Watering palms: how much, how often and with what.
Palms root, settle in and drink differently from broadleaf trees, and some kinds want far more water than others. You are deciding how to water a new palm until it settles, which palms can share a zone, where the bubblers go, and how long and how often to run them.
Written for homeowners and estate and facility managers. Updated .
Key points
- Water a palm over the wide, shallow spread of its roots, never at the trunk: all its roots grow from the base and stay thin.
- Keep a new palm's root ball moist, never waterlogged, until it settles in; then water less often.
- Put thirsty palms and drought-tolerant palms on separate zones, and keep both off the lawn's.
- Keep sprinklers off a palm's fronds and trunk: wet leaves spread leaf spots, and watering the crown is no better than watering the soil.
- Start with bubblers on the root ball, then move them out over the roots as the palm settles.
On this page
How a palm differs from other trees
A broadleaf tree grows a few large roots from the base of its trunk, and they thicken as it grows. A palm does not. UF/IFAS, the University of Florida's extension service, explains that all of a palm's main roots grow from a band at the base of the trunk, the root-initiation zone, which keeps sending out many new, thin roots. They never grow thicker than when they first appear.
Most spread sideways, reaching 15 m or more from the trunk of a large palm. The fine roots that branch off them take up the water: they live only a short time, often grow up toward the surface, and have no root hairs. So a palm drinks from a wide, shallow spread of soil, not at its trunk.
Our tree guide covers broadleaf trees; this guide covers what is different for palms.
- Root ball of a newly planted palm: until new roots grow out, it drinks only from here
- Bubblers on the root ball, on either side of the trunk and clear of it
- Months later, the palm has settled in
- Bubblers moved out over the spreading roots, still away from the trunk
- Base of the trunk: every main root a palm has grows from here, and none of them thickens
- Thin roots spread sideways, far past the fronds; the finest, near the surface, take up the water
Watering trees: bubblers, drip rings and the root zone
Sources: UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Transplanting Palms in the Landscape (CIR1047); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Palm Morphology and Anatomy (ENH1212): roots; UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Regenerated Sabal/Cabbage Palms (Sabal palmetto): Why and How (ENH1279).
A zone for the palms
A hydrozone is a group of plants with similar water needs and rooting depth, in similar sun and soil, watered together on one valve with its own run time: an idea from California's landscape water rules. Palms need their own, for three reasons:
- Timing: a newly planted palm needs water often for some months, a settled one far less often.
- Need: some palms want much more water than others, so thirsty and drought-tolerant palms belong on separate zones.
- Leaves: UF/IFAS advises keeping palm leaves dry, as water spreads leaf spot diseases and lets them take hold, and it found no benefit in watering the crown rather than the soil. So keep palms off the lawn's zone, and aim its sprinklers away from them.
Home garden and lawn irrigationEstate and commercial landscape irrigation
Sources: California Code of Regulations, Title 23, section 490.2 (2025), Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance: definitions of hydrozone and plant factor; UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Transplanting Palms in the Landscape (CIR1047); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Leaf Spots and Leaf Blights of Palm (PP-218): management.
Thirsty palms and drought-tolerant ones
The 2017 survey of Abuja's city trees counted royal palms (Roystonea regia and Roystonea dunlapiana) and coconut palms (Cocos nucifera), and an oil palm (Elaeis guineensis). Gardens and estates grow many others, for example the areca, foxtail and Bismarck palms.
UF/IFAS notes that palms from dry climates usually tolerate drought better than those from rain forests with no real dry season. Its palm fact sheets say how much water each kind wants, and the table groups some of them. WUCOLS, the Californian plant list behind the ordinance's classes, rates the areca, foxtail and fishtail palms high in California's mild South Coastal region, and the Bismarck and Chinese fan palms moderate there.
