers should be to grow this cycad. In the bay area it's the cool summers not the winters to worry about. Some observations of Cycas revoluta...full sun is required in the bay area..in hot summers areas they look very fern like in part shade. Don't crowd them.They dont like root competition. The best are planted alone or are featured garden plants. They can skip years in flushing,so do not toss out! Fertilize. They look their best fed regularly.Or else they have a tendancy to get chlorotic.
Size? the largest i have seen in the B.A. has 6' of trunk. Interesting that the plant has stunted, 2' fronds. I wonder how many owners that plant has seen in it's lifetime and seems to be waiting for a new owner who knows what they are doing as someone did in the past!
I want to mention that they can make treasured Bonsai in warm climates.In the B.A. it's difficult since they flush so little in a Bonsai pot and the full sun they need requires expert care and careful watering. Tricky to maintain is the phrase that fits best.

No pests on outdoors plants here. Clean and green they grow.

i love this plant. potential trunk hardieness down to 0 F(dont expect the leaves to survive.) slow growing. even slow to germinate. i bought three seeds 9 months ago and they just started to sprout. i also bought a sago at my local walmart for $14.00 and stuck it out side in the ground. i was surprized to find 5 new fronds sprout in a ring. dosent seem to mind clay soil. hoping for even more growth this summer.

update...
my two seedlings are amasingly still green, with little damage after +7F. i covered both with a milk jug. my mature sago is not so lucky. all of its fronds are yellow. i have covered it with mulch up to the bottom of the fronds. the leafletts at the base of the treeare still green, which gives me hope for next spring

The first one I had died. I think I might have over watered it, so with my second plant I go very easy on the watering, and it seems to do well with that. Its in a window which gets some direct light, but not much. Mostly it gets bright ambient light, and it dries out between waterings.

We have 4 Sago palms now and they are all pretty. Two of them were much larger plants when purchased, and one of those now has a beautiful bloom- 14-16" tall and yellow-gold in color. It is my understanding it is a male sago. I don't know of any reports of troubles with them in our area.
My only trouble is that the blooming one has got to be moved- but I will wait until the bloom is gone.

We killed this one, which is hard to do, with malice and forethought. Very hard to live with, especially if it is near a place you walk, sit, etc. Ours was under a mulberry tree and fall cleaning was a headache we avoided until we simply could not any more. I gave the babies away to others who happily took them, I am just glad it is out of my hair. I mean yard. Now we joke at nurseries we visit, "Look honey, we could get a Sego for just $49.99!!"

This tough and beautiful plant is long proven in zone 8b throughout the southern U.S.; hardiness is slightly variable throughout populations of this species, and though some plants will show leaf-damage in the low 20s F in exposed areas, others are unaffected: On most plants, foliage remains green down into the teens, especially if grown in some shade. The stems are much hardier, and many very old plants survive in Natchez, Mississippi; on Louisiana's "river road"; and elsewhere in zone 8b where temperatures have plunged to between 5 and 10 degrees F several times in the last 50 years (e.g., 1989).

Great attractive fronds. Available in tubes for around $5 AUS. pokerboy.

Lots and lots of Sago's here in San Antonio. My own King Sago is about 5 years old and doing very well and getting quite large.

I used to live in Florida and I grew many Sagos ( Cycads) the King and Queen.They grew pretty fast for me. I trimmed the leaves back several times a year. Even tho it isn't a true palm, Vigero palm fertilizer is the best i had found for it. I contains a certain element it needs.
As far as the scales went, i used the Ultrafine spray oil to smother the scales. They do live in the dirt too. I first thing i would do is trim the infected leaves off so i could see how it was doing. You will have to spray it every 10 days to get it under control.
I did grow one from seed......but for me it is easier to pull the pup off and put rootone on where the roots would be, then pot it. sometimes i put sticks around it to hold it in place while it rooted. I did transplant a 5 foot Queen Sago to another spot in my yard. I asked the Master Gardeners there if it was possible. They said they didnt think so...but i did. And it loved it better where i put it. There is a trick to transplanting them to another area.

I have found that sagos grow faster if given a diluted acid-loving plant food (Camellia-Azalea food). I use a liquid because it's easy to dilute, but be sure to deep water occasionally to wash away the mineral/salt build up and avoid tip burning.

I have a couple of Sago Palms growing in my yard. I am in Zone 11 (Guam) and the only frustration I have with them is their really slow growth, even in perfect conditions. We just had the Asiatic scale disease come to Guam for the first time and has spread enormously. It has been a couple of months already and those Sago's that were first infected seem to have recuperated and are putting out new leaves. I know for a fact they have not received any spraying as the first ones I noticed were on an abandoned lot. So maybe, its just a cycletic thing.

I've got an attack of the Asian Cycad Scale in Tampa as well.

It's a beautiful palm, but not worth the upkeep once this attacks. :(

These grow well here and have had success in rooting from "pups" and from seeds.

