Tonight is the first meeting of the Flamingo Gardens Garden Club.
We hope to make it an engaging and fun environment where we can learn, share, and grow, together.
An article I contributed to is in the latest issue (Spring 2025) of Horticulture magazine. Say Hello to Heliconias
Wednesday I held a Pruning 101 class in the Learning Center. I covered the basics of pruning; basically the what, when, where, why, and how. This is the last of this series of classes at the garden, going forward we will incorporate them in a less formal fashion into our garden club meetings. We hope to soft launch the club this spring or summer, depending on the initial interest, with quarterly or bimonthly meetings to start, ramping up to monthly when the need arises. To find out more about the garden club click here
Update: we now have 23 Florida Champion trees in the garden, the most by far in any single location in the state. Flamingo Gardens is “The Florida Champion Tree Garden”
Black Calabash Record The newest tree to make the list is a Black Calabash tree. https://ffs.fdacs.gov/ChampionTrees/home.mvc/Detail/1307
We are seeking feedback on starting a West Broward gardening club based at Flamingo Gardens in Davie.
Follow the link for more information.
Wednesday afternoon I will be teaching another class at the garden.
Class Description: What’s that bug? Friend or Foe? Learn how to identify common landscape insects to determine if they are beneficial or harmful, and how to manage pests safely. We will also discuss the basics of horticulture, specifically for home gardeners in southeast Florida (Broward, Dade, Palm Beach).>
I’m just finished speaking at Equality Garden club What a fantastic group of gardeners, it was a great time and I can’t believe they have almost a hundred people turn out on a Wednesday night. I talked about the garden generally, a bit of garden history, and about some of my favorite plants and trees in the garden. Thanks for the invitation, EGC.
🌴 🌱 #planttalks #gardentalks #equalitygardenclub
We have news! We have 3 new Florida Champion trees in the garden. A native Strangler Fig - Ficus aurea, A Ceylon Cinnamon tree - Cinnamomum verum, and an Apple Blossom Cassia tree - Cassia javanica were all added into the Champion Tree Registry this week.
ffs.fdacs.gov/Champion trees/home.mvc/Index
Will this become the new Florida Champion Ficus aurea -Strangler Fig? We will soon find out… Stay tuned. 🌴 🌱
#tropicaltrees #floridanative #ficus
Added to the Zingiberales collection today, 8 new goodies went into the garden, two Heliconias, two Alpinias, two Calathea and two Etlingera.
Wednesday, September 18, 2024 →
Today we began a trial Mango tree rejuvenation project. Stumping back some severely overgrown mangos in the grove to see how they respond. We are following the example done by Louise King and her team at The Fruit and Spice Park in the Redlands.
We will monitor and evaluate how the three specimens respond to the cutback.and how long they take to regrow and produce fruit.
Saturday, September 14, 2024 →
Galangal ginger Alpinia galanga blooming in the Zingiberales collection in the garden.
Wednesday, September 11, 2024 →
One of the many Florida Champion Trees at Flamingo Gardens. This is a Kukui Nut Tree, Alurites moluccanus
This year we added 5 new trees to the Florida Champion Tree Registry.
We say goodbye to the summer Dinosaur exhibit today. They were fun, but now to move on to the Fall. We’ve got Rewild Florida nature art coming to the gallery, then the Harvest Festival coming up throughout October. Lots to do this week in the garden cleaning up the Dinosaur mess.
A couple of Heliconias which are blooming in the garden right now.
For those that may not know, the Heliconia Society International was started at Flamingo Gardens in 1985. It then moved to Fairchild Tropic Botanical Garden and then to Hawaii where it is based today.
Heliconia Society International
When bamboo flowers it dies,and makes quite a mess. These clumps are around 40 years old, and we had 7 bloom at the same time…leaving quite the maintenance nightmare.
#gregariousflowering #bamboo #clumpingbamboo
The honeybees are active this morning
Garden photos from today.
It’s hot out there.
