Dill is a cool season herb in South Florida. I usually have several plants in pots, this year I have really enjoyed the dill and there is no foliage left to eat! Long Island Mammoth Dill is my favorite variety, the current plant is producing seed heads and I have been enjoying them in flower arrangements and will save some seed for next year. I usually don’t like the seed for eating but have recently learned to make sandwich bread, so I am going to give a dill seed loaf a try. Everything else I made from this plant has been Dillicious. Including this herbal sweet scented concoction in my mother’s crystal rose bowl.
My dillicious vase this week includes:
Fireworks in this vase are from dill seed heads and flowers in chartreuse and orange tubular flowers from the Firebush (Hamelia patens)
Another delicious flower appealing to a different sense is the white Tropical Gardenia (Tabernaemontana divaricata). These flowers lend a heavenly scent to the garden at night. They are sometimes called the Pinwheel Gardenia, there is a flatter flowering variety that looks more like a pinwheel.
That’s all from SoFla this week. To traverse distant gardens and visit via vase follow this link to Cathy’s blog.
Tropinative is a word I invented (I think) to describe what plants inhabit my garden. I like tropicals and native plants, a lot of color and texture and plants that appeal to pollinators. I dislike anything that requires a lot of water, lawn, pesticides, herbicides and I really like plants that live without too much drama. This is how my front garden ended up with a native Turkeytangle Frogfruit (lawn) and a Bromeliad border on one side with an English cottage style perennial border on the other side. Kind of mind boggling.
This vase accurately reflects what easily grows here. I haven’t made much effort to water any of it – I think it has been two weeks since it rained. I water herbs and other touchy flowers. The amount of water necessary for a decent lawn in South Florida is appalling.
The vase is a thrift store find I have enjoyed. Here’s what is in the vase – the tropicals.
Purple flower with pink stems is a Portea ‘Candy’ Bromeliad; the white flowers are Tropical Gardenias (Tabernaemontana diviricata); rough textured stems and foliage with little blue flowers are Blue Porterweed (Stachytarpeta jamaicaensis)
Mostly natives are in the top of the vase:
The natives in the vase are: in pink clouds, Muhly Grass (Muhlenbergia capillaris); off white spikes are Juba Bush (Iresine diffusa); ferns are Boston Fern (Nephrolepis exaltata). Non native, varigated foliage is Tasmanian Flax Lily (Dianella tasmanica).
The Gardenia and Juba Bush have scented the foyer with a lovely floral fragrance. It makes traversing through the front door more enjoyable.
That is all from South Florida this Monday. I was on GardenRant last year, this is my rant for this year! Use less water.
I am holding out hope for cooler weather as the dog days of summer officially end on August 11. I doubt that will bring an end to our daily high temperatures of over 90 F, but one can dream. September brings an average high of 89. October is when the real cool down begins. Rain is still copious and all the more tropical summer flowers are relishing the moisture and flowering with reckless abandon.
I challenged myself this week to create a vase with gardenias that wasn’t all white or seemingly formal. This is the easy, breezy, country casual gardenia vase. Tropical version.
The vase started out in a mason jar. Very casual country. The clear glass showed too much of the weird and thick tropical stems of the bromeliad and palm. Who ever thought stems would be distracting? The vase needed clothes. A basket a friend sent with a gardenia plant (I killed it, G. jasminoides) was pressed into service.
The red and yellow flowers are parrotflowers (Heliconia psittacorum ‘Lady Di’); the red and blue tipped flowers are miniata bromeliads (Aechmea miniata); white flowers are tropical gardenias (Tabernaemontana diviricata); white green stems with berries are adonidia palm (Veitchii merrillii) unripe fruit; striped foliage is martin bromeliad (Neoregelia martinii); ferny accents are asparagus fern.
Another view:
Thanks to Cathy at ramblinginthegarden.wordpress.com for hosting this weekly array of floral abundance. Follow the link to see more vases.
The Tropical Gardenias (Tabernaemontana diviricata) have been flowering madly. I have been waiting for an opportunity to cut them for a vase. The shrub is over ten feet tall, so blooms have to be on the low side. Several flowers were within reach on Sunday morning and I cut all of them.
Last week, Susie’s heirloom teapot vase made me remember mine inspiring its use as a vase. This teapot was a wedding gift my parents received in 1950. It was used to brew iced tea as long as I can remember – the interior of the pot is stained tea colored. The white tea towel was unearthed in an old friend’s grandmother’s house. The grandmother was in her 90’s in the 1980’s and the towel belonged to her mother – who knows how old it is. I was gifted the towel as it matched my monogram. They certainly don’t make things like this anymore. The G.