It's a common misconception, the majority of people think a Cycad is a type of palm. A Cycad is in no way related to a palm other than the pinnate appearence of its evergreen fronds. It's true that a Cycad is actually related to coniferous plants like pine trees. The fonds are "needle" like, similiar to pines. Cycads are of course less cold hardy than conifers, but it is related to the cone bearing plants of the north. Cycas revoluta, is a Cycad, which has been around for over 250 million years, before the first palm trees began to grow on Earth. Cycas revoluta is found fossilized in a lot of rock throughout North America. Cycas revoluta is also cold hardy down to 15F, it can take temps below 20F.

I am growing sago palm in a semi shaded location in mid-town Sacramento and it just put out a fabulous crown of new leaves. Before it was in sun and the leaves got burned. It also gets regular water from the sprinkler but as it is very tight in a deep pot, the water tends to run right through. I used cactus mix soil but have not repotted it since last year. I was outside all winter and I almost threw itaway because it looked so ugly. Now it looks great but I am afraid to repot it or change anything!

Very slow growing but quite showy when plants are large. I am not truely sold on this palm, I like the taller date, coconut palm types better.

[HYPERLINK@www.rhapisgardens.com]

Contains a lot of information on the sago palm.

I keep mine indoors away from direct light..and water only about once a month, however I mist frequently..seems to do just fine on the dry side.

Here in Corpus Christi we also have a huge scale problem. I have spent over $30 for sprays trying to save two sagos and am not sure they are going to make it. Two others are not infected. I don't think the plant is worth all the trouble. Will probably have them removed.

Sagos are nice, but they are magnets for the white Asiatic scale that's making the rounds here in Florida. Sagos are pretty much getting wiped out in the area where I live. I work at a nursery and every day people are coming in for Cygon and Malathion because those two things work well on the scale. (Unless you have an ample supply of Asian parasitic wasps on hand that prey on this particular scale.)

Most people are just opting to rip their sagos out of their yard because they don't feel like making a weekly commitment to spraying them and the surrounding ground. The scale will come back even if you get rid of it. It's airborne and too many people do not realize they have it. Sago Palms can be pretty and all, but if I had to have one I'd keep it in a pot on a glass lanai. We've put a stop on selling the Sagos until the scale epidemic is under control. Too many people don't realize those little white, round specs all over their sagos are scale and not part of the plant therefore, they are paying no mind to the seriousness of it while infecting their neighbors Sagos (and Birds of Paradise and Traveler's Palms, to name a few), which has happened to customers who brought in samples and showed us.

I live in Murfreesboro, TN (USDA Zone 6b). Two years ago, I planted in my yard two Sago Palms, about a foot tall each. The first winter was relatively warm for Tennessee and the plants survived with some protection with only some burnt fronds. Last winter was a bear - several snowfalls and two nights at -4°F! Then came Spring 2003 and no sign of life from the Sagos, so I threw several layers of newspaper over them and four inches of mulch for a proper burial. June 2003 came and one day working in the bed there they were - my Sagos had pushed up thru all the layers of newspaper and mulch and were alive!

A pretty carefree addition to our container garden. They thrive inside or out here, year-round and are a patient plant for the new and/or unattentive gardener.

Unless you want to sentence yourself to spraying this plant with fish oil and the like DON'T PLANT IT!

We have a scale insect that has taken over these cycads in the southern Florida areas. To date, there are only supression methods that marginally help.

I tear these out and replace them whenevr I can. It's a shame, but they aren't worth all the trouble, not to mention they tend to be overused and misplaced in the landscape down here.

I have an 8 year old Cycas revoluta grown as Bonsai for one year. It just pushed a fresh flush that looks fine, but the last flush suddenly curled, twisted and contorted. The color is still fine, but the leaves are brown at the tips (not the individual points, like a manganese problem). Just a brown clump that falls off. The previous flush is perfect, and the current one is too, but its just that second one.

Have a nice Sago Palm growing in a pot on my deck. It has been growing in the pot and outdoors for the last 5 years here in Western Washington state. It is rather slow growing but think alot has to do with our cool nights even in the summer. It has wintered outside year after year. I just move the pot up against the West side of the house for some Winter protection. Has survived many frosts and even a snow storm or two. Foliage is glossy "plastic" finish in a deep green. Did have to give it some iron chelate to get the leaves to be nice dark green. No pest problems with this tough old fossil.

I bought a Cycas planted in a 2 or 3 gallon pot in February. It developed nicely over the summer, grew a new set of larger leaves but for the past 3 weeks it has become sick. Some of the leaves have discolored portions of light green, some turned light brown, others reddish brown ... One person recommended palm fertilizer but it doesn't seem to help. Used anti-fungal spray on the leaves about 2-3 times a week, but more fronds turn light brown.

Since I saw the first signs of this disease took the plant indoors but I have not noticed any improvements. A few years ago the leaves of a ficus plant turned brown in the fall (September/October), and I had to cut lots of them and took the plant indoors. Then the disease stopped. In that case it was virus for sure.

Cycads are extremely tolerant plants and are also very slow growing. The good thing about being slow growing sometimes it a plant can take a lot of abuse while 'not growing' and weather it fine.

