I am writing today to make you feel better. Yup, it’s a pretty depressing morning here, so I hope that will make you feel better about your bad start to the day. If you had a good start, yay for you. If you are having gardening troubles, you are not alone.
Here in the jungle, summer is the pits. It is too hot to be outside for long, and if I venture out, it’s either loaded with bug repellent, or covered in long sleeves and pants.
On top of that, there is very little in the way of food growing. All my Seminole pumpkins start to grow, then turn yellow and fall off the vine.
Finally, I have one that looks like it will continue to grow. And today I see that raccoons (my best guess) have scratched it all up!
The Dahlia is wilting. We just had a little tropical system swirling over our area of the state and it dropped 4 inches of rain. We had minor flooding, which went away quickly. But maybe the dahlia did not like all that water. Maybe it doesn’t like July in Florida. I can’t blame it.
The weeds, or should I say, grass has gone nuts. This is all getting away from me because of all the vines that are sprawling all over the yard. The squash vine is done, and I should pull it up. But it’s too hot and buggy.
The watermelon vines have 1 watermelon. The pumpkin vines – well, I mentioned that above. Those vines have nearly made it from the back of the house to the front. They’ve dropped about 10 pumpkins at this point.
Speaking of vines. That mound in the distance in my photo above is an Elm tree next to a Beautyberry bush. Below is a photo of the two trees with most of the vines pulled off. I used to work at this, even though this is not part of my yard. I’d love to see both grow and do well. As you can see it’s a losing battle.
These are trying to grow under that mound of vines in the photo above.
A banana pepper plant has died, and the other peppers don’t look so good. So it’s a depressing start to the day for me. I think I’ll stay inside.
When my daughter gifted me a packet of Dahlia seeds, I had little hope that the plants would grow. I often feel that way about “normal” things trying to grow in this jungle. I live in zone 9b.
My daughter was a little bit obsessed with the Floret flower farm. It was (is?) a show on one of the networks, and focused on a young couple who began a huge flower farm in Washington state.
Their farm is impressive, and they have turned it into a thriving flower business. From what I can tell, the husband is behind the scenes doing all the heavy lifting, while his wife, Erin, does the social stuff, writing of books, and poses for photos. Photography of her holding humongous bouquets appears to be their trademark.
My Dahlia has pale yellow flowers
Growing From Dahlia Seeds, Year One
I put the dahlia seeds into a shallow clay pot. I’d never grown dahlias, and had no idea how to do it. I’d always heard that dahlias were tough to grow. Between that and the fact that the seeds came from Washington, I honestly did not think anything would happen.
When I lived in New Hampshire a local farm sold them out of the greenhouse. Greenhouse plants generally mean they like it warm. But I bought a dahlia plant and put it in my yard. It died. This added to my doubts.
The Floret seeds came with a little booklet full of information about growing Dahlias, Zinnias, and Celosia. These three were the seed types my daughter sent. Floret also has a whole page online about How to Grow Dahlias From Seed.
So the first year my seeds became small, scraggly dahlia plants. They grew about 4-5 inches tall in the shallow pot. When the season was over I pulled them up. They had some tubers at the bottom. Surprise, surprise!
In the booklet that came with the seeds, Erin (the writer) said that she stores her tubers in a cool place in ziplock bags. I was not going to bother with that. All I had was possibly the fridge for storage. So I yanked out the little plants with their tubers and tossed them into the compost barrel. I know, I am awful.
Unexpected Dahlia Plants, Year Two
After months went by and I grew my “winter” crops here in Florida, it was time to ready the gardens for Spring growing. As I dug through the dirt in my compost bin, I found the dahlia tubers just laying at the side! They still looked okay, and I figured I’d just put them into the ground for the heck of it. And they grew. I never even marked where they were planted and now I am only guessing about some of them. Like the photo in the center below. I’m pretty sure it’s a Dahlia.
Yellow flowering dahliaDahlia, I thinkSeedlings from tubers
I now have some pretty nice dahlia plants growing! One is tall, and flowering with pale yellow flowers. I had expected the fluffy type bloom, but got this star shaped flower.
Year two, growing the tubers, is working out much better. I plan to leave the plants growing in the ground and see what happens over winter. If they go dormant and need temperatures that are not freezing, the plants should be okay. The ones in pots might just need transplanting to larger pots until next year. It is very hot to be gardening in July.
Flower Books From Floret
Amazon sells books all about the Floret flower farm (paid link). If nothing else, they are full of beautiful photos. Her books will show you how to grow, harvest, save seeds, and make arrangements from the flowers you grow. I do not have any of her books, and personally, I am not interested. I do not cut my measly little selection of flowers to make floral arrangements. I leave the flowers for the bees and butterflies.
