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

May 18, 2026

It Has Begun

While I had originally predicted Sunday, the Rains actually started Saturday.  One minute my app said clear, hot afternoons, and the next, it showed dark clouds with little lightening bolts, everyday.  But, the app didn’t actually catch-up until after the Rains had started on Saturday.  LOL!  The plants are relieved and a little tattered in places.  They haven’t started their extra hearty growth and weren’t quite prepared for the beating.  It’s okay, they will get there.

We are, of course, excited and resigned.  We grow for this time, when exotic tropicals get happy.  Nurturing things outside, like Amaryllis, others only dream about.  We know, that was once our dream.  Shrubs become trees you can cut tunnels through.  Philodendrons that climb trunks into the sky with leaves the size of umbrellas.  Whole beds filled with Bromeliads.  Coconuts, Bananas and Dragon Fruit, there in the landscaping for eating.  It’s still exciting and fun after all these years.

And wet, and oppressively hot.  So much so many flee north for cooler climates.  Or used to.  We’re adjusting to earlier mornings with shorter blocks of time in Our Garden.  Boo-Hiss.  It didn’t help that we were trying to lay the new concrete paver path last week in an area that gets direct sunlight, most of the day.  It was hot and water was thick in the air.

Around Our Garden

We did indeed work on the new concrete paver path last week.  The new pavers we poured set nicely.  They were ready to dig-up and place.  Since we were looking for an organic design mixing the very geometric square ones, My Mom’s rustic ones, and my more detailed ones, we spent an entire morning puzzling them into a pleasing order.  We had more time, but the sun was not our friend.  Blazing down.

The next morning we moved the pavers and bed borders, raked the area level (draining into the dry detention), and removed a trench of dirt where we set the pavers.  Now, we’re working on finish-leveling each paver.  We want a smooth walk.  If My Mom can trip over it, she will.  So, we’re spending some time to make sure that’s correct.  Falling would be bad.

There was also weeding, of course.  That never ends.  Since we took out the grass to mulch new areas and paths, we have to spot-treat any new seeds that sprout or planties coming back from the roots.  There’s lots of new areas.  More chopping of stuff that died in the hard freeze, finally labeled as ‘not coming back’, and we did a spruce-up of the slopes and mulch in the new dry detention and berm.  Lots of water is coming its way.  And, we cleaned-up the fountain.  The Pickerelweed had lots of spent flower spikes.  That meant seeds.

Harvest

So, you guessed it.  We Harvested Pickerelweed seed last week to eat.  After cutting all the dying stalks from the fountain, we removed the whole seed heads before dumping the rest into compost.  Then, we removed the seeds from the buds to dry.  They are currently sitting in a brown paper bag.  Once they turn brown, we’ll lightly roast them.  You can eat them dried, but they have a nuttier flavor roasted.  Yum.

We also pulled in more Tomatoes, Broccoli, Cabbage, Carrots, and Leaks.  We’ve noticed the remaining Cabbage has some leaf eaters munching on them.  Dang.  It’s about time to pull everything, anyway.  In the next couple of weeks, the Veggies will mostly choke.  Too much water and heat.  We’re going to add some shade cloth which blocks both, but it’s only a matter of time.  Dang.

Flowers

The Zinnias got the Feature because they were awesome last week.  The plants finally have enough girth for the bigger flowers, and I couldn’t stop snapping pics of them.  There was a big selection.  LOL!  The Butterflies and Bees thought so too.  I’m pretty sure I befriended a Gulf Fritillary.  LOL!  Let me have my joys.  Hopefully, we’ll have the lovelies, both kinds, through most of the summer.  Can’t wait.

The Zinnia’s were not the only wildflowers going crazy.  Both the Orange Cosmos and Lanceleaf Coreopsis looked fantastic with large overgrown plants in pots and beds throughout the yard.  There was a significant amount of dead-heading the spent flowers to keep the seeds down last week.  We also moved several of the Yellow Cosmos plants, not blooming, into the bed in the back.  They were blocking the irrigation.  Hopefully, they’ll go to bloom back there.  Check out: How to Grow Wildflowers in Your Yard . Also looking fabulous, the new Orange Canna’s My Son and Hannah brought for Mother’s Day and all the Dendrobium Orchids.  Woo-Hoo!  Enjoy!

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.