Wildflowers. Photo Credit: Tyler Jones, University of Florida/IFAS
To celebrate “No Mow March”, this month’s Gardening in the Panhandle LIVE was all about pollinators. “No Mow March” was inspired by “No Mow May” events that were originally organized in Great Britain then adapted by some of our more northern states. Lawns in the panhandle definitely need to be mowed in May, so we set our sights on March.
Most warm season turfgrass species don’t grow much (or at all) in March, but some people may feel the need to mow their lawns. If you feel the need to mow, we recommend you leave the borders of your lawn or a small area un-mowed. This will encourage flowering plants to bloom and bring more pollinators to your yard.
Butterflies are loved by many for their beauty, but they also pollinate a lot of our favorite plants. To encourage butterflies to visit your garden, try planting some things they like to eat. The publication “Butterfly Gardening in Florida” provides lots of information about bringing butterflies to your yard. Be sure to check out the tables in the article for information on seasons and life cycles. If butterflies aren’t your thing, then search for plants by pollinator species in this webpage on Nectar Plants. Some plants have Extrafoliar Nectaries to attract a diversity of insects.
If you’re interested in anything about any insect, then you’ll enjoy the Featured Creatures website. You can search by species name or by what they like to eat.
Not all bees live in hives. Some bees, like mason bees, prefer to live in above ground “houses” or “hotels”. You can build your own pollinator hotel if you follow the simple steps found in the article “Build Your Own Pollinator Hotel”. And here’s even more information on “gardening for bees”.
Some of us live in the woods and need suggestions on shade loving plants. The article “Landscaping in the Shade” provides some good information on what plants can handle shady spots. A number of different ornamental gingers like the shade.
Turfgrass isn’t the only groundcover on the market. There are lots of alternatives like frogfruit and perennial peanut that attract pollinators.
If you’re interested in being a part of “No Mow March”, the first step is to sign the pledge at go.ufl.edu/NoMowMarch. Also, be sure to record your “No Mow March” observations at iNaturalist.
Past episodes of Gardening in the Panhandle LIVE can be found on our YouTube playlist.
A mixed vegetable garden. Photo Credit: eXtension.org.
It doesn’t get much better than eating fresh vegetables out of your own garden. I guess you could add a beverage to the mix to improve the experience. A dry chenin blanc would probably go well. Unfortunately, this month’s Gardening in the Panhandle LIVE steered clear of wine as a topic, but the featured agents did focus on vegetables.
Container Gardening
Size does matter when it comes to container gardening. Think about the full grown size of the plants you plan to grow when selecting a container size. For most vegetables, 10 inches wide by 10 inches deep is sufficient, but you can grow in much larger containers. The larger the container, the more room the roots will have. For more information on gardening in containers, check out the articles “Don’t Think You Have a Green Thumb? Try Container Gardening!” and “Container Gardens for Outdoor Spaces”.
If you have a really deep container and don’t want to spend the money on potting soil to fill it up, then you’re kind of out of luck. Rocks or other materials placed in the bottom of containers will create a perched water table. So basically, you’re creating a shallower container by putting materials other than potting mix in the bottom. The physics on this topic is better explained in “Rocks in Pots: Drainage or Perched Water Table Problems?”.
It’s best to start with new potting soil each year. Especially if you plan to grow the same plant species/families in the same containers. However, if you do plan to reuse potting soil, make sure to mix it up a bit with a trowel or dump it out and put it back in the container or another container. Also, choose a different crop than what you grew in the soil the previous year. Here’s an interesting publication on growing squash in recycled potting soil.
Raised Beds
Raised beds are a great option if you live in an area with poorly drained soil or with a soil that doesn’t hold nutrients. They also can be built on legs like a table to save your back some stress. More information on build a raised bed can be found in the article “Building Raised Beds”.
Vegetables need space to grow whether they’re planted in the ground, in a small container, or in a raised bed. Recommended varieties for container gardening and spacing recommendations can be found in this container gardening fact sheet from UF/IFAS Extension in Leon County.
Who says you can’t landscape with vegetable plants and fruit trees? Vegetables such as cabbage and kale can add a depth of color and texture to your annual flower beds. And blueberry bushes and citrus trees have beautiful blooms that bees love.
Trellises can be easily built and attached to raised bed gardens. Pole beans and Malabar spinach are just a couple examples of vegetables that need something to climb on. Lettuce and other small vegetables can be grown vertically in different hydroponic systems.
Plant Selection
Some seeds can be sown directly into the garden while others should be started in trays and transplanted. More information on sowing seeds and timing can be found in the Vegetable Gardening Guide. Just make sure to check out the tables at the end of the guide.