Remember that the books are written by a woman who has a huge area of space, with greenhouses, and lots of help. Also, she lives in Washington, which is about as far (in the US) from Florida as it gets.
My Other Floret Flower Seeds
Along with the Dahlia seeds, I also received Zinnia and Celosia seeds. I grew the Zinnias and they were unimpressive. The colors were a pale blush pink. Zinnias, in my opinion, should be bold in color. I love my deep reds, bright oranges, and stunning pinks. I did not save any Floret zinnia seeds. This year I planted from my own saved seeds, and bought a few others.
Zinnias in my 2025 garden
However, the Celosia were another story! Holy cow, these things are prolific. Celosia is another plant I was totally unfamiliar with, and let me tell you, they are beasts! Apparently they love the Florida climate and the bees LOVE the fluffy flowers. I will be writing a page about them soon.
Celosia – new to the garden, 2024
In Conclusion
The secret to successfully growing things is this: Toss seeds somewhere, ignore them, treat them badly, expect nothing, and see spectacular results. (I am only partly kidding.)
Thanks for reading. Feel free to leave a story about your growing adventures in the comments.
Lots of flowers are beginning to bloom in June. Here in central Florida we have a jump on growing, but look forward to growth just the same.
I love to photograph flowers. They make an excellent subject. Who doesn’t like viewing the delicate intricacies, fantastic shapes, and stunning colors of flowers. They don’t move so photography is simple! LOVE.
So…. from all the flowers above, I see bees visiting most often the Spiderwort. I’ve let some clumps of Spiderwort grow randomly around the garden. Each morning when I water, I hear and see bumblebees visiting the purple flowers.
Another favorite is the purple Holy Basil, also called Tatsoi. Those flowers come out on tall spikes and the flowers are very tiny. But the bumblebees love them!
Butterflies usually visit the beautiful zinnias, but I have not had many butterflies. The occasional Gulf Fritillary has been spotted, and a few Zebra longwings, but honestly not many at all.
The Cosmos are not like the cosmos I grew in New Hampshire. These are small plants and not leggy like the northern plants. All of the cosmos growing in my yard came from saved seeds. I bought one plant and saved the seeds that I continue to plant in the yard. I like not knowing if the flowers will be yellow or orange, or a combination.
From the Front Yard
I rarely pay much attention to what is growing in my front yard. My focus is on the vegetable garden and flowers planted there. But, my hydrangea plant is blooming with big pink flowers.
Hydrangeas are the reason I began this blog. Many years ago, I lived in New England and grew many types of hydrangeas. I photographed the blue ones especially, and created this blog to share hydrangea info.
A few years ago, I decided to see what a hydrangea bush would do in my Florida yard. And here it is, still growing and flowering. I pay almost no attention to it. The bush is still small, but I believe it is surviving because it is constantly in the shade of a very large shrub.
BromeliadHydrangea shrubHydrangea flower
I bought the hydrangea in May one year. That’s when you might be able to find the plants. Big box stores get them out on display for Mother’s Day. When I bought this one, it was blue, or purple-blue. The gorgeous blues I had on my New Hampshire hydrangea bushes can’t really be replicated by making the soil acidic. I believe that the pretty light blue is just natural, and comes from the earth.
Happy June, and here are some photos of the wonderful insects visiting my small Central Florida garden.
First I want to update readers on my Monarch butterflies. Yes, mine. I watched a couple of them hatch so I feel like their mom. I had three flying around the yard for quite a while, then one was found dead on the ground. After that I had two. After a while another showed up, and now there are four!
Each day, around 9AM they begin to fly. They circle the garden, fly over the lot next door, over the roof, and back. I think they’ve become used to seeing me, and fly right over my head. At least I like to think that. They are certainly enjoying the milkweed.
Monarchs
Monarch caterpillarcaterpillar camouflage Big milkweed plant
This morning I got a few photos of my monarchs on the tropical milkweed. This plant will not die back in fall, so I will need to cut it. For now, it’s one of the only flowering milkweeds in the yard. I need it for the butterflies because they love it.
Tropical milkweed is not a Florida native. Read more about it on this page. I have also been growing new milkweeds, that are all native to the state. My plan to fill the yard with good types of milkweed (for the Monarchs, who only lay eggs on milkweed) is coming to pass.
Whorled milkweedWhite swamp milkweed
I’m slowly getting some of my milkweed seedlings into the ground. The rain has quit here, or goes around us, so I’m constantly watering once again. One of my Whorled milkweed seedings is in the ground along with the White swamp variety.
