Simple Gifts

There's something so wonderful about an afternoon to yourself at the end of a very busy week. And it's even nicer when that afternoon is warm and sunny (while the weather reports are full of the winter storm up north!), and you have a few new plants needing homes, like the kalanchoe and sedum you found that are just perfect for the rock planters, and the marigolds you rescued from the clearance rack for half price.

Nothing fancy, nothing crazy... just some simple garden tasks in the backyard that you've finally taken back from the weeds of last summer. Remember this nightmare from last fall?

You can't help but pleased to know you're finally in charge again, and your favorite bench is available for basking in the winter sun once more.

Once you're done getting your hands in the dirt, you can wander around and see what's new in the garden. Winter is a wonderful time for native Coral Honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens), and in a few weeks the hummingbirds will pass through on migration and stop to enjoy it. This afternoon, the pleasure was all mine.

I've not been alone all afternoon, of course. The tufted titmice and cardinals are visiting the feeder, and a Great Egret is stalking its dinner in the pond nearby. Even more interesting, a pair of Blue-Winged Teal are floating past, the first time we've documented this species in My Florida Backyard.

And now, as the song goes, "the purple dusk of twilight time steals across the meadows of my heart..." as well as across My Florida Backyard. 

It's not as calm and peaceful as the pictures might suggest - our neighbors are racing a dirt bike around the block, children are playing a noisy game across the lake, and it's our time of night to be in the flight path for Tampa International Airport. But the frogs are singing too, and a mockingbird in a nearby tree is trying out every tune in his repertoire. A limpkin calls in the distance, and the flapping of wings on the ponds suggests not all the ducks have settled down for the night. Nature fights for dominance in the suburbs, and rarely wins. But we do our best to focus on the simple gifts of My Florida Backyard, and let the rest slide by - at least today.

Natural Blues

As you may know, we can't really get enough salvia in My Florida Backyard. We love discovering a new species to add to the collection, so when we found Bi-color Sage (Salvia sinaloensis) a few months ago, we knew we needed it. We bought two and planted them, but before we could get any pictures, they stopped blooming. Last week's rain seems to have brought them back, though, and flower spikes have started to appear again.

This salvia is native to Mexico, as indicated by the botanical name - sinaloensis refers to the Sinaloa district of Mexico where the plant was first identified. The common name refers to the two colors of the blooms, blue with white centers.

The blooms spikes are gorgeous, but the foliage has a lot going for it too. It forms a nice low-growing mat of green and bronze leaves, making great ground-cover. Bicolor sage can be grown in full sun to part shade, and is said to be hardy all the way down to zero degrees, so we expect it to do quite well here even if we have a frost or two.

Nearly all salvias are wonderful in the butterfly garden as nectar plants (with Salvia splendens being a notable exception), so we can never have too much. Easy to grow, easy to love... those are the kinds of plants we love in My Florida Backyard!

Mexico Came Here

Fall in Florida is the season of purples. Asters, muhly, beautyberry - so many of fall's fantastic showstoppers here are purple. Another great example is Mexican Sage (Salvia leucantha), which begins blooming in early fall and lasts until first frost.

Though not native to Florida (it hails from Central American and Mexico), Mexican Sage is well-suited to our climate and shows no invasive tendencies. It has silvery green foliage that grows into almost shrub-like proportions by the end of summer (3 feet high and tall), when the flower stalks emerge and add another foot or so to the height. (Ours are still small - we planted them only a month or so ago when we got a great deal on the clearance rack at Lowe's.)

The stalks and calyxes are purple and fuzzy, while the blooms themselves are a soft white color. This late-bloomer is a favorite of pollinators like bees and butterflies, and is very easy to maintain. After the first flush of blooms has finished, cut back to the base (you'll see the new growth beneath) for continued blooming as long as the season permits.

Mexican Sage will likely die back to the ground if we have a hard frost, but will re-grow quickly once warmer weather arrives. We always love adding new salvia species to the butterfly garden in My Florida Backyard - especially those that add to the purple pageant of autumn!

