On November 14, 2014, Richard Lyons’ Nursery posted an article on its website entitled, “Why This Nursery Doesn’t Recommend Citrus or Avocado Trees.” It reported that citrus greening disease was primarily responsible last year for the state’s poor orange production, 104 million boxes. Unfortunately, new information shows that things are getting even worse. On January 12 the…
Read more
Okay, we all know that it’s a little too soon to be plucking nice, ripe mangos from your trees, but it is true that early-maturing cultivars have already been in flower for a few weeks and, barring damaging frost as winter rolls along, we might be able to start harvesting the delicious, juicy fruits sometime in May. It’s…
Read more
In many parts of the United States, the Copperleaf is a popular summertime landscaping element, a heat-loving annual bedding plant that disintegrates with the onset of winter conditions. But it’s really a perennial evergreen shrub, and we in southern Florida are fortunate to be able to grow it inground or in containers year-round, allowing it…
Read more
Of the palms suitable to cultivation in southern Florida, the genus Ptychosperma is among the most successful. Its 30 or so species are Asian in origin, native mostly to New Guinea and Australia. Though they’re primarily rain forest species, some, such as the ubiquitous Solitaire Palm (Ptychosperma elegans), have proven successful in sunny exposures. A few species are single-stemmed,…
Read more
Does this name fail to ring a bell with you? Fret not; you aren’t alone. Biscayne Prickly Ash is among the rarest, and least known, of our state’s native flora. While the small tree occurs naturally from the western Caribbean into Florida, from Palm Beach County south, coastal development has been making it vanish. (It…
Read more