The opening of 2024’s tenth month has cooler weather on the horizon, finally. While the lawn mowing schedule slowed during September with the shortening days, the unusually warm weather kept turf growing at a rapid pace. The impending seasonal change dictates several behavioral adjustments when it comes to the proper care and maintenance of yard…Read more
Tag: Home Landscaping and Gardening
A Safer Option for a Green Lawn Through the Cooler Months
Autumn has finally arrived, at least on the calendar. Weather forecasts still predict some days in the low 90’s, but at least the humidity has moderated a bit. While some residents of panhandle Florida consider working in the home landscape a chore, many view it as a means of enhancing their personal environment. One of…Read more
A Popular, Healthy Garden Staple for the Cool Season
Simple, easy and low maintenance are not normally terms applied to growing vegetables in panhandle Florida, or anywhere else. To every rule, however, there are a few exceptions, and gardening is no different.Gardeners in the coming cool season have many advantages to go along with the challenges. Insects are few to non-existent, there are far…Read more
Fall Gardening in the Sunshine State
September is a month of curious contradictions and juxtapositions, at least for gardeners in panhandle Florida. Depending on the individual characteristics of the environmental factors of the year, events and occurrences can, and often do, cancel each other. Still, much can be accomplished during this transitional period from summer to autumn. The summer of 2024…Read more
Better Pruning for Tree Health and Safety – Part 2
As described in Monday’s release, there are four walls plus the branch collar that the tree uses to block the spread of decay. Below are the descriptions of these walls as listed in the order of weakest to strongest response: Wall 1 limits the vertical spread of decay up the tree. It is the weakest…Read more
Better Pruning for Tree Health and Safety – Part 1
There are many ways trees can be damaged. I am always amazed at how trees manage to respond when subjected to injury. Mechanical injury, such as lightning strikes and storm winds. Construction damage by vehicles, grading equipment and soil trenching equipment. All can cause damage to limbs, trunks and roots. Although we do not often…Read more
Lightning Strikes and Tree Safety
Florida is one of the world’s highest lightning strike regions. Securely grounding homes and buildings is a common practice (and building code requirement) to mitigate the damage done by random hits from these high voltage events. This same type of system can be used on trees to improve their chances of surviving a lightning strike….Read more
A Spicy Addition to the Home Garden in the Sunshine State
Panhandle Florida’s gardens are still producing in August, at least in plots where the weeds have not overtaken the remaining vegetable plants. Granted, the choice of crops is limited to a few stalwarts able to handle the 90-degree plus temperatures, the high humidity and the intermittent rains, some of which have been brutal in their…Read more
Techniques for When Your Trees Need a Little Extra Support
When reviewing trees for safety, identifying hazardous or weak limbs which may fail is an important part of the evaluation. Poor structure, decay caused by disease or other defects may be the cause of the problem bough. The usual remedy for resolving the threat is the removal of the dangerous limbs that have the potential…Read more
Keeping Palms Healthy in the Sunshine State
Technically panhandle Florida is on the borderline of the sub-tropics by virtue of its latitudinal location. It is roughly halfway between the tropical zone and the northern temperate zone, getting, by most estimates, the best of both worlds. There are winters here and they are usually pretty mild, at least by Minnesota standards. A light…Read more