Mellow Yellow

Fall is the time of purple and gold in My Florida Backyard, and one of the brightest patches of yellow comes from the Winter Cassia (Cassia bicapsularis syn. Senna bicapsularis). This shrub provides a bright burst of color from now through the first frost with its unusual flowers, but that's not the only way it provides gold in the garden. You see, cassia species are host plants for sulphur caterpillars of several varieties. Normally, these caterpillars are the same green shade as the leaves they eat. But when the flowering season arrives, the caterpillars immediately begin to dine on this delicacy, and as a result - they turn bright yellow.

The species above is an Orange-Barred Sulphur caterpillar, but Cloudless Sulphur butterflies (shown below) will lay on cassia as well, along with the smaller Sleepy Orange. They generally lay far more eggs than will ever hatch - Winter Cassia is extremely attractive to ants, and while harvesting nectar the ants will also gobble up any sulphur eggs along the way. Fortunately, sulphur butterflies seem to haunt these bushes, laying eggs from spring to first frost, so their continued success is pretty well-assured.

It should be noted that some organizations place Cassia bicapsularis on invasive species lists, but other groups, like the University of Florida Extension, are not concerned and in fact continue to recommend this bush for planting. To add to the mess, C. bicapsularis is sometimes confused with Senna pendula, a similar and possibly more invasive species. You can use your own judgment on whether to include this non-native in your own landscape, but in My Florida Backyard, we feel comfortable enough with this plant to enjoy the incredible benefits it brings to the butterfly garden, including the bright yellow caterpillars of fall.

P.S. Nov. 7: A quick update - here's a good article from FloridaGardener.com with more info about the differences between C. bicapsularis and S. pendula.

Don't Be Shy

Here in My Florida Backyard, we're lucky to live on a stormwater drainage pond, part of a huge stormwater management system designed to prevent flooding and filter out contaminants before they can drain into the groundwater. This pond also adds a wetland aspect to our environment, bringing in wading birds, alligators, and water-loving plants we wouldn't have otherwise. We love to check out the shoreline for new sightings, like this cute little wildflower we found the other day.

We pulled out our Wildflowers of Florida Field Guide and found it on the first page of the "yellow flowers" section. It's Shyleaf (Aeschynomene americana), a native plant found in wetlands throughout Florida. It grows about 2 feet by 2 feet, in a rather feathery fashion that reminds us of Partridge Pea.

In fact, both Partridge Pea and Shyleaf are in the Pea Family (Fabaceae), as you can pretty easily tell by looking at the flowers, and by the fact that it spreads by seeds from pods. It prefers moist soil, so it's often found along the edge of lakes and rivers. As you might have guessed from the name, Shyleaf folds up its leaves when touched, and it's a host plant for the Barred Yellow (Eurema daira) butterfly, a fairly small pale yellow butterfly with a green caterpillar.

It's always fun to find a new plant in and around My Florida Backyard, and when it's a native wildflower, that's even better. When you keep your eyes open, you never know what you might find!

Flowers are Red

As we work to rehab the gardens after the long humid days of summer, we've been adding new plants here and there. One of our new additions to the butterfly garden is a small shrub called Peregrina, or Spicy Jatropha (Jatropha integerrima). It has interestingly-shaped shiny green leaves and delicate small red flowers that butterflies love.

Though small now, this shrub has the ability to grow up 10 feet tall. We'll probably keep it trimmed to 3 - 4 feet, encouraging it to grow wider instead of taller. Spicy Jatropha is native to Cuba and Hispaniola, and is sensitive to hard freezes, though it will re-grow even if killed to the ground. We will most likely cover it if any especially cold weather threatens.

This is a popular plant with butterflies, especially zebra longwings. The little flowers are less than an inch across, but very beautiful up close. All parts of this plant are toxic, so don't plant if you have dogs that like to chew on your shrubbery, and be careful when pruning as those with sensitive skin can have reactions to the milky sap.