The Tropical Gardenias are joined by two types of Salvia, ‘White Flame’ and Tropical Red; foliage is Asian Sword Ferns and a few sprigs of Golden Dewdrop (Duranta repens).
Happy Monday!! I’ll be sniffing my foyer enjoying the fragrance of Gardenias..
It’s Saturday morning and time to look around the garden for new things. I have been noticing pleasant fragrances upon stepping out on my porch in the morning and did a little detective work. Warmer weather and longer days bring the fragrant flowers into bloom. Nothing says tropical summer like the scent of Frangipani in the air.
This is a locally common Frangipani (Plumeria spp.) I have no idea what variety it is, but these are everywhere and likely shared as cuttings for decades. A friend gave me a cutting several years ago, it is now about four feet tall. They make a nice small tree, if you know how to prune them. I don’t, though it is big enough to give it a try this winter when dormancy reappears.
The first Tropical Gardenia (Tabernaemontana divaricata) of the season. These are not as fragrant as the Gardenia jasminoides, but leave a light scent at night. The Frangipani are also more noticeable at night.
I pruned the Sweet Almond Bush (Aloysia virgata) rather severely about a month ago. It is rewarding me with fresh, deep green leaves and a flush of fragrant flowers. This fragrance is more noticeable during daylight hours, so I have round the clock scents right now.
Now I am wobbling into things that smell weird. This is a New Gold Lantana. I have issues with this plant from working on the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, where it was a theme plant. There were so many plants around town, I never wanted to see another one. I guess it took me 27 years to get over it. I bought two in pots last year as they are sterile and a great butterfly plant. They remained in their pots until a couple of weeks ago and look at them now.
Gallardias or Indian Blankets (Gallardia pulchella). Another wildflower that does well in hot Florida sand. Despite being considered native for years they have been ruled non native. These have jumped into the crushed shell walkways for some reason. Left in place and stepped on sometimes, they are thriving with no water and growing in the shell. Amazing. Do I care if they are native? Not one bit.
Presenting the ‘Alaska’ Nasturtium. I planted a package of these seeds a little late (February, I think. December 1 is the time here) The seeds in the beds came up, gasped and died. A few in pots grew up and flowered. My opinion on these is the varigated foliage looks a bit sickly instead of crisply attractive. Back to Jewel Mix Nasturtiums, here’s hoping I will remember in December.
It’s September in Florida. Eventually a hurricane is going to take aim at my garden. We spent the weekend watching weather models, called spaghetti models because the paths on the models look like cooked pasta. I am on the east coast of Florida and currently out of the area predicted to be affected by Hurricane Ian. Thus far, 35 mph winds are forecast here as the hurricane passes on the other side of the peninsula. The feeling is relief mixed with concern for my fellow Floridians and a certain trepidation that no one really knows what Ian will do.
Here is the current spaghetti:
Back to the flowers, this does look a bit like a spaghetti model with the linear stems of the flowers.
The purple berries are from Beautyberry (Calliocarpa americana); blue flowers are Blue Porterweed (Stachytarpheta jamaicaensis); white flowers are Sweet Almond Bush (Aloysia virgata); and a few sprigs of Muhly Grass (Muhlbergia capillaris) in pale pink.
Late season Tropical Gardenias (Tabernaemontana diviricata) grace the edge of the vase. The cobalt blue vase was a gift from my brother.The Gardenias and Sweet Almond flowers add a nice fragrance to my foyer.
Time will tell which piece of pasta was the path Ian takes. Until then, no garden cleanup will be attempted.
According to some Floridians, the bitter end of Snowbird season is Mother’s Day. (Snowbirds are people from cold climates who spend the winter in Florida). Mother’s Day is May 8. I suppose that is a cultural and seasonal shift. As a year round resident, I welcome the departure of the crowds. I also welcome the shift to the classic warm season scents in my garden.
This week, the Frangipani and Gardenia started flowering. They are about 20 feet apart and to stand between the two fragrances and inhale…ahhh, and then realize the traffic is dying down, too.
Life is good.
The combination of the two scents is lemony and so reminiscent of my childhood in Atlanta, it left me looking around for a flowering Southern Magnolia (Magnolia grandiflora) – there aren’t any in my garden. Southern Magnolias will grow here, at the far end of their range, usually looking puny, thin and in search of a large martini to cope with all the Snowbirds. Too much heat and stress for the iconic evergreen Southern Belles to remain fresh and beautiful.