So put the thirstier palms in the high class, 0.7 to 1.0, and the others in the moderate class, 0.4 to 0.6. The classes are Californian and a guide only: watch your palms and adjust.
| Palm | What UF/IFAS says about water | Zone |
|---|---|---|
| Areca palm (Dypsis lutescens) | Thrives in well-drained soil with plenty of water | Thirstier palms |
| Foxtail palm (Wodyetia bifurcata) | Drought tolerant, but grows most strongly with ample water | Thirstier palms |
| Fishtail palm (Caryota mitis) | Moderate drought tolerance | Thirstier palms |
| Royal palm (Roystonea regia) | Grows well in wet soils, yet quite drought tolerant once established | Drought-tolerant palms, once established |
| Chinese fan palm (Livistona chinensis) | Considered tolerant of drought | Drought-tolerant palms |
| Bismarck palm (Bismarckia nobilis) | Highly drought tolerant | Drought-tolerant palms |
Sources: Agbelade, Onyekwelu and Oyun (2017), Tree species richness, diversity and vegetation index for Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Nigeria, International Journal of Forestry Research: Table 2; UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Physiological Disorders of Landscape Palms (ENH1011); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Dypsis lutescens, Areca Palm (FOR 247); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Wodyetia bifurcata, Foxtail Palm (FOR 242); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Caryota mitis: Fishtail Palm (ENH283); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Roystonea regia: Royal Palm (ENH-732); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Livistona chinensis: Chinese Fan Palm (ENH-524); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Bismarckia nobilis: Bismarck Palm (ENH260); University of California, Davis (2025), WUCOLS V: Water Use Classification of Landscape Species, ratings by region; California Code of Regulations, Title 23, section 490.2 (2025), Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance: definitions of hydrozone and plant factor.
Settling a new palm in
A broadleaf tree takes longer to settle in the bigger its trunk, as our tree guide shows. UF/IFAS gives palms in Florida the times in the table below. A palm from a container sits in potting soil that dries faster than the ground around it. One dug from a field loses many roots; in some kinds, such as the cabbage palm, almost every cut root dies back and new ones must grow from the base of the trunk.
Once settled, water less often: UF/IFAS finds palms in general fairly tolerant of drought once established, and writes that watering can then be cut back, or stopped where the rain is enough. It still advises watering the areca through droughts. A Nigerian dry season lasts for months, so most settled palms still need their zone through it; the example further down works out for how long.
Plant the top of the root ball level with the ground: UF/IFAS finds that palms planted too deep starve their roots of air, and that palms should not go where the water table is high or the drainage poor. In Florida, more palms survive when planted in the rainy season.
| How the palm was grown | Time to settle in | Water until then |
|---|---|---|
| In a container | Six to eight months | Water or rain every other day, over the root ball |
| In a field, then dug up | Four to six months | Keep the soil around the root ball evenly moist, never waterlogged |
Sources: UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Transplanting Palms in the Landscape (CIR1047); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Regenerated Sabal/Cabbage Palms (Sabal palmetto): Why and How (ENH1279); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Physiological Disorders of Landscape Palms (ENH1011); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Dypsis lutescens: Yellow Butterfly Palm (ENH324); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Fertilization and Irrigation Needs for Florida Lawns and Landscapes (ENH860): Table 1, note 1; FAO (1994), Aquatic plants and wetland wildlife resources of Nigeria, CIFA Occasional Paper 21: section 1.1, Climate.
Bubblers on the root ball, then over the roots
Hunter's tree brochure suggests bubblers for new plantings in light to medium soils, aimed away from the base of the tree to prevent root rot. A bubbler is a nozzle that floods a small area. Hunter's PCN bubbler nozzles screw onto a Pro-Spray pop-up body and are pressure-compensating, giving the same flow over a wide range of pressures: 0.9 or 1.9 litres a minute as a trickle, or 3.8 or 7.6 litres a minute in an umbrella pattern.
For a new palm, set two bubblers on the root ball, on opposite sides of the trunk and clear of it, so the water lands where the only roots are.
As the palm settles and its roots spread, move the bubblers out over them, or add more further out; the bodies also take larger nozzles. On heavy clay, Hunter points to dripline instead, which our tree guide lays out in rings.
Give the palms' bubblers a valve of their own, apart from any drip: Hunter's brochure gives each way of watering trees its own zone.