A Tiny Drawback
Caterpillars keep showing up on the smallest of milkweed plants. And they move from one to another. Maybe they like munching on those tender little leaves, but the plants are being destroyed! Of course, it’s why I’m growing them in the first place – to feed the Monarch caterpillars.
These caterpillars are sneaky. They show up out of nowhere and then they disappear. I found one on the side of a pot. Then, they come back from wherever and begin eating again.
Chow timeA few minutes ago this stem had leavescaterpillar camouflage
I have surrounded these little milkweed plants with rosemary, dahlias and other things to hopefully keep things from eating the caterpillars. Between the lizards, wasps and birds, most caterpillars don’t make it. They eat all the leaves off the plants and then become food for something. I guess that’s the way it goes. Everything has to eat.
Desert Rose Bee Diving
A beautiful bee showed up the other morning. I watched him crawl way down inside each trumpet-shaped, Desert Rose flower. I don’t think he missed a single bloom!
Although this plant has a “desert” name, it grows great here in Central Florida. I’ve had it in this pot for years. It requires very little maintenance and has the brightest pink flowers.
Giant Swallowtails
As I was writing this article, I happened to see two Eastern Giant Swallowtail butterflies outside my window! The photos are not good, but I am sharing them to prove they were here – haha. The two of them flew together around the orange tree and then off into the yard. I am not good when it comes to photographing moving targets, but wanted to share these photos anyway. To see this butterfly better view the Wikipedia page and iNaturalist.
That’s it for now. Soon, I’ll be sharing about my success at growing a spaghetti squash. It was so tasty! Also, the Seminole pumpkin vines are getting long, and I’ve found one little pumpkin beginning to grow. That is exciting!
Planting the coral honeysuckle with a new obelisk for support.
A Florida native plant that I’ve wanted in the yard for some time is the Coral Honeysuckle. A tiny plant was part of my mail order selection, but the plant arrived very tiny. I’m not sure I would live long enough to see it reach a great height!
After putting my Lee Valley Obelisk (large size) together, I needed a plant to go with it. At my local nursery there were many Coral Honeysuckle plants that looked great. I chose one, popped it into my little car, and planted it the following day.
The hole was easy to dig, once I removed all the roots growing under the sand. Here in Florida, rocks are not a problem when digging, but you may come across pieces of concrete that were left behind from the building of the house.
When checking out at the nursery, the woman talked me into getting a little bag of fertilizer to add to the hole. I also mixed in some of my own compost and a bit of Happy Frog, with the sand. BUT…. before I added dirt back into the hole, I placed my obelisk around the plant. That way the poles were down nice and far into the ground.
I also planted the tiny, mail order plant right next to the bigger plant.
Spot is chosenDigging roots and sandMixing good stuff into the soilOld staking system
Once the plant was in the ground, I undid the ties holding the old trellis system. Three bamboo stakes were tied for the vine to wrap around. I planned to remove the bamboo completely, but decided to leave it in place. Much of the honeysuckle was already firmly wrapped around them.
I will train the vines to continue up the trellis. Once it gets tall, the hummingbirds should love it. I haven’t had hummingbirds since the Firespike plant lost its red flowers. Honeysuckle can loose its leaves in cold locations, but grows well in the entire state of Florida, Zones 4-10. It will bloom all Spring and Summer!
Once the mulch was down, I gave this new plant a good soaking with three fills of my Haws watering can.
Once the Coral Honeysuckle is established, it shouldn’t need much attention. I’ll keep it pruned to fit the round trellis.
Coral honeysuckle flower
The rainy season is here, and with our regular afternoon storms, this plant should do quite well.
My little hydrangea shrub is blooming with one pink flower.
A quick little post to share a photo. My hydrangea is blooming and has one pink flower. I’ve mostly neglected this entire garden because I’ve focused on growing vegetables.
This garden is by the front door and is a bit overrun with dollar weed and other things. I haven’t done a thing here – no fertilizer, very little weeding, and occasional watering from the sprinkler system.
The bromeliad is also blooming, and it always reminds me of the friend who gifted it to me. 🙂
The sandy soil is alkaline in my yard so my hydrangeas will always be pink. This shrub had purple-blue flowers when I bought it – back in March, 2019. If I chose to add an acid fertilizer the flowers might become blue again. But, I don’t really care. I am happy the plant is still doing well after a few years, although it is not very large.
If you are wondering if hydrangeas will grow here in Florida, my answer would be yes. This plant is five years old now. It gets shade all day long.
Hydrangeas Blue 