This is pretty general, but spend the money for high quality garden tools and equipment. That $60 trimmer you got on sale is only going to last you one or two seasons if you're lucky. Want to know what brand to buy? Look at what the professional lawn service guys use.

Don't plant Crepe Myrtle trees overhanging the sidewalk (or any flowering tree for that matter).

Don't plant a bouganvilla next to the house unless it's in a container.

Never, ever for any reason plant an asparagus fern in the ground.

Look around your immediate area before planting to see if what you want is growing well there. Just because it grows 5 miles down the road doesn't mean it will grow in your particular area due to different soils and micro-climates.

Plant berry/fruit producing bushes/trees away from the front yard/driveway. This will reduce the amount of bird droppings on your or your friends' cars.

This one is basic, but I see it often: Mulch deep. 3-4 inches. If you think you 'might' have 3 inches, add another bag/wagon/barrow full. Anything less than 3 inches and weeds/grass can still grow through, even with newspaper.

Monitor the sunlight in your yard at least twice a year, mid-summer and mid-winter. That deep shade spot on the north side of the house in January can be full sun come May.

If you have room, let one bed go 'wild' with wildflowers. While other plants are good at bringing in pollinators, a wildflower bed can keep them around all year long.

Give any plastic planters/tools/watering cans two coats of spray polyurathane. The sun will eventually do these in, but the poly can greatly extend the life of the plastic and color.

Hi
Since I grow almost everything in pots , always on the eternal quest for the ultimate material and have come to the conclusion there isn't one lol.
I find the general mix of pine bark fines along with some top soil as effective as most potting mixes and costs around a third . .
This is just for terrestrial plants of course NOT orchids, water plants succulents or cacti
I put a layer of crushed lava rock on top which prevents most diggers but not ants lol
Some of best things I've done over the years is a compost bin. keeping a color coded log, and carefully researching BEFORE I buy rather than after lol
gary

Carol,

I want to thank you for the Mojito tip. AND my Hilo Beauty thanks you, too.

I went to Kirby's nursery today to find a replacement for my Mojito that did not come back this year. Now I know why...

While there I saw a Hilo Beauty planted in several inches of flowing water in a display pond. My own Hilo is my second one and is struggling. The first one died.

#2 now has some fresh dirt on top and is immersed in my little pondlett until I can repot into a non draining container.

Alas, no new Mojito... Yet. So thanks again. Great tip!

Stopped using Round-Up and pesticides. Weeds are a nightmare, but manageable with lots of cardboard and wood chips.

No pesticides and my garden beds are filled with butterflies. I am amazed how many different varieties there are and I've stared planting 'host' plants to feed them. I'm still only seeing a few bees.

Most orchids love Florida. I feel like a kid in a candy store with all the blooms. I hardly have to do anything and they grow and grow.

Jane

Another one I forgot is you can make your own potting mix cheap by mixing top soil with fine pine mark mulch, and you can fluff it up more if needed with perlite. I have also put a layer of mulch in the bottom of pots for drainage like Carol mentioned. We also keep a couple of compost piles going, and all excess soil from seedlings that are transplanted get tossed in there. Also, I occasionally mix some Epsom Salt in with the Miracle Grow when I fertilize the blooming and fruiting plants.

You all have such great tips! I was hoping this thread would slowly string along... it is amazing how much I learn from you all.

Yes, Photobucket has topped me out. I have exceeded bandwidth so my pictures do not display. (I think they will display again next month - each month your bandwidth starts over). I will move to another host. Sorry my pics don't show up. :(

Thonotorose (tell us about your user name.. is it "Though 'No', to rose"? Do you dislike roses? I've always wondered), I have Hilo Beauty, too, and have it in pots. This is my first year with it. There has been lots and lots of discussion on the web about whether or not Hilo Beauty is an alocasia or a caladium. I believe it was recently definitively determined to be a caladium by the Aroid Society. Please see link to various discussions, below. You may want to be careful, if you have that one in a non-draining pot, in winter because caladium do not like to be wet when dormant. They will usually rot. I put my Hilo Beauty in draining, clay pots with labels (because they will go dormant in winter and I may forget what I put in the pot). I know, I know, it is conflicting info from the Mojito and probably not what you wanted to hear... but I do not want you to lose your plant! If you keep it the way it is, I will be eager to hear how it goes through the winter. Will you be going to the Fall swap? I can probably bring you a Mojito...

Greenie - I agree. I bought a really good quality lawn mower and edger/weedwacker and I'm glad I did. (I bought a cheap blower, but I've been very lucky with it, too.) That was good advice.

Rita - all good advice! My mother made the Asparagus fern mistake at the old house. Every time I see it in the box stores - and I see it there all the time - I think someone should be held accountable for the future problems it holds.

Jane - I'm still trying to grow orchids like any ONE of yours. Boy, you have the touch. I hope I get a bloom next year.

Leekle - excellent tips. I think I started noticing where the sun came up and set after several years of gardening. I thought I had planned my shade and didn't realize it changed throughout the year for awhile... I have adjusted and my shade is planned (targeted) for June/July/August.

