Summer of Roses

A blooming rose in Florida's summer heat that's not a Knockout Rose? That's why we love Belinda's Dream. Given enough rain (something that hasn't been much of an issue lately), it will bloom pretty much 12 months a year. It doesn't suffer from disease or fungus either. And the pink blooms are even prettier than these photos show.

My Florida Backyard is in the middle of the summer doldrums, where we start to lose sight of the flowers due to the weeds. It's nice to have a bloom like Belinda's Dream to distract us from the jungle!

Love is a Rose

Happy Valentine's Day from My Florida Backyard!

The red rose whispers of passion,

And the white rose breathes of love;

O, the red rose is a falcon,

And the white rose is a dove.

-John Boyle O'Reilly

Everything's Coming Up Roses

Wow, the Knockout Rose by our front door is happy! Although Knockouts can withstand the heat of a Florida summer, they're much happier when the cooler weather sets in. We gave ours a shot of fertilizer a few weeks ago and covered it during the freeze last week to protect the buds, and it's really paying off!

Oh, and the bees are enjoying it too...

Roses in winter... just one more reason we here in My Florida Backyard couldn't imagine living anywhere else!

Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming...

...from tender bud has sprung.

 It came, a floweret bright...

...amid the cold of winter, when half spent was the night.

La Vie en Rose

My Florida Backyard has a very special visitor right now, a snowbird from up north who finds her way to Florida for two weeks every winter - my mom! She always makes wonderful contributions to the gardens when she's in town, and this year is no exception... My Florida Backyard now has its first roses.

My mother has an amazing rose garden up north in the summer. She babies her roses and they reward her delightfully. She's been urging us to grow roses here for a long time, but I've always resisted, for several reasons. First, roses can find it very hard to deal with Florida's hot and humid summers. Second, roses take a lot of care and specialized knowledge, and I wasn't sure they were a good fit in our mostly native gardens.

So what changed my mind? First of all, a prime piece of sunny real estate became available in my gardens - the croton bush by the front door went kaput in the freeze, and since I've never been that fond of it anyway, we decided to pull it out entirely.

Second, I've become acquainted with the amazing plant called the Knock Out Rose. Fellow gardeners have informed me that this is the rose for people who don't think they can grow roses. It's disease-resistant, heat-tolerant, and almost impossible to kill, even in Florida summers. Perfect!

After removing the old croton bush, we prepped the hole with some bone meal and blood meal, and popped the rose in. We added fresh mulch around the base, but left room for the plant to breathe. We watered it in thoroughly, and voila, our Double Knock Out Rose is in place to welcome visitors!

My mom also bought a couple hybrid tea rose plants for us to try as well. We planted these in the backyard where they can get some dappled shade in the hot summer afternoons. I'll be curious to see how these little fellows fare as the season progresses.


All of gardening is a bit of an experiment... even native plants can sometimes be a challenge. I'm not sure how successful My Florida Backyard will be with its roses, but we look forward to the effort and the possible rewards!