Some plants are more tolerant of salt air and salt water. This doesn’t mean you can water these plants with the Gulf of Mexico, but they will tolerate a little bit of salt. A list of salt tolerant vegetables can be found in “Salt Tolerant Vegetable Gardening”.
A number of cherry tomato varieties produce a big crop fast and over a long period of time. A list of recommended cherry tomato varieties can be found in this article on cherry tomatoes.
There aren’t a lot of options for perennial vegetables in North Florida. A perennial vegetable that can be grown here, taro, can be invasive. If you plan to grow this vegetable, please consider growing it in a container. Fortunately, we have a lot of options for perennial fruiting crops. More information on growing fruit trees can be found in the publication Dooryard Fruit Varieties.
Blackberries grow well in North Florida. You may want to try the thornless varieties ‘Freedom’, ‘Traveler’, ‘Osage’, and ‘Ouachita’. More information on growing blackberries can be found in the publication “The Blackberry”.
Some vegetables grow well in the shade. The “Veggies and Herbs Made in the Shade” publication includes a list of shade loving vegetables and herbs along with growing tips.
Community gardens provide a place to garden for people that may not have space at home. Gardening in these plots also gives people a place to meet their neighbors. Information on starting a community garden can found in the publication “Starting a Community Garden”.
Homegrown beets don’t taste anything like the ones your grandmother gave you out of a can. More information on growing beets and other root crops can be found in the Root Crop Chapter of the Vegetable Production Handbook of Florida.
Vine borers and leaf footed bugs are some of the most damaging pests to a vegetable garden. Planting early in the season can help avoid these pests, but if you’re too late on planting then you might want to give some natural products a try. The publication “Natural Products for Managing Landscape and Garden Pests in Florida” provides some good pointers on controlling these and other insect pests.
Squirrels and other wildlife can also be pests in the garden. Deterrents can help keep these pests out of the garden.
Ants don’t usually mess with your vegetables, but they can be a nuisance when working in the garden. Fire ant management information can be found in the publication “Managing Imported Fire Ants in Urban Areas”.
Squash and other cucurbits don’t last long in wet areas. They don’t last long on the vine in the first place. Growing on plastic mulch, or even pine straw, can help these vegetables stay dry. You may also want to consider building a trellis for vining cucurbits. Also, make sure to harvest in a timely manner. Squash that overripen on the vine attract insect and disease pests and just don’t taste very good.
Weeds can compete for nutrients with your crops and don’t look very attractive in the garden (or anywhere). If you’re tired of hand weeding, the Vegetable Production Handbook of Florida lists herbicide options by crop.
Past episodes of Gardening in the Panhandle LIVE can be found on our YouTube playlist.
This article was written by: Joanna Jaramillo Silva1, Rachel Mallinger2, Xavier Martini3
1 Ph.D. Student, University of Florida, Department of Entomology and Nematology
2 Assistant Professor, University of Florida, Department of Entomology and Nematology
3 Assistant Professor, North Florida Research and Education Center, University of Florida, Department of Entomology and Nematology
Bees are the primary pollinators of plants, essential in natural and crop environments for guaranteeing global food security to the human population. Florida is home of more than 300 species of native wild bees, which rely on pollen and nectar from flowers to survive. However, a global pollinator decline reported for honeybees and wild species (including insects, birds, and bats), is decreasing the worldwide provision of pollination services. Food limitation (pollen and nectar), resulting from decreasing flower diversity and quantity, is one of the multiple causes of pollinator decline. Pollinator-friendly plants are receiving attention from people of various disciplines such as the scientific community, stakeholders, Master Gardeners, and citizen science groups willing to participate in pollinator conservation efforts.
Domestic gardens
Domestic gardens comprise a substantial proportion of land in the urban landscape and are often the most significant component of green space; they play essential roles in conserving plant genetic resources, insects, and other wildlife, and have social and economic value. Gardens behave as islands of usable habitat surrounded by urbanization, and they present varying benefits for pollinators. There is generally a positive relationship between high pollinator abundance, flower diversity, and bloom evenness. Gardens for pollinators propose to solve the pollinator crisis by enlarging greenspaces in urban areas by planting more flowers in urbanized environment and by improving the diversity of floral resources for pollinators.
Pollinator friendly plants
There are different categories of floral traits: qualities that attract pollinators such as floral size and color, and physical characteristics that reward the pollinator (nectar and pollen quantity and quality). Flowers with higher quality and quantity rewards are more attractive to pollinators. Nectar provides the main sugar source for insect pollinators; its energetic value is determined by its sugar concentration. The volume of nectar produced by flowers will directly affected visitation by honeybees and bumblebees, butterflies, and birds. Pollen on the other side, consists of the main source of protein for most pollinators.
