Greetings Growers & Lovers of Green Things

The Tropical Grower welcomes you to the online version of Our Garden. Check out our What’s Bloomn’ slideshow featuring last week’s flowers, cruz the latest topics at the Blog Page for information, enjoy the Photos, or just check out what’s happening this week in Garden Dirt. While we are Growing Tropical, growing is for everyone, and we’re here to share the green.

Garden Dirt

December 16, 2024

It’s Sooo Pretty

While the Lazy trend stuck around early last week with the cold, (Grumpy Old Man Buc Dog even woke me up in the middle of the night because he was cold and wanted to snuggle), we got to spend some extended time in Our Garden late last week as it warmed up.  Woo-Hoo.  There isn’t an exclamation because it’s hard to move past Lazy once you’ve reached that point.  LOL!

My motivation had to climb the hill past a chilly bite, the sun with that harsh wintery glare, and Our Garden dried and crispy around the edges. It’s good there’s the Holiday Season to cheer up the place.  The Lights, the Food, the Good Cheer.  Motivation is finally making a rebound.  Finally.

Around Our Garden

The warming weather was the best motivator. I spent most of the weekend in the yard.  It rained all day Saturday.  Woo-Hoo!  I was inside the Cage Match, lifting the fallen satellite panel with a jack brace and securing it with a storm bar and aluminum secondary brace.  Those were added in addition to the rod iron trellises, repositioned.  

The Dragon Fruit Cactus is way overweight.  It needs to be 10 pounds, each piece, before it will bloom.  Any added support is helpful as I trim up the Cactus really good this winter.  It’s obviously past time when it starts caving in the ceiling.  Oops.  It will be a long drawn out process.  I knew this day was coming.

I also spent an entire day trimming berries off the Schefflera, and I probably have a full day more to go.  Dang.  We always have some berries, which turn into seeds, but this year the plant by the pool, we are training to shade the Orchids fence, is completely covered in berries.  Since we do not want baby Schefflera sprouts all over everywhere, those berries need to go.  So, we’re removing all of them.  For more on Schefflera care try How to Grow Schefflera Outside.

Harvest

Last week I found a baby tomato.  Finally.  You might recall in our post last week I was hoping the baby tomatoes were just too small to see.  Indeed, that was the case.  For one.  I didn’t find any more.  LOL!  It doesn’t matter, one made me happy.  More would be good too.  The Habanero peppers were also looking joyous, growing away.  It’s a good thing we have people who love those because they do not belong in Our Kitchen.

3 Turnips and 2 Eggplants were Harvested last week.  I took them the same day as some Big Ole Swiss Chard leaves.  Yum.  We were thinking Turnips in the Twice Baked Potatoes.  Our menu is still fluent at this point.  It makes me chuckle.  There were also several Oranges and a couple more Key Limes.  Yeah, that’s me smiling.

Flowers

Because I got a fun shot of the Variegated Hibiscus and we couldn’t decide between the tree flower pics, we’re Featuring the Hibiscus this week.  The new plant in the back has been consistently showing the prettiest red blooms for months.  It was time.

Both the Anniversary Tree, that’s the Purple Hong Kong Orchid, and the Ligustrum tree started popping flowers last week.  It’s so pretty.  I’m particularly fond of blooming trees.  Since the Bougainvillea, all definitely tree size, are blazing bright pink, the color contrast sets everything apart.  And, it’s so pretty.  I’m sorry, did I mention how pretty it is?  LOL!  The rain just made everything brighter.  I’m excited.

Those crazy Laelia Orchids on the fence just keep going, changing from dark to light purple as they age.  It’s a giant puff of color at the moment.  The last of the big bushy White Dendrobium spikes are making their final show.  They’re not fond of the chilly weather, and we’re not expecting any new spikes until it warms up a bit.  So, we’re enjoying them while they last.  We hope you do too! 

Check out What’s Bloomn’ slideshow for more flowers or visit Garden Dirt Diary to catch up on what’s been going on around Our Garden.