I feel your pain Lycheeluva. We suffer from zone denial. : (

Did you know Al aka Tapla is banned from gardenweb?

no i did not know- he is so nice- what happened?
i assume he can still participate using a different screen name?

no i did not know- he is so nice- what happened?
i assume he can still participate using a different screen name?

I wonder how you guys do it as well. I was born in S. FL.....so I am (this winter notwithstanding) season-change challenged. Its fine with me to have basically a summer that lasts 6 months, a spring for most of the rest of the year and only a few days of winter cold. If I want to get cold I can go visit the frigid north country. But some people need the change. When its 90 degrees with 85% humidity and hurricanes are bopping around threatening to blow us away, things can get a bit "heated." But then a again, I've been in NYC with 100 degree heat and close to that in humidity and they are even talking about NYC being overdue for a major hurricane hit. So.....you just have to make the most of what you got weatherwise until you can move to where you really want to live.

I'm looking forward to showing you my garden while your here. See you soon.

Harry

"no i did not know- he is so nice- what happened?
i assume he can still participate using a different screen name?"

LL, Al has moved on to a totally new garden forum, under the same screen name. You can read about it on the Container forum under the thread "Where's Al". He will be surely MISSED". He is such a wonderful and kind man...helped so many of us here on the forums, wealth of information and vast knowledge he always shared very freely and unselfishly.

Lycheeluva,
Nice day here in western NY. Yeah its still chilly but its getting into the high fourties today. That was what I was meaning. It is a teazer though. Calling for another week of snow. I guess you could say I am in the same position as you. I would love to move to FL but it my partner has kids here so I can't leave till the youngest is done with high school and she is only in the 6th grade. GRRR! My doctor actually told me last week that it would be better for me to live somewhere that had a warm climate year round, do I need a boulder to hit me in the head! Why am I still here!!! Enjoy FL while you can, I still have another 6-7 months before I can go. I HATE IT IN THIS F****** STATE!!!
Andrew

I left the Northeast about twenty years ago and have moved steadily southward since with the exception of a few years spent in California. Upstate New York, then Ocean City Maryland, then Orlando Florida then South Florida out to Cali then back again to South Florida where I'm planning to retire in 4-5 more years.

My job requires occasional travel, whenever I'm up north during the winter I wonder why does anyone choose to stay in that cold grey climate?

Yes to me it is a lot better down here in the sub-tropics.

I was in FLL a year ago today. Enjoying Hollywood Beach and watching the girls prance about in their little.... Ok.. Yeah.. Drove down to Homestead and was shocked to see the fields of bananas, managoes, papayas, etc etc.. Walked around the "Fruit and Spice Park", tried some different fruit...

You guys in NYC have it better then us over here! At least you don't have snow that has been on the ground since Dec 8, haven't seen the sun in a WEEK! and next week shows temps not getting above 10F and i just was looking at the 10 day and it looks COLD COLD COLD. To tell you the truth, i'd rather have 5F and full sunshine then 25F or 30F and clouds... I could never live in parts of Michigan that can go 50 or 60 days without the sun coming out (lake effect clouds).

This is my personally belief, but i really think that humans should only be living about 30 degrees N and S of the equator. I say this because our bodies REQUIRE vitamin D to survive and outside of about this range, your body makes NONE during the winter. Sure you can take supplements, but can a day at the beach in Jan really be "supplemented"!

I'm not such a fan of high humidity, so my pale body would probably do better in Phoenix or Cairo! Plus tropicals can be grown in both places without much problem (given WATER).

If you guys up north do have problems with winter, start exercising. I took up running about half a year ago and i've never felt better and yes...my wife is the reason i'm still up here too...!

I don't know, I live in the NYC/NJ metro area and don't find our climate that harsh--and I hate arctic cold too. Years ago, I remember winters that had more sustained cold and were much CLOUDIER. In more recent years, I've been busy growing windmill palms, camellias, Spanish moss, Southern Magnolias, Sabals, and even have a loquat tree outside without protection. My family left NYC years ago, I can remember as a teenager suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder but not since my move to the burbs. The thing about NYC (especially Manhattan) is that all those tall building block so much natural light that one is much more likely to develop seasonal depression.--Add to that the wind tunnel effect created by all those tall building. Of course, in the summer, all that concrete makes everything bake and feel blisteringly hot. (It's more comfortable in the Keys than Manhattan during the summer!) We have actually had a rather sunny winter. Today was gorgeous, crystal clear, bright white light and far from dreary. It really has NOT been so cold locally. Consider that many southern cities had record cold (even Havana, Cuba recorded a new all time record low--39F.. Local minimums have only been in the mid to upper teens (17F for me). That's not bad for mid January. Not Key West but mild enough for me to create my little, subtropical, piece of paradise.--A goal I suspect many of us share--north, south, east, and west. Peace out!

for those following the part of this thread that addressed tapla's ban at the container forum, i checked out the threads and apparently he was briefly banned in may for some bizarre reason but he was allowed back within a few days. i last saw a post by him on jan 10th- so unless he was banned in the last few days, he is not currently banned.

Why would they ban somebody here? I mean I'm sure there are certain rules but how hard would it be to just change your name and profile and re enter the forum. I thought you could say what you want without fear of being banned.
Back to the original subject. There are a lot of things I would miss about living here. Besides the fam, there are many plants and trees that cannot be grown in Fl. I would miss the fall, the leaves changing color. Lilacs, cherries, apple picking season, the concord grape harvest, the first snow, a white christmas but honestly I could trade it all in and live the last half of my life in FL. That is my mission. With or without my partner, no just kidding, couldn't do that but I am tempted. Especially when I am running out of room for tropicals and not looking forward to added expenses of a high tech light system!
Andrew

LL, he has been banned...I talked with him via email...but he has so many "fans" and followers that are trying to get him reinstated. I'm sure its just a matter of time before he is back in. You can't keep a GREAT person off too long. Keeping fingers crossed.

