Open Greenhouse & Plant Swap, Saturday, May 7, from 9 am to 1 pm, 602 Ronele Drive, Brandon, FL 33511
Does it feel like we went from freezing temperatures to cooking practically overnight this year! We’ve been hard at work but you can’t tell from the street. The greenhouse is mostly green again, although it still needs work, but we’re open for the first Saturday in May – back to 9 am to 1 pm.
If you have fussy kids, you need to be here! First – we’ll have a dozen potted Everglades tomato seedlings ready to go in the ground, along with a handful of Tough Boys that need to go in immediately, while it’s still cool enough for them to set fruit. The Everglades are the only tomatoes that will go all summer long, and they’re the perfect size for kids. They’ll stop and eat them even before you get a chance to pick them and bring them inside.
And now is the time to check out the sweet tasty fruit on our mulberries and take some cuttings home. They’re the favorites of every kid I know, and the birds love them too.
Some of the other plants we’ll be swapping are the ones that made it through three nights in the 20s. Even better, most of them are easy to share!
I was gifted a Simpson stopper shortly after we moved here 13 years ago, and it’s been trucking right along. It has gorgeous shiny green leaves, little white flowers in the spring, followed by pretty red berries in the fall, so it’s an attractive addition to the landscape. The best part, however, is that it was totally unfazed by the cold. You can’t even tell what it’s been through! And all those years, it’s been throwing volunteers into the wooded copse where it’s been growing. They’ve been overshadowed by more flamboyant neighbors like firebush and salvia, but now they’re ready to shine – and to share! Please plan on putting them in pots for a couple of months, maybe until rainy season, and then they grow in either sun or shade.
We give away tons of American elderberry every month because people want to grow it for the health benefits, but it may have an even more important wildlife benefit because it’s still blooming. What looks like a big white bloom is actually dozens of tiny white flowers that are feeding the pollinators and butterflies emerging from the cold. If you don’t pick the berries, they’ll attract dozens of birds. The literature says they thrive in wet locations (and they do), but they also do well even in the driest parts of my yarden where the only water they ever get is rain. They do spread by runners, so you’ll need to be prepared to allow them extra space or plan on digging them up.
My Louis Phillippe rose – also known as the Florida cracker rose – didn’t miss a beat in the cold either. They root pretty easily in water and I intentionally haven’t trimmed this back so it needs it!
And watching the thousands of areca palms dying back in cold weather made me really appreciate the fact that my lady palms still look phenomenal. I’ve seen comments about them being invasive, and they have spread since we moved in 14 years ago, but I’ve never seen one just pop up somewhere it wasn’t planted. They have giant roots and you may want to transplant them into a pot you can keep in the shade to start, but there’s plenty here to share.
Along with you-digs and cuttings, we have a nice selection of seeds to share, including zinnias (fast-growing color), native red salvia, dwarf poinciana that got zinged in the cold but are coming back from the ground, papaya, sorrel, blanket flower and Dombeya (Florida hydrangea) that froze to the ground but is coming back already.
See you then!