Red Palm Weevil Treatment in Mallorca

The red palm weevil lays its eggs in the crown, and the larvae feed inside the palm where nobody can see them. By the time the outer fronds drop into the shape of an open umbrella, the growing point at the centre is often already destroyed. The Canary Island date palm is the species it attacks most readily, and it is a common garden and finca palm on Mallorca.

There are signs before that stage: fronds in the centre of the crown leaning or growing lopsided, holes and chewed fibre at the base of the fronds, a sour, fermented smell from the crown, and brown cocoons among the old fibres. Any one of them is a reason to have the palm looked at by someone who treats palms, not only by whoever prunes them.

A palm caught early can usually be saved. One whose heart has gone cannot, and it has to be taken down and disposed of properly, because the adults that hatch inside it fly on to the next palm, often the neighbour’s.

Endotherapy injects the treatment into the trunk, and the palm’s own sap carries it up into the crown, where the larvae feed. Nothing is sprayed, so there is no drift onto a pool, a terrace or the next garden, and no smell. Wind does not stop the work either, as it would stop a spray.

As prevention it is a programme rather than a single visit: the palm is injected on a calendar through the year, and the interval depends on the product and the size of the palm. As a cure it is combined with cleaning out the damaged tissue in the crown, and it only works while the growing point is still alive.

The request is where you describe the palms: how many, which kind if you know, roughly how tall, and anything you have noticed. A photograph of each crown helps more than a description. The specialist quotes the treatment and the calendar, and you decide.

The same method protects pines. The pine processionary moth builds white silk nests in Aleppo pines through autumn and winter, and late in the winter the caterpillars come down the trunk in lines to pupate in the soil. Their hairs cause rashes and eye irritation in people and serious reactions in dogs. Endotherapy is applied to the pines in autumn, before the nests form, and one visit can cover the palms and the pines on the same property. Nests already in the tree are cut out, which on a tall pine is rope or platform work.

Pruning is the other half of palm health. Fresh cuts release the scent that draws the adult weevil, which is why palms on Mallorca are pruned in the cold months and every cut is treated before the crew leaves. If your palms are due for pruning, say so in the request, so the cut and the treatment are planned together. The tree and palm pruning page covers the cutting side.