Post #510062 by Bay Park Buzzy on Mon, Feb 8, 2010 11:30 PM

On 2010-02-08 19:16, BIG tiki scott wrote:
p.s. from my observations the spots are wood pecker holes that they start make it thrgh the outer hard husk and hit the wet stringy palm core and decide its not a good spot and move to try another. then as water and air and what not get in there the log surface rots a hair and leaves a spot. but i will investigate!!

Those are probably from tree trimmers spikes as he was climbing up and down the tree cleaning off the dead fronds. Trees in parking lots and hotels that have regular maintenence done to them usually have those all over them like yours does. Same thing with the Mexican Fan palms we have out here. I got this really old one from a hotel where for liability they had it cleaned about once a year. It had holes on one side only, where the tree trimmer guy climbed up and down it several times over the lifespan of the tree:

If you look close at some of yours, they may even be square, or triangle shaped, deepending on what type of spikes the guyb had on his boots.

The log in the front of the pile has them all over one side too:

A few of those logs in that had one side where there were spots that you can see. Some had none because they could fit a boom truck in to get them cleaned, instead of having a guy climb it.

they turn brown because the tree lived after the damage occured and it no longer was able to transport the water and nutrients through that broken portion and it died in that spot. Like scar tissue.

...at least that's what I remember from what the arborist told me when I said to him, "Whoa! Look at what the woodpeckers did to that side of the log!" Then he looked at me like I was high, laughed at me, and asked when the last time that I saw a woodpecker around here was.

Buzzy Out!