Some of these cycads can be burned in raging forest fires.. and as soon as things cool off, a new flush of leaves pops out. In fact, some species of cycads require a good burn now and then to pop out a cone (their reproductive structure).

The reason a Sago Palm weathered the winter in total darkness was because it wasn't doing anything. It has lots of energy stored in its caudex to survive long periods of drought, dark or whatever. The fact it was watered probably was a good move, since it may have rotted otherwise. Plants that aren't in the process of growing and metabolizing much often rot if placed in wet, especially cold, situations.

Sago Palms have been raised for many generations on Japan and one of the reasons they have been is they survive hundreds of years. It gets very cold in Japan (some places in Japan) and the routine of storing the family Sago in a dark, dry place over the winter has been going on for hundreds if not a thousand years. Works for them, it should work for you.

My best friend (from Lorain,OH...zone6 or 5a-b, whatever) lives in Florida for 6months of the year. Last spring (2002) he brought home a sago palm in a 2 gallon pot. It survived through the summer and fall. The interesting thing is that when he returned to Florida that October, he stored it in his garage where it over wintered ... in practically total darkness. And it just so happened that the Winter of 2002/2003 was a very cold winter.

To my friend's surprise (and mine, as well), the sago palm survived WITHOUT ANY DAMAGE whatsoever! The leaves were dark green and very healthy looking ... no discoloration! It may have been watered only three times while over-wintering in the garage. It looked as if it had been growing under perfect conditions. This spring, after the danger of frost (May 15th or so), he placed it outside in a partly sunny location ... with more afternoon sun. This month, new growth appeared (7 or 8 new leaves).

And, so far... so good! Cross your fingers for this upcoming winter!

Soak seeds in a bucket of water for a couple of days. USE RUBBER GLOVES to remove the outer flesh as the orange flesh will stain your hands! After being cleaned, the seed is good if it does not float to the top. I've had best luck laying the seed sideways and and only covering half way. Keep it wet by bottom watering until a frond appears. The pup will form from underneath and the seed will eventually fall away.

I had a beautiful sago in my sunny Hawaiian front yard that started out as a potted plant. In a dozen years it had a trunk of 5-6 feet and many "keikis", or offshoots. It was the showiest plant in my garden, with deep green fronds that spilled out in all directions.

Sadly, a couple of years ago, it got a blight from whiteflies. I tried lots of suggested remedies, but was warned it was probably hopeless. It was, but I'd like to start over with another.

When fronds get killed back by severe cold temperature remove them when new growth appears. The old fronds tend to lie back then making the job easier. Remove offshoots while still small in order to give plants room to develop to their natural shape. Given sufficient water these plants will live and reproduce for many, many years.

I live in Jacksonville, Florida. My yard is part shade/part sun & have one sago about 3' tall, another about 2' tall, both growing in the same area of my yard. This past winter we had 19 degree weather with wind chills much lower. The 3' tall sago I didn't cover at all & it fared the harsh weather beautifully. The smaller sago I covered and it had noticeable damage & doesn't seem to have grown at all this year. From now on I will leave it be.

We raised many of these palms from the babies which sprang up under our neighbor's Sago Palm. We gave most of them away to others. The ones we kept, grow fine. Here in Louisiana, this is a popular plant found in most Catholic church yards. The fronds are cut every year to be used in their Palm Sunday church service. You can find reference to it in the Christian Bible, John 12:13. After such a severe pruning you'd think the plant whould suffer damage! To the contrary; it seems to help it grow more beautiful. It replaces all those dark green fronds that were cut away, with lots of fresh new light green ones. It gives the plant a pleasing shape, also.

I had been told that this plant only put on new leaves once a year, in the spring. The one on my porch (in partial shade with an eastern exposure) has doubled the number of leaves it had when I bought it. I am in zone 7(b) - central Arkansas - and plan to over winter the plant in my garden shed, as I understand our winter humidity rather than cold temps can zap the crown.

My Sago Palm has survived 14 years as an outside plant here in coastal South Carolina (Zone 8-b). There have been a couple of times when the fronds were killed back by 20F temperature, but new fronds have always developed the following spring. This year, the plant survived 15F weather for 3 days, but the plant had been covered with a sheet for some modest protection.

IN India, the seeds from the cones are collected and then dried and ground. They use the "flour" in cooking bread. My Indian HOUSEBOY from Kerala shared this info with me the other day......It is amazing how interested my household has become in plants!

Another very interesting feature about the Sago is that it is known to have survived for over 200 million years! This just boggles my mind. I suppose there must be other specimens on the earth today decending from a very old age. I would be interested in knowing about others...I find it very easy to maintain....it is potted inside my apartment and goes in the shower and drenched ( and get cleaned off ) when it becomes quite dry. It has full sun and in the winter monthes it is under a grow light. Yes, they are very slow growing.

Although many think of the Sago as a plam, it is not a palm at all. It is in the Cycadaceae family. Sagos are a very slow growing plants and are very tough. They can tolerate up to 15*F without damage. They do however get leaf spot in areas where heavy rainfall occurs.