I am embarking on my sixth year of gardening in South Florida. What a ride. As always, I am amazed by what will grow in infertile beach sand. My summer favorites have changed with my gardening location. I used to love Hydrangeas, Roses and Clematis. Now I am loving the contents of this vase and more…
The smorgasboard of plant material that grows in South Florida continues to boggle my mind. I love Bromeliads and there are 200,000 varieties! Mind boggling. My garden is on the northern end of tropical, so the trick of siting the plant and maintaining a proper environment has been a challenge. Then, there’s always the native plants to consider.
So, my new favorites are a little bit of everything.
The white flower is a Tropical Gardenia (Tabernaemontana divericata) – not a true Gardenia, mine was rescued from the underbrush and is now recovering at 8 – 10 feet tall, I continue to prune the jungly interlopers.
The red flowers with blue tips are Miniata Bromeliads, Aechmea is the genus, I think – then again there are 200,000 others?!
The pink and red Salvia are Tropical Red Salvia (Salvia coccinea) – a reseeding native perennial that never dies but doesn’t look very good unless it is raining.
The foliage. Well, Asian Sword Fern is hard to beat in an arrangement and the garden. Considered invasive, it would take a bulldozer to remove it from my garden. Finally, the striped foliage, the indestructible New Zealand Flax (Dianella) if only there was a dwarf variety…. It would be my new favorite.
The Shrub Queen 
I also had to adapt to new plants and a new way of gardening in semi-tropical Texas. Salvias seem to do well everywhere.
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I think Houston would be a trial for me. Actually, Salvias and probably Oxalis are the only two plants I think everyone I know on WordPress can grow. Can you grow Oxalis?
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The Oxalis grow themselves. Some, the lavender flower kind grow like weeds. I have the purple leaf and white flower ones (don’t really know their names) and I will find them growing in the yard, but they are not as invasive. Salvia are my salvation 🙂 as they will grow anywhere and the critters don’t eat them. I need to count how many different kinds I have.
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I thought I knew what to plant when I started my garden here, but it has been a steep learning curve. I always love your exotic vases.
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Absolutely the same here, I have killed a fair number of plants that “should live here” BAH! Thank you, embracing the tropical madness.
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We are not used to quite such variable gardening conditions in the UK – there is a huge contrast between roses, clematis and hydrangeas and your new tropical favourites! The colours and textures somehow always seem to shout ‘tropical’ and it is good that they have quickly usurped your old favourites. That glossy fern is a brilliant foil for the scarlets and other slightly less bright colours – gorgeous!
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Thank you, quite variable is a good way to put it! There is really a tiny portion of the US with this plant palette, South Florida, a bit of Southern California and Hawaii.
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It’s interesting to know this, still being very much a Geographer at heart – thanks!
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Your vases are always a surprise and a learning experience for me. And the drama of those big leaves and flower spikes is lovely. I find it hard enough to cope with changing weather/conditions so I can’t imagine gardening in another climate.
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I have been on a six year learning experience! Every now and again I wonder how many plants I have learned?
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Always interesting to view your exotics….
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Thanks, I agree. Never know what I will find.
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As water becomes more of an issue and summer temperatures continue to soar, I feel as though I’m constantly adapting my garden to new conditions. I’m getting more and more into bromeliads myself, even though our climate isn’t nearly as hospitable for them as yours. Flowers are relative rarities on my plants. Do you fertilize yours, or is it just all that lovely rain that makes them flush with flowers?
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Actually, a lot of the Bromeliads are just foliage.Picking the variety that flowers is the key. I am finding a fair number of passalongs that flower. Rarely fertilize them, only fill the cups when it is very dry.
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I love the drape and flow of your arrangement. Well done!
Learning what works in the garden is on-going. While I try to site my plants optimally, I won’t fuss with a temperamental plant. I call it the Darwin School of Gardening– survival of the fittest! 😉 Looks like you’ve got some winners there.
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I absolutely agree, Eliza! Finding a good place is one thing-replacing the dirt, not happening.
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I love this vase and especially the glossy leaves and the flower of the Tropical Gardenia!
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Beautiful. The red flowers with blue tips are so cool. I missed the blue tips at first.
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It’s always amazing to me to see what you can grow in Florida! I love bromeliads but they’re snowbirds here, coming inside before the cold weather arrives. What a fun time of discovery you’re having. I remember how amazed I was at the variety of plants we could grow when I moved from zone 3 to zone 8.
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Dianella is New Zealand flax? We know Phormium tenax as New Zealand flax. There is a cultivar (of Phormium tenax) known as ‘Jack Sprat’ with grassy bronze foliage. It does not compare to dianella, but supposedly stays smaller. I find that it is like ‘Peter Pan’ agapanthus, in the sense that not all plants labeled as such are created equal. Some are quite small and grassy, but others are bigger than dianella.
Anyway, your flowers rock like always, especially since there are a few that I can not grow here. Even the salvias that we can grow here are not like those.
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