RECOMMENDATIONS
1. Provide a Mix of floral shapes and sizes.
There is usually a positive correlation between flower size and nectar volume: long tube flowers usually provide more nectar, whereas open or flat flowers provide more pollen. In addition, flower shapes are also associated with different pollinator types (Fig. 1). Long-tongued insects (Butterflies, and some bees) visit deep corolla tube flowers, while short-tongued pollinators (wasps, flies and some bees) remain on short tube or open corolla flowers.
Figure 1. Examples of plants with long tube flowers, short-medium, and open corolla flowers (From left to right: Butterfly on a Pardon my pink (Monarda didyma) (Credits: Joanna J. Silva); Carpenterbee on Salvia Indigo spires (Salvia longispicata x farinaceae) (Credits: Kelly Thomas); Sweat bee on Gaillardia pulchella) (Credits: Joanna J. Silva).
2. Provide a mix of flower colors
Color patterns influence the flower’s attractiveness and increase the efficiency of pollination by helping insects orient on the flower and guide them to the reward (Fig. 2). Bees prefer white, yellow, or blue-purple flowers. Orange, pink, and red flowers attract other pollinators such as butterflies.
Figure 2. Examples of native plants to Florida that display different colors Native to Florida (From left to right: Butterfly on Spanish needles (Bidens alba), Tickseed coreopsis (Coreopsis leavenworthii), Sckullcap (Scutellaria arrenicola), Pitcher sage (Salvia azurea), Swamp Rose-mallow (Hibiscus grandiflorus), Carpenterbee on False-Rosemary (Conradina grandiflora), Spotted beebalm (Monarda puctata), Blanket flower or Firewheel* (Gaillardia pulchella) . Credits: Joanna J. Silva *A recent discovery suggests that Firewheel is not considered native to Florida, but it is widely cultivated. It is probably not native to the rest of the eastern USA as previously thought (ISB: Atlas of Florida Plants (usf.edu), Gaillardia – University of Florida, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (ufl.edu)).
3. Include a pollinator hotel
Add a bee nest box for the native bees that build their nests above ground. Solitary bees and wasps will take up residence in a pollinator hotel after you place it outside.
4. Provide flowers throughout the year.
Pollen and nectar collection varies seasonally for honeybees, while many other solitary bee species collect pollen continuously during adult foraging to feed their larvae. Design the garden to have three or more different plants blooming at any given time during the growing season, which is March through November in northern areas of the state (Fig. 3).
Figure 3. Honeybee on Viburnum (Winter) (Credits: Joanna J. Silva), Honeybee on Salvia Indigo spires taking nectar (Spring-Summer) (Credits: Walker Bensch), False Rosemary and Muhlly grass (Muhlenbergia capillaris) (Fall) (Credits: Joanna J. Silva).
5. Include native plants.
A “Florida native plant” refers to a species occurring within the state boundaries prior to European contact, according to the best available scientific and historical documentation. Florida is home to over 4,867 species of plants; 3,314 species are considered native of which 230 species are endemic.
6. Chose the right plant for each location.
Success depends on using the right plant in the right place, especially by considering plant’s cold hardiness (Fig. 4). Plant selection for landscapers, nurseries, and gardens requires individual site criteria and an evaluation of individual plant performance under different environmental circumstances, such as water, soil, and temperature.
Figure 4. Hardiness zones in Florida (http://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov).
Garden and landscape maintenance can be relaxing, but it can also be stressful. Sometimes you may just not have the time or the patience to get all the work done. In that case, you may choose to hire a professional to get your yard to looks its best. A number of things should be considered when selecting a company. First of all, make sure you find a company that provides the services needed. You probably don’t want to hire a business that specializes in planting food plots if you need some trees removed from around your house. And you may not want to hire a company that manages sports fields if you want some trees and shrubs installed. Please find a checklist below of some things to consider when choosing a landscape professional.
Applying the proper amount of fertilizer keeps your landscape healthier and protects local waterbodies. Credit: UF/IFAS.
Insurance, Licenses, and Certifications – Make sure to hire professionals who meet all state and local license and insurance requirements for the work they are are contracted for.
General Liability Insurance – General liability insurance protects against bodily injury, property damage, and personal injury. Ask for proof of this coverage.
Workers’ Compensation Insurance – Worker’s compensation insurance provides medical and wage benefits to employees who are injured or get sick at work. More information on this coverage can be found at myfloridacfo.com.
