To Paint a Palm Tree: Art or Naw?

 This past week in Southern Florida was definitely one to remember. Overwhelmed with the colorful nature and new places, my brain feels like it could explode with all the new stuff I learned about the area. Observing everything with a close eye, there was one thing that captured my attention that I questioned one of the early mornings when walking to our fourteen-passenger van to at the start of our day. I noticed that all of the tall palm trees had white painting around their bottoms on the bark. Some of the paintings were creative and showy, while others were just as simple as ring around the tree. Was this to prevent something from climbing/eating the tree or was this just for looks? I had to find out.

Among the family of Arecaceae (palm trees), the Cocos nucifera, more commonly known as the coconut palm tree, grows tall and produces coconuts from the top of the tree. I did some research and found a website that answered my question about the paint around the bottom. The link for the website that I found is below.

http://homeguides.sfgate.com/paint-trunks-palm-trees-100463.html

What was found is that the paint around the bottom of the tree can be there for many different reasons. Most importantly, the paint can be there to prevent insects from eating the leaves of the tree and eating the coconuts, causing them to go bad. In urban areas, the paint can act as a deterrent for termites that will actually eat and diminish the bark around the palm tree. In some areas, like Mexico, the paint can act as a more aesthetic look for the trees and can be used to give it a more attractive look. For what I learned and what I saw, I can probably conclude that the paint on these trees would for deterring insects because some of the paintings looked somewhat lazy. There are so many palm trees in Southern Florida that it seems near impossible that someone could paint the bottoms of everyone, but in some areas including the hotel we stayed at, I saw that this was not the case.

The photo above shows a picture of the palms that are painted fully and it is a clear sign that it is not for looks, but it is to prevent something from going up it. Finally, I learned that the painting does not stop at palm trees. I learned that people paint the trunks of all sorts of trees for similar reasons. I also found a video below of termites eating the trunk of a palm tree. Maybe this could be prevented with a little bit of white paint!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7brFRvoBxEs