I am not sure what inspired the fragrant flowers in my garden, though I can imagine the arrival of some long overdue rain helped things along, unless the plants are glad to see the Snowbirds leave, too…
Closer views:
The clear yellow flower in the back is Frangipani (Plumeria spp), this is a passalong from a friend, I would love to know the name; blue flowers are Chinese Forget Me Nots (Cynoglossum amiable); white flowers are Tropical Gardenias (Tabernaemontana diviricata), not a true Gardenia, but close enough for me; chartreuse flowers are my next generation Envy Zinnias; yellow flower in foreground is Goldmoss Sedum (Sedum acre)
The other side:
There are a couple of white Nigella lurking behind the Gardenias…
When September starts winding down and the Fall Equinox approaches there is an ever so subtle change in the weather and South Floridians feel less torched. Or maybe less scorched. The daily high temperatures are less than 90 degrees F/32 C. Eighty eight degrees with less humidity is refreshingly cooler. Sort of.
While searching for vase contents, I was happy to see a new bough of flowers on the Tropical Gardenias, then decided to cut the Flaming Torch Bromeliads as the centerpiece of the arrangement. The flowers are most likely courtesy of many late afternoon thundershowers in the past weeks.
A closer view:
The pink flowers are Flaming Torch Bromeliads (Billbergia pyramidalis), AKA Hurricane Bromeliads as they typically flower during peak Atlantic hurricane season. These are sort of a passalong plant in South Florida. I cannot recall ever seeing one for sale, these were shared with me.The white flowers are Tropical Gardenias (Tabernaemontana diviricata) – I am wondering how long these will flower, it seems I have had them most of the summer off and on. Green dreadlocks and varigated foliage belong to the ‘Java White’ Copperleaf (Acalypha wilkesiana). I am not sure it the dreadlocks are buds or seeds or flowers, so I took a close up.
Any thoughts? I have three groups of Java White in the garden and this is the only one with dreadlocks. The mystery continues.
The past few nights the fragrance from my Tropical Gardenias tickled my senses and compelled me to focus on the flowers in this week’s vase. Then I looked them up and found online sources calling them a Crepe Jasmine tree? Most locals call them Tropical or Florida Gardenias. Botanically they are Tabernaemontana divaricata, belonging to the same family as the more common Gardenia jasminoides but much more tropical, growing in the warmest areas of South Florida. They are bigger than common Gardenias, with oversized, glossy foliage and easily reach heights of ten feet. Additionally, nearly bug free and don’t need any coddling. I found mine buried under some overgrown shrubbery in the back yard and cut it free. It is probably 12 feet tall. A little effort is expended to reach and cut the flowers.
A closer view:
The cut flowers were arranged with most of their foliage intact. I pruned a bit of the foliage to emphasize the flowers and then added some cuttings of flowers from my Adonidia Palm (Veitchia merrilli) The vase, a thrift store find, is my favorite squatty vase.
I adore the flowers on palm trees, having never seen any before moving to Florida. They seem like an architectural element.
The palm flower.
Thank you to Cathy at http://www.ramblinginthegarden.wordpress.com for hosting this weekly gardening meme. I enjoy seeing vases of flowers from gardeners all over the world. Follow the link to see more vases.
I find something of interest every week in my garden and share it with others gardeners via Six on Saturday. To see more interesting items from other gardens, visit Jon at http://www.thepropagatorblog.wordpress.com.
Above is a Gopher Tortoise, ambling down my shell driveway. These tortoises are endemic to Florida, large – this one is probably 18 inches long and long lived, 50 to 60 years. They are known for making gigantic burrows and sharing them with all sorts of other animals, rattlesnakes included. I am not sure where this one lives. They are not known to travel very far from home and shouldn’t be moved unless necessary. He turned and went back up my driveway and continued down the street.
This morning I noticed the scents of summer are coming on. Several of my neighbors have large Arabian Jasmine shrubs and they are at their sweetest in the moonlight and early in the morning. I don’t have one, don’t need one! In my garden the Tropical Gardenia (Tabernaemontana diviricata) – above and Sweet Almond Bush (Aloysia virgata) – below are flowering and there are buds on the Moonvine.
I planted my summer veg – edible Hibiscus. These are called Roselles (Hibiscus sabdariffa). The leaves and flowers are edible. These grow to about four feet and the flowers are harvested in the fall. The calyx of the flower is harvested and used to make tea, jam and jelly – tastes a bit like cranberries. Young leaves may be used in salad similar to Arugula.
I have harvested and eaten my first Glenn Mango. These are good, low in fiber and have a coconut mango flavor.
This is a Pickering Mango. It is still ripening on the counter. I had these last year and they are yummy.
The Shrub Queen 