Gary - where do you buy crushed lava rock? And you just spread it on the top of the plant? How do you remove it when reusing the pot - does the old soil and lava rock mix get tossed into the yard somewhere together? Or do you have to pull out the lava rock for separate disposal?

Gary, also interested to hear about your color-coded log. I keep a log, too, but haven't used colors. Is your log on paper or electronic? How does it work?

Here's a "quick log" method for new gardeners. If you don't have time to keep a log, but want to maintain basic information on your plants, you might like this. I keep an old cigar box for plant tags. First, if the tag is plastic, I wash and dry it. Then, on the tag, with a Sharpie pen, I write:
- Date (I planted it)
- Store name
- Price
- If I buy 12 of something, I don't throw all 12 tags into the box. I just take one and write Q12 (quantity of 12).
Then I just toss the tag into the box. I don't try to keep the box sorted. This way, if something doesn't get onto the log, I always have the tags as a backup. I like having the tag info, anyway, if I ever need to look something up.

Here's one more random, crazy tip... at least it is something that works for me. If you rotate your plant pots (I'm talking about turning them while in place, not swapping them around), I always turn mine the SAME way - a 1/4 turn clockwise... so that I don't have to remember how I turned them last time. It's always a 1/4 turn clockwise.

I know lots of you have other random, miscellaneous tips rolling around in your heads. Throw one on here! :)

Carol

Here is a link that might be useful: Google - Hilo Beauty classification

Interesting about Hilo. I will keep that in mind.

LOL...! I am BESOTTED with roses. I have about 60 different ones, mostly antiques. I live in Thonotosassa. Tho-no-to-sass-a. All of the first three syllables rhyme with "toe". Even our weather man has called it Thon-o-sassa. FYI, Sassa is a Native American word for "big water".

One day I will make Silvia's swap. I caretake my 90 year old mother. She is in very good shape but it is hard to get away.

Carol, it is fun to read all your tips. You are so organized and think about every detail and of course you are the cheerleader in the forum.:)

Veronica, I remember that one time you explain about the handle name, and when I saw the name while traveling in the car, I thought of you again.:) Hope to meet you one day when you are ready...

Silvia

Some good info here!

I use a 2 foot concrete mixing tub as my potting bench, not only does it keep the soil from being messy by containing it, I can move it around to work in the shade and breeze :-)

Also, when potting up root bound plants after soaking them thoroughly, I use a hacksaw blade to loosen the roots from the pot and minimize root damage for transfer.

Tom

Carol
I use the crushed lava around 3/4 1 inch for epi orchids
It will not rot nor hold too much water Two problems in large containers it's too heavy so use styrofoam on the bottom half 2/3 depending on the plant
The large 2/3 inch I place on top keeps most things from digging. You can use hardware cloth to separate when time to repot. You can get it at walmart but Bushel stop carries several grades
the note book has edges in various colors . You can write on the cover various plants then just go to that color when referencing ofr adding info.. An example "Bottle Palm " Blue On the blue page Potted dates, fert.,
frond dates and so on. Can't trust computers ?? lol
i try to assign a color to various plants such as blue for palms, red for orchids ,green for aroids so when full can continue on to the next book . I have info going back to 1981 lol saves going through all the pages to get particular info. Two flaws in the system you MUST actually write down the info and you must be able to read your own writing lol Still working on those . gary

Thonotorose, if you even see this, and have a chance to review this thread, I'm curious how your Hilo Beauty performed in water? I got two Hilo Beauties last year but planted them like caladium. Well, they had sort of a mediocre performance. I'm thinking about trying them in non-draining pots to hold more water, similar to the Mojitos, if you had good luck with your Hilo Beauty?

Thanks!

Carol

I have Hilo Beauty in a pot. It got really huge last year. I let it dry out and i stored it w the potted dormant gingers over the winter. I pulled them all out this week so far it hasnt resprouted. Maybe it will soon since we r getting all this rain now.

Carol, what a great way to start the weekend with a blast from the past! It is great to see old posters and new ones too sharing their experiences.

Silvia

Unless you're living under the iron thumb of an HOA, don't worry so much about pretty and worry more about healthy. I use what nature gives me, and my plants do fine. My beds aren't pretty, never will be, but I'm practicing soil building, not making the neighbors happy.

Which brings me to soil. NEVER stop building your soil -- NEVER. In Florida, organic matter breaks down in the soil in one season and practically disappears. In my experience, it can take up to 10 years to build our sandy or marl soil into something that resembles loam. It will never be loam, but it will be close. I turned a yard full of marl into beautiful, crumbly black soil over 13 years simply by using leaves and twigs to amend it and letting the oak leaves stay where they lay and adding more on top of that. The people who live there now could not care less about the yard and the developer removed most of the plants all but the citrus trees. My ex-neighbors say the citrus has greening, but that's o.k., because they never water or feed them anyway. That's not my yard anymore, but it still breaks my heart.

