Yes, my cousin who moved to Naples some years ago sent me a blow-by-blow description of the coconuts' demise. A shame, many people didn't like the trees but they seemed to fit the Florida scene so well - especially when people would install floodlights beneath them. We had one coconut tree in our yard - forget if it just grew on its own or we had planted it. It grew tall enough to produce nuts by the time my family and I moved away in '65. Gave my parents and neighbors the willies whenever a hurricane would come through!

So now it's whiteflies? Sheeeshh! Florida is so "buggy." Many types of palms in California but as you probably know, not a single coconut. At least that I have ever seen. I had a young sawtooth palmetto growing here in a pot - let it dry out and die because nobody out this way likes planting prickly-stemmed palms - too great a chance for a lawsuit when somebody rips their skin off. Had another in a rental house I used to own - would have to go over with a sturdy saw and gloves to cut the older leaves (drooping over a sidewalk) and even then I would usually cut myself.