Though we try to focus on native plants in My Florida Backyard, some carefully chosen non-natives are fine in any garden. This plant doesn't really show any signs of being invasive in Central Florida, so we can plant and enjoy it in good conscience!

Georgia on My Mind

Last spring, we bought a neat little native wildflower from Wilcox Nursery over in Largo. We were intrigued by the yummy minty smell at the time, and the promise of hordes of tiny flowers in the fall. Well, fall has arrived, and the Georgia Calamint (Calamintha georgiana) has delivered the promised buds and blooms, the sheer number of which are hard to appreciate in this photograph.

Up close, the flowers resemble those of Florida Pennyroyal (Piloblepis rigida), another native member of the Mint family (Lamiaceae). The flavor and smell of mint from the foliage has a bit of savory spice to it, which is most likely why its other common name is Georgia Basil. Some write of using this plant as seasoning or for teas.

Our plant is fairly small still, though it's said to grow 2 feet high by 3 feet wide. This species is actually not really found in the wild this far south, though it's common a little further north, including (as you might guess) Georgia. Here in Florida, it's only found in a few counties in the extreme north. It does well here, though, and apparently can be propagated by cuttings if they're kept sufficiently moist.

Though this small plant hasn't put on a whole lot of new growth in the last six months, it seems to have established itself well. It's said to be deciduous, so the small needle-leaves will apparently fall off during the winter. In the meantime, we're in peak flowering season, which will last a couple of weeks. Bees, small butterflies, and tiny nectar-seeking ants seem to be loving it, and so are we.

'Tis Autumn

At last, fall weather has arrived. The days are still plenty warm, but the nights are generally cooler, and good breezes have made working outdoors pleasant again. We spent the weekend cleaning up the backyard and putting in a few new plants. We love to hit the markdown rack at the Lowe's garden center, where perfectly good plants that just need some love are often available at a bargain. This week, we found some Mexican Sage that just needed to be cut back and watered well (more on that in another post) along with some wonderful Anise Hyssop plants.

Anise Hyssop (Agastache foeniculum) isn't a true hyssop but, like the Agastache rupestris we planted last spring, it's a member of the mint family (Lamiaceae). The tiny flowers attract bees and butterflies by the dozens, and humans enjoy the licorice scent of the foliage.

Anise Hyssop is native to the northern part of the U.S. and Canada. That makes it perfect for growing in Florida in the cooler months. If we cover it from hard freezes, we should have it right through spring. It likes sunny spots for best flowering, and will need a little supplemental watering during the driest spells. Cutting back the flower stalks after they bloom will help encourage further flowers. Northern growers note that this plant re-seeds prolifically, but I don't expect that to be too much of a problem here, as it is unlikely to survive the hot wet summers.

At the butterfly garden where I work, Anise Hyssop is one of the biggest draws for butterflies. Here in My Florida Backyard, we were especially pleased to get these plants because they were marked down to half-price ($5 each for plants in 2.25 gallon pots) even though they seemed to be in perfect condition. They were a fantastic bargain and are helping to replenish the butterfly garden as we head into the wonderful months ahead.

Orange in Bloom

This spring, we planted a variety of new canna bulbs we ordered online. Cannas come in a wide selection of colors, most of which aren't available locally, but you can find some interesting options online. Since we planted them, they've grown well, putting on plenty of large green leaves, but have been very slow to bloom. This past week, at last, one of the new plants finally deigned to show some color.

This isn't one of the showier cannas we planted. It's called Tangelo, and on closer inspection, you can see the orange blooms are actually touched with yellow.

Fortunately, the occasional invasion from canna skipper caterpillars don't really damage the blooms, though they do cause some leaf damage. As wildlife gardeners, we tolerate these caterpillars rather than use pesticides, although if we spot the eggs before they hatch, we scrape them off. They're fascinating caterpillars, as we've noted before in previous posts.

