Video: Palm Care After the Freeze
Palms in North Florida suffered serious damage as a result of freezing weather in December 2022. As spring approaches, we will be looking to see if the palms will recover. Learn what to do now and what to expect from your palms with UF IFAS Extension Escambia County....
Landscaping in the Panhandle of Florida: Opportunities & Challenges
Landscaping in the Panhandle of Florida comes with many opportunities and challenges in this diverse plant environment of coastal, flatwoods (aka pine woodland), sandhills, and clay soil areas running adjacent to the Alabama/Georgia lines. Sandy soil is the...
Supporting Native Wild Bees in the Florida Landscape
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...
Be on the Lookout for Crape Myrtle Bark Scale
Being a gardener in Florida is exciting. We have many plants to choose from and the weather is mostly pleasant but always seeming to surprise us. One disadvantage of living in such a place, in addition to having so many growing zones, landscape nurseries, and major...
How Weather Affects Citrus and Other Dooryard Fruit Varieties
The weather is the most important factor determining where certain fruits can be successfully grown. Terms such as chilling requirement and cold hardiness play a major role in both species and variety selection. Most fruits which grow in the Panhandle are deciduous,...
Understanding Chill Hours
Any North Florida resident who has tried their hand at growing apples, peaches, or plums may occasionally find themselves frustrated by a year (or two…or three) with a poor or nonexistent harvest. What has gone wrong? Are the trees getting a disease? Were they not...
Guidelines for Hiring a Landscape Professional
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...
A Primer on Pruning
Pruning is a much needed yet often misunderstood practice. This is perfectly understandable as most people look at a tree and wonder which branches need to be cut, why they need to be cut, and what time of year is appropriate to do so. Confusion is understandable, but...
Winter is Tree Planting Time
Red Maple structure IFAS Photo: Hassing, G. January to February is the ideal time to plant trees. During dormancy, all the energy in a tree is in the root system. They will establish very quickly. In the spring, they will be ready to grow leaves. Planting and...
The Joys of Growing Elephant Garlic
One of my all-time favorite vegetables to grow and eat is elephant garlic. While related to garlic, elephant garlic (Allium ampeloprasum) is actually considered a bulbing leek. Like garlic, it is in the genus Allium, a family of flowering plants that includes over 600...