re: Mostly dead palm tree question

I had three 30' queen palms that were damaged badly in the 2007 freeze. Just DO NOT make the mistake of cutting the green shoots back, too. In a rush I whacked the first one all the back to the base of the fronds... realizing I wasn't sure about what I was doing I went back in, Googled and did the next two by cutting the dead growth only. The first one never came back because I didn't leave any green area that could receive sun for photosynthesis. It rotted and left a massive hole when we pulled it up. The two that were done "right" survived... leave any and all green or partially green you can find! Those things are majestic giants and take many years to replace. Good luck!

Thanks for your post/pic...lol
My experience with palms is as follows...trimming obviously dead fronds soon after hard freezes, is most advisable. That includes sagos and other low profile palm-like plants.Leave anything that even remotely looks like it might be "green' ! Lowes,Home Depot and even some nurseries, will promote/sell certain species that will not do well in any type of freeze i.e. small/medium queen palms,most date palm species,majestic palms and fishtail palms...they buy in bulk,put them on "sale" and every 2-3 yrs. when we do get hard freezes...they count on a big die off and hope people will "rinse/repeat' !
Stick to the hardiest of species {although they do grow slowly}, such as washatona/washington palm,chusan palm,bismarck palm and of course the venerable slow growth sago !