We're still waiting on some of the more exotic-colored flowers to make their first appearances, like Cleopatra and Yellow King Humbert. We planted them in an area with part shade, which is usually fine for Cannas this far south, but we're wondering if this could be keeping them from flowering. Fortunately, since they're bulbs, they'll be easy to transplant this winter or spring if we need to.

In the meantime, we'll appreciate the blooms we have. Autumn is here, according to the calendar, so hopefully soon the temperatures will drop and we'll be outside doing clean-up and new fall plantings. We can hardly wait!

Wild Turkey

We were pleased to find a few patches of what has to be the best-named wildflower out there growing near the lake in My Florida Backyard. It seems like such a nondescript little plant to have such a silly and fun name, but there it is... Phyla nodiflora, commonly known as "Turkey Tangle Fogfruit", or sometimes just Frogfruit.

This little native plant is actually pretty important for butterfly gardeners - the Common Buckeye, White Peacock, and Phaon Crescent all use it as a caterpillar host plant. Smaller butterflies nectar on the little purple and white flowers too, so a patch or two of this can be very valuable.

As for the fun and crazy name of this plant... well, that's anyone's guess. No amount of searching has turned up any clue as to who gave this wildflower its common name, or why they chose that of all names. If you have any clue, please drop us a comment. We really hate unsolved mysteries in My Florida Backyard!

Orange Wings

Even with the very dry weather we had leading up to our recent welcome rains, the Golden Dewdrop (Duranta erecta) has been putting on new growth and blooming happily in the butterfly garden, in soft shades almost reminiscent of an Impressionist painting.

The soft colors quickly fade to the background when the orange wings of the Gulf Fritillary butterfly appear, as they do throughout the day, every day, in My Florida Backyard. This is by far our most common butterfly visitor, and our most populous caterpillar, as the tattered state of our passionvine can attest.

The ever-changing palette of colors in My Florida Backyard is always worth watching, in wet weather and dry.

Live and Let Live

So, it's summer in Florida. It's hot. Really hot. The kind of hot where you sweat just thinking about going outside, and can suffer heat stroke on your way to the mailbox. Yup, it's hot. And, I'm sorry to say, that means we've been neglecting the gardens in My Florida Backyard. The time for new plantings is past for now, and we're relying on the gardens to do their best with what they have, which is why it was so nice to go outside the other day and discover that the Purple Coneflower (Echinacea purpurea) was flowering for the first time in months.

Echinacea is a little out of its range in Central Florida - something about our climate means that while the plants can survive, they certainly don't thrive like they do up north. Rather than growing to 3 or 4 feet tall, here they tend to top out around 12 inches or so. But given the right conditions, they do still flower well, and it seems that, without doing anything in particular, we've finally started providing the right conditions for our Echinacea. It's not very tall, but it has more flowers than ever before. Apparently, it thrives on benign neglect!

Our Echinacea is in the butterfly garden, where it receives morning sun and afternoon shade. The soil there is dry and fairly poor. It's currently nearly buried by more robust plants nearby, and to be honest, we'd forgotten it was there. We had only a few anemic-looking blooms on it last year, and left it on its own. It's rewarding us by coming back with vigor, perhaps proving that whatever doesn't kill you only makes you stronger!

Echinacea is well-known by both medicinal and butterfly gardeners, and it's nice to have it finally doing reasonably well. It will never be like the coneflower up north (see our pictures from Ohio last summer for proof), but we love it for doing the best it can in a very difficult environment!

Lily Was Here

In honor of the rain that finally fell in My Florida Backyard last night, today we're featuring the rain lily (Zephyranthes atamasca), a really great little Florida wildflower. Rain lilies, as their name implies, pop up after a good rainstorm in the spring and early summer. They are native to the eastern U.S. from Virginia down through northern Florida, and often seem to grow where no one remembers planting them, especially in the middle of grassy lawns.

Rain lilies grow from bulbs, and will definitely spread over time. If you have some growing randomly in your lawn and you'd like to move them to a new place, simply dig up the bulbs and transplant. You can expect several periods of bloom during the spring and summer, usually a few days after a heavy rain following a dry spell. They're the sort of flower you tend to forget is there until they suddenly surprise you with delicate color and subtle fragrance.

