In March, the UF/IFAS extension office was awarded a grant from the Apalachee Audubon Society to install a pollinator garden at the Jefferson County Extension Office. The goal of the pollinator garden is to educate the community on the importance of pollinator and native pollinator plants. The pollinator garden is a demonstration site encouraging community members to plant more pollinator plants in their home landscape. A pollinator garden at home is fantastic because it attracts and supports essential pollinators like bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds. These pollinators help fertilize flowers, leading to better fruit and vegetable production in your garden. Plus, it’s great for the environment.
Pollinator Garden
UF/IFAS Jefferson County
Pollinators are essential for our ecosystem. Pollinators play a crucial role in the reproduction of plants by transferring pollen from the male parts of a flower to the female parts. This process allows plants to produce fruits, seeds, and new plants. Many plants would struggle to reproduce without pollinators. This can lead to a decline in biodiversity and the availability of food sources for other food sources. Pollinators are like nature’s superheroes.
Types of Pollinators
UF/IFAS
The garden consists of over 50 different pollinators and native plants. Planting more native pollinator gardens is super important. Native plants adapt well to the local environment, making them easier to grow and maintain. Pollinators and native plants have an extraordinary relationship. Native plants offer nectar, pollen, and shelter that are specifically suited to the needs of native pollinators. By Planting native flowers, one is creating a haven for these vital pollinators, increasing biodiversity, and ensuring the health of our ecosystems.
Pollinator Plants
UF/IFAS Jefferson County
The pollinator garden includes an herb garden. The herb garden aims to educate community members about edible landscaping and pollinator herb plants. Edible landscaping can allow one to produce food using sustainable agricultural practices that conserve water, protect water quality, provide wildlife habitat, and reduce chemical inputs. Planting herbs in your garden is a great idea. Herbs like basil, rosemary, and mint can attract beneficial insects to your garden and repel pests. Herbs are easy to grow and can be used in cooking, teas, and even for natural remedies.
Pollinator Herb Section
UF/IFAS Jefferson County
The garden includes a small pond demonstrating a healthy aquatic ecosystem in home landscapes. Creating a pond is an excellent addition to your pollinator landscape. They provide a water source for pollinators like bees and butterflies, which is essential for survival. Pollinators need water to stay hydrated, especially during hot and dry weather. Having a pond in your garden can attract various pollinators and create a habitat for them to thrive. A healthy aquatic ecosystem can help manage water by reducing runoff and filtering pollutants.
Pond in Pollinator Garden
UF/IFAS Jefferson County
If you are in the area, please feel free to stop by the Jefferson County extension office and visit the pollinator garden. Please visit UF/IFAS for more information regarding pollinator plants and Florida Friendly Landscaping.
Chrysanthemums in different colors. NC State Extension
Fall hasn’t even started and the garden centers are already filled with mums. Somehow I made that sound like a bad thing. Chrysanthemums look great in containers at the front door and planted in the garden too. They also last pretty long as cut flowers. And they’re not just a fall decoration, mums are a great addition to the garden for years.
Mums have deep-green, lobed foliage with soft gray undersides. They are available in a number of colors, from dark red and orange to lavender and pink to white. Mums bloom when nights start to get longer in late summer and fall. Some species and varieties can be used as low-growing groundcovers and others can grow to 5 feet tall. All are herbaceous perennials that can continue to bloom for years.
Mums prefer full sun to partial shade. They like slightly acidic, well-drained soil that is rich in organic matter. Use slow-release fertilizer to ensure an even flow of nutrients throughout the season. Keep plants looking attractive and healthy and full of new blooms by dead heading. You may also choose to choose to cut of side buds on main shoots to create larger flowers.
Mums can be propagated by either division or cuttings. It is important to either divide and re-pot potted plants or transfer potted plants to larger containers to keep plants from becoming root bound. Chrysanthemums are relatively pest free, but spider mites can become a problem in hot, dry weather. Make sure plants receive water regularly in hot, dry weather.
Bright color is sometimes hard to come by in landscapes, especially in those areas where not much likes to grow. In particularly sandy areas along our coastlines, it can be a challenge to find plants that can both tolerate extremely dry conditions with heavy salt spray and provide an aesthetic boost. Luckily, there is at least one flower out there that goes above and beyond when it comes to beauty.
Gaillardia pulchella, or blanket flower, Indian blanket flower, firewheel, or sundance is a relatively low growing (up to 1.5 feet tall) plant that favors conditions that would make most plants wither. It grows as an annual or short-lived perennial and though it goes dormant in the winter, during warm weather, it’s bright and colorful! It is native to the United States, but probably never spread farther east than Texas until assisted by humans. It grows well throughout Florida, and can often be seen along roadsides.
Gaillardia on the beach
Spreading to around two feet wide, each individual plant may not blanket the ground, but it readily produces seed which is easy to germinate. Flowers are produced throughout the growing season. Varieties are available with different appearances, though all tend to be some combination of bright yellow and dusky red. The blossoms can be used as cut flowers, or left in the landscape to attract pollinators.
Blanket flower prefers well-drained soil, even growing out into beach dunes. As stated previously, it may be propagated easily by seed; either let dried seed heads remain on the plant long enough to drop seeds or harvest them to plant elsewhere. Sow seeds in the spring and enjoy low-maintenance color for months after!
An activity during our No Mow March campaign was for participants to document flowers and pollinators from their landscapes. This activity was available through an INaturalist group specific to No Mow March. Although we only had 13 participants, they made 85 observations representing 50 species of plants and insects.
The photo that was selected as the favorite is the Clasping Venus’s Looking Glass, Triodanis perfoliate, by Martha W. This was around the Tallahassee, FL area. Martha received an electric edger, battery, and charger.
We hope to have more participants in our photo collection next year as we observe the plants and pollinators visiting our landscapes when we don’t mow.
Have you ever visited a public garden or a park and wondered what type of plant you were looking at? Or found the name on a sign but wondered – can I grow that at my house? How big will it get? Does it have flowers, berries, keep its leaves in the winter? We feel your pain, fellow plant lovers!
Gardens are ever evolving and providing up to date printed information on all the plants can become difficult to manage and involve a lot of wasted resources. In Bay County, we have several gardens at the Extension Office, and we try to keep everything labeled, but space on signs is limited to plant name and we want to teach gardeners how to grow not just identify plants. To expand outreach of Florida-Friendly plants, we have created a website with all the plants in our demonstration gardens.
The site is organized by garden area, common name, and botanical name to ease navigation. Each plant profile has photos at different stages, basic cultural information, and links to additional research-based information.
Whether you are visiting our gardens in person or just want information on plants that perform well in the Florida Panhandle, we hope you will check out our new site and let us know if you found it useful and how we can improve.
Pollinator hotel. J. McConnell, UFIFASGinkgo leaves. J. McConnell, UFIFASBlanket flower. J. McConnell, UFIFASAmerican beautyberry. J. McConnell, UFIFASEastern redbud. J. McConnell, UFIFASPollinator garden. J. McConnell, UFIFASMaypop flower. J. McConnell, UFIFASAutumn fern. J. McConnell, UFIFASHummingbird at red bottlebrush flower. J. McConnell, UFIFAS