I agree completely with Gary about the container soil. I've been using plain old Florida sand layered with organic matter in the form of pine bark mulch (fines if I can get them), leaves and twigs for years. I pour several kettles of hot water through to kill the nematodes, then I plant and I've had great success. The next year, I dump the soil and layer it with more organic matter. You wouldn't believe the black, crumbly stuff you get after the third year. I can't believe people spend so much money on potting soil, but I used to do that too.

Plant a bean plant next to every tomato you plant. It may never have beans, but it will feed nitrogen to the tomato.

I watch what Mother Nature does and mimic her. She seems to have this whole permaculture thing down pat.

Thonotorose and Sultry, I had both my Hilo Beauties in pots, but regular clay pots (along with other caladium), not non-draining pots. Neither of them have resprouted, so I may have nothing to worry about if they don't come back. Sultry, was yours in a non-draining pot, too? If not, you are probably better with regular watering than I was last year. I hardly made it out to garden at all except for lawn care last year. :(

Silvia, I love reading through these old tips, too. I did the quarter-turn pot thing yesterday.

Dirtygardener, you make great points about continuous amendment of the soil. I go up and down the street every spring, sweeping up the giant piles of oak leaves from the curb in front of the neighbors' houses. (The developer made this an oak-lined street - everyone has a live oak in the same position in the front yard.) My neighbors love that. I'm the leaf-thief.

Carol in Jacksonville

Carol, I have one up on you. My neighbors actually used to rake their leaves up and put them in bags, then call me to come get them. I always returned their paper bags, neatly folded, for the next year and gave them flowers and produce in thanks.

Wow, that's great! I'm sure they loved you and appreciated it so much!

Carol

If you garden in Florida, your soil needs everything bur sand and nematodes!

Do your garden work in the morning or evening hours, when the sun doesn't bear down on you directly. Doing this, you will last longer, get more done and your plants will fair better. Pulling weeds in the morning and leaving their roots exposed to that day's sun is a good way to ensure their demise

When I try to garden in the morning or PM I get eaten alive by mosquitoes! The heat of the afternoon is horrible, but the evening hours are worse.

Jane

banana peels in the bottom of my planting holes helps my roses look good! and i get used coffee grounds from starbucks (sorry i am not a big coffee drinker myself) that i just sprinkle a handful each at the base of my roses. So far so good!

My Hilo Beauty is in a nursery pot w holes in the bottom. I just noticed my caladiums are coming up finally in the flower beds. So maybe hilo beauty will emerge soon. I read they are very closely related to caladiums..more so than colocasias or alocasias. Agristarts is now listing it as Caladium praeterissum .https://www.agristarts.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/plants.plantDetail/plant_ID/264/index.htm

Jane, yes... what the chamber of commerce does not advertise! I get by with one or more: mosquito repellent or very diluted Dawn (lemon smell!), or, when pushed to it, carrying outside an electric fan on an outdoor extension cord and staying in front of it.

Carol, maybe they did. They never did act too enthusiastic. I had some strange neighbors, but they rallied around each other and me when they were really needed. I think they thought I was weird, which was true. Everyone sort of stayed to themselves unless you happened to run into them out for a walk or in the yard. I miss having neighbors that come over for coffee or call you up just to say hi. Everyone has such busy lives nowadays.

Revisiting since spring is here.

I enjoyed re-reading all of these. I have a couple more tips.

If you don't have a full 8 hours of full sun, but do have 4-6, and you want tomatoes, plant them anyway. Your yields won't be as good, but I've found this year that if you prune the plants, you will get a decent number of large tomatoes. I'm not preserving my tomatoes in any way, so this only applies if you want a few tomatoes to eat.

There are a lot of lovely veggies and edible plants that will grow in partial shade, so do your research and you can still grow veggies and edibles without a full-sun spot.

Eat your sweet potato leaves. They are yummy. The tender tips are good raw and the older ones cook up well. The tubers will still form, even if you use some of the leaves. Most ornamental sweet potatoes don't have edible leaves (they taste horrible). I use regular sweet potatoes as ground cover just so I can eat the leaves. I never dig the ones in the ornamental beds, and they come back every year, providing ground cover, food, and a never-ending supply of slips for the edible beds.

If you have earthworms, cultivate them by giving them lots of organic matter to eat. If you don't have earthworms, get some. They are nature's little fertilizer factories. You can buy red wigglers from just about any bait shop, or go out into the woods early in the morning and dig some up. They are abundant here in FL.

Grow flowers! Even in veggie beds, they attract pollinators and better than that, they feed your soul.

That's all. Lots to do today since we're having what I hope is our last freeze tomorrow.

I just love this old thread. I have learned so many wonderful things here.

One of my other favorite threads is this one:

What are your favorite beyond-the-basics garden tools?

Carol

The best tip I can give for gardening is the use of biochare\charcoal. If you have a fire pit when you're done for the night put your fire out with a hose don't let it burn down harvest the charcoal the next day and use it in your gardens