Rain lilies often figure fondly in the memories of long-time Florida residents. Because they're a native wildflower, they've been around since the early days of settlement, popping up just like fleabane or toadflax but with a more cultivated feel. The ones in My Florida Backyard are a soft rosy pink when they first bloom, fading to almost white in a few days. We like to snap off a handful and bring them inside to a small bud vase, where they'll last for several days.

If you don't have rain lilies in your yard, but would like to have them, you can purchase bulbs online from places like American Meadows. This is a simple, elegant, easy-to-grow flower that anyone can plant and enjoy. We're so glad to have them (and the rain that makes them bloom!) here in My Florida Backyard.

Blueberry Kisses

Back in January, when we spent some time dreaming over seed catalogs, one of the new blooms that caught our eye was Vinca 'First Kiss Blueberry'. Park Seed offered this deep purple-blue version of one of our favorite annuals, and we decided it was worth a try.

Our results haven't been too bad, and the color itself matches the advertised picture pretty well, although the bloom fades a bit after a few days. We started 10 seeds around the middle of February, and 5 of them sprouted well (it took nearly 30 days) and grew into healthy plants. They started to bloom about two weeks ago, and we're hoping the plants will become bushier and covered with more blooms, as vincas usually do once they get well established.

We're keeping them in a planter on the porch for now while they get stronger and more vigorous, though we may eventually plant them outside. Vincas are wonderfully hardy once they get going - once their root systems get established, they weather heat and drought without blinking an eye. They also tend to re-seed pretty readily, so we're hoping to gather some seed from these vincas and grow more of this wonderful color to spread around My Florida Backyard in the future.

American Beauty

It's no secret that one of our favorite native shrubs is the American Beautyberry (Callicarpa americana). Although it's deciduous, it's an interesting plant every day of the year. The berries that appear in fall stay with the bush through the leafless days of winter (at least until the birds eat them), and when the soft green leaves appear in the spring, the delicate pink blooms won't be far behind.

Most people are familiar with the purple-berried version of C. americana, but on a recent trip to Wilcox Nursery in Largo, we found the white-berried version at last, and we snapped one up to add to our Beautyberry hedge. At this time of year, the leaves and flowers look exactly the same, but we look forward to seeing the white berries mixed with the purple when fall arrives.

If you're new to American Beautyberry, check out some of our previous posts to learn more. If you're already a Beautyberry lover and you don't have the white-berried version yet, check with Wilcox or your local native plant nursery to see if they have any in stock. We're very glad to have one at last in My Florida Backyard!

Mint Condition

This neat little shrub is another of our purchases from Wilcox Nursery last weekend. It's called Georgia Basil or Georgia Calamint (Calamintha georgiana). While it is native to Florida, it's very rare here, found only in a few of the northern counties. It's much more common throughout much of zone 8, including Alabama and Georgia (as you might expect from the name).

Calamint is a member of the Lamiaceae family, which includes culinary herbs like mint and basil. Interestingly, that's exactly what Calamint smells like - a combination of mint and basil. It can be used as seasoning in cooking, or even in making teas.

Practical uses aside, look at these little flowers! Though calamint supposedly blooms only in the fall, ours has one stem covered in blooms right now, and truly it was these little flowers that made us notice the plant in the first place. The flowers themselves are very attractive to bees and smaller butterflies, making it a nice addition to the wildlife garden.

Calamint prefers sandy well-drained soil, and will tolerate full to part sun. Since we live in zone 9b, a little to the south of its common range, we chose to plant it in only part sun, thinking the full sun of summer might be a bit too much for it. It's described as an evergreen, growing to about 2 feet maximum, so it's perfect in the corner of the butterfly garden. We look forward to seeing it this fall when, we've been promised, it will be completely covered in delightful blooms. All in all, a great little native that we're glad to add to My Florida Backyard!