Hunter PCN bubbler nozzle, which fits a Pro-Spray bodyHunter Pro-Spray pop-up bodyHunter PGV zone valveRings of dripline, in our tree guide
Sources: Hunter Industries (2025), Irrigating Trees: best practices brochure (HI-042), pages 2 to 4; Hunter Industries (2026), Product Catalogue Vol. 41, EMEA metric edition, page 81.
How much water, and for how long
The method is the one our tree guide uses. Daily water need, in mm, is ETo × plant factor, where ETo is the weather's drying power: the water a well-watered field of grass would lose in your weather, in mm a day, as our crop guide explains. Multiply by the area under the fronds, since 1 mm of water over 1 m² is 1 litre, and divide by 0.9, as drip gets about 90 percent of the water to the roots, FAO's value, which this series uses for bubblers too.
Need climbs through the dry season: FAO puts the highest needs where it is hot, dry, windy and sunny, and in the north the dusty harmattan may blow from October to May. The humid south needs less, and so do the rains: when they come, cut the zone back or switch it off, and top up only in dry spells.
How ETo is worked out, in our crop guideWatering sandy, loamy and clay soilsPlanning dry-season irrigation in NigeriaSupplemental irrigation in the rainy season
Sources: Onwuegbunam and others (2025), Actual crop coefficients and yield response factors of irrigated tomato in Afaka, Northwest Nigeria, Journal of Applied Life Sciences and Environment 58(1): study location and Tables 1a and 1b; FAO (1986), Irrigation Water Management Training Manual No. 3: Irrigation Water Needs, chapter 3, Tables 5, 6 and 14; FAO (1986), Irrigation Water Management Training Manual No. 3: Irrigation Water Needs, chapter 2, section 2.1 and Table 1; FAO (1994), Aquatic plants and wetland wildlife resources of Nigeria, CIFA Occasional Paper 21: section 1.1, Climate; California Code of Regulations, Title 23, section 490.2 (2025), Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance: definitions of hydrozone and plant factor; FAO (1989), Irrigation Water Management Training Manual No. 4: Irrigation Scheduling, Annex I, Table 8; Hunter Industries (2026), Product Catalogue Vol. 41, EMEA metric edition, page 81; Hunter Industries (2019), Residential Sprinkler System Design and Installation Guide (LIT-226), page 26.
Signs of too much and too little water
UF/IFAS's guide to palm disorders gives the first two signs below. Check the soil and the planting depth before you change a run time:
- Too little water: growth slows, and the leaflet tips of the oldest fronds turn brown, spreading over the whole frond. Some palms fold their leaflets along the midrib, or wilt.
- Roots short of air, from soil kept too wet or a palm planted too deep: leaves yellow, fronds wilt, the trunk shrivels and the roots rot. Wilting in wet soil points to rotting or airless roots, or a wilt disease, not thirst.
- If in doubt, dig beside the root ball: its top should be level with the ground.
- After a watering, look at the palm: its fronds and trunk should be dry. Turn or move any sprinkler that wets them.
- Feel the soil over the roots with the feel test in our soils guide before you change a run time.
- At the start of each dry season, run the zone and check that every bubbler flows, with none blocked, buried or aimed at the trunk.
Irrigation maintenance through the seasonThe feel test, in our soils guide
Sources: UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Physiological Disorders of Landscape Palms (ENH1011); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Regenerated Sabal/Cabbage Palms (Sabal palmetto): Why and How (ENH1279); UF/IFAS Extension, University of Florida (checked 2026), Leaf Spots and Leaf Blights of Palm (PP-218): management; Hunter Industries (2025), Irrigating Trees: best practices brochure (HI-042), page 2; Hunter Industries (2019), Residential Sprinkler System Design and Installation Guide (LIT-226), page 26.
When to ask for a design
A palm zone's sizes depend on the site: the water source's flow and pressure, the soil, slopes, and how many palms there are, of which kinds and sizes. Palms along a drive or scattered through a lawn need their own pipes and valve, apart from the lawn's.
To design it, we need:
- State and town or local government area
- Crop, or the type of site
- Area, in hectares, acres or square metres
- Where the water comes from, and how much you think you have
- How you pump today, and what powers the pump
- When you want the system working
- How many palms, which kinds, how tall, and which are newly planted, or photos
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