Pesticide Applicator License – A pesticide applicator license is required for individuals spraying pesticides in and around your home. Some licenses allow the applicator to spray your entire landscape while others only grant the applicator to lawfully spray ornamental beds and shrubs around the home. You can search for applicators by name or license number at Licensed Pesticide Applicator Search.
Fertilizer Applicator License – A fertilizer applicator license is required for individuals applying fertilizer to turf and ornamentals on your property. You can search for applicators by name or license number at Licensed Pesticide Applicator Search.
FNGLA – The Florida Nursery, Growers and Landscape Association (FNGLA) certifies landscape professionals on their landscape installation and/or maintenance expertise. You can search for certified individuals at FNGLA Certifications.
FFL – The Florida-Friendly Landscaping Program offers a Florida-Friendly Landscaping Certified Professional (FFLCP) certification to individuals are familiar with the latest UF/IFAS recommendations and who implement the 9 Florida-Friendly Landscaping principles by using environmentally friendly landscape management practices. A list of certified individuals can be found at Florida-Friendly Landscaping Certified Professionals Listing.
ISA – The International Society of Arboriculture certifies landscape professionals and arborists on their expertise on tree care and installation. You can search for certified arborists at Certified Arborist Search.
In addition to checking for accreditations, a number of questions can be asked to determine if a company meets your needs. These questions will help determine whether the company follows environmentally friendly landscape management and installation practices.
Does the landscape professional understand irrigation system design and know how to calibrate an irrigation system?
Does the landscape professional maintain mowing and pruning equipment and tools to make clean cuts?
Does the landscape professional maintain turf at the appropriate height for the species/cultivar being grown?
Does the landscape professional follow UF/IFAS fertilizer recommendations for fertilizer rates and products?
Does the landscape professional apply fertilizer only when turf and ornamentals are actively growing?
Does the landscape professional use soil tests to help determine fertilizer needs?
Does the landscape professional regularly check turf and ornamentals for insect pests and diseases?
Does the landscape professional follow recommendations for plant installation and spacing?
These are just a few things to consider when hiring a landscape professional/company. After reviewing qualifications and asking tough questions you’ll also want to consider cost. Make sure to consider the scope of work of the companies that gave you quotes. For more comprehensive guidelines, please check out the UF/IFAS Publication Guidelines for Hiring a Florida-Friendly Landscape Professional.
Pecans are a flavorful and nutritious nut and an essential component of a southerner’s diet. The trees also provide nice shade and intense fall color to landscapes throughout the south. However, not all pecan tree varieties are suited for the Florida panhandle. There are a number of things you should consider before planting a pecan tree.
Pecan tree grove in North Florida. UF/IFAS Photo: Thomas Wright.
Site Selection – Pecan trees are native to the river valleys of North America. They perform best in deep, fertile, well-drained soils. The key is that the soil is well-drained. Pecan trees will not do well in soils that hold a lot of water and do not drain quickly. Pecan trees also need space to grow. Trees should be planted at least sixty feet apart and at least sixty feet from other large trees and structures. This will allow adequate light for the trees produce a good crop.
Disease Resistance – Pecan scab is the most detrimental pecan disease in the southeast. Trees advertised as scab resistant in the past may have become more susceptible over time. A few varieties that seem to be available at tree farms and have maintained their scab resistance are ‘Caddo’, ‘Elliot’, ‘Lakota’, and ‘Gafford’. Newer varieties that currently have good scab resistance are ‘Avalon’, ‘Huffman’, and ‘Whiddon’. However, these newer varieties may be more difficult to find at nurseries and farm stores.
Pollination – Pecan trees produce both female and male flowers on the same tree. Trees are split into two pollination groups. Type I pollinators produce mature pollen before their female flowers are receptive and Type II trees produce receptive female flowers before their pollen is mature. Timing of flower maturity may change with tree age, but it is a good practice to plant a Type I tree along with a Type II tree to ensure a good crop in each tree. A pollination compatibility chart can be found at UGA Pecan Compatibility Chart.
Planting – Commercially, pecan trees are most commonly planted as bare-root transplants, but container-grown trees can also be used. Bare-root trees are usually cheaper and more readily available. They should be planted while dormant, between December and March and should be planted the day they are delivered. If the root system looks dry, soak the trees in water for a few hours before planting. Container-grown trees can be planted any time of the year, but they have the best chance of survival if planted during dormancy. Trees should be planted at the depth they stood at the nursery or the depth they were planted in a container. Planting holes should be at least 18 inches wide and only native soil should be used to fill in the hole. The main causes of death in young trees are planting too deep and inadequate moisture during the first two years following planting.
Pecan trees provide focal points in the landscape and a tasty treat for the belly. For more information on growing pecans and the benefits of pecans please see these Pecan Publications from the University of Georgia.