That's funny Gerry, I always think why do I live in Central FL. Too far north to really grow the tropical stuff without a ton of protection, and too far south to grow Cherries and most peaches, apples...My next house is definitely going to be a couple hundred miles south.

i was banned twice, i dont know why.
yes its easy to make another profile.

i moved down here from NY two years ago, dont miss it so much.
the weather has been really pleasant here since the cold front, 70s all day.

i went down to homestead today and picked up two more lychees for $20 a piece, both Sweetheart. i think one is going in my neighbors yard.

mango kush- where do u buy your lychee trees in homestead
Nancy- he was banned again in the last few days? why?

LL...UPDATE, I just saw a post a few minutes ago on the Container forum posted by Al...that he was just reinstated!! So he's back...thank goodness!!

Mangokush,
Not that it is any of my business but why would you plant a tree you bought for your neighbor? Are you out of room or something? that is generous if your neighbor lets you "borrow" some space to plant fruit trees! I would love to do that. Does anyone have a small spot in there yard that I can plant a mango in? We can share the fruit! LOL!!
Andrew

i decided that there wasnt enough lychee trees in my neighborhood.

i already have a sweetheart in the ground, dont have room for another.

i guess i could put another one in the same hole.

Nice Lychee trees Mangokush...that's a really good price. I've never seen lychee trees offered here for less than $25
(3 gal) and that was at lowe's over two years ago. I thought I lucked out when I bought mine at a local nursery (5 gal)? for $35 over two yrs ago. Haven't priced them this year?

Born and raised in NY, then moved to NJ for college and 16 years after that....
That is the #1 reason we moved to PR- weather. I was tired of being cold half the year.
We tried doing the zone-denial thing in NJ for a long time. Made a bedroom into a nursery until the sheet rock started growing mold. Then moved the set up into the basement, where the grow lights where set on timers for most of the day/night. We were always afraid the Feds would show up one day, thinking we were growing marijuana there instead of tropicals!

these were in 1 gallons, i potted them up. i could tell they were recently air layered but they rooted well.

i dont remember the name of the nursery, it was more of a landscaping company.

Jan 23, central Wisconsin, 37F and RAIN all day... Amazing...and we have 7 inches of GLACIER on the ground...

FLL was 85F and MIA was 86F yesterday. 90F's snuck all the way up into N. Mexico yesterday with areas near the TX border flirted with 100F... I think i could manage S. FL (Orlando south) and S. TX (Brownsville), AZ (Phoenix/Tucson) and S. CA (LA south...) :)

When i was in Key Largo, a guy in front of me was talking loud to his mother and some reason mentioned going home to Wisconsin in the spring...comes down every year for the entire winter and then goes back...I could handle that!

Yesterday it got up to 50 degrees in western NY.....today 30! LOL
Andrew

Harry i would say NY is due for another hurricane. the last one was Hurricane Gloria in 1985. it was a strong Cat 2 but still uprooted huge trees, destroyed boardwalks and left us without power for two weeks. i was 5.

Lycheeluva,

I detest Florida. I'm a Native, have lived here all my life. I find the heat debilitating. I'd much rather be cold than hot! I enjoy the few cool days we get in Jan/Feb much more than the rest of the year.

It is crowded (and we live in the country), dirty, traffic is terrible, we have way more than our share of criminals and Wal-Mart type folks. It looks so cheap and garish here, with plastic and neon everywhere.

If any of you people who don't like the cold, want to buy a fully fenced property full of tropical fruit trees, and a small, neat home, we will be leaving in 4-5 years to move west. The Rocky Mountains have won us over. We've been there many times over the years and always dread coming back to Florida.

The cold energizes us, and we can actually hike with the dogs and ride horses in cold weather. In Florida, my poor dogs are in A/C nearly all year.

We will not miss the hurricanes, insects, power outages, droughts, and heat at all...

You people who love tropical fruit trees would be horrified to see that many people here let fruit fall off their trees and rot. They prefer fruit from Publix. So weird!

Lisa
Jupiter, Florida

Having seen pics of your fruit trees, I would buy your property in a heartbeat if I could afford it! May I ask you, do you do anything special to your apples and stone fruit to adapt them to the zone 10 climate? I have ordered some low chill stuff from Bay Laurel Nursery and would appreciate any tips you could offer.

Thanks!

gcmastiffs, change of scenery sometimes is good, grass is always greener.

Are the property values their equal to where you are now? thats an important factor in comparing, im sure Denver has its neighborhoods too, definitely not as bad as some of Floridas, but Midwest towns have their share of meth problems.

i cant bear the cold and i was born and raised in it. when i visit NY my lips chap and crack my face turns red, my nose turns into a faucet and my extremities go numb. when i lived their though i was able to bear it better than most, which means it will probably only get better for you with time in Colorado.

ive been around the Orlando area and i definitely know what you mean about Wal-Mart types and down here on the beach its definitely garish. i kind of like it though, its old Florida. its nice in South Beach.

where i live in Hollywood, a mixed middle income average area, its mostly families. the storefronts are definitely dated in my part. when i bought my house it had terazzo floors and pink and turquouise bathroom tile, YIKES! i kept the terrazo but toned down the bathroom, i bet it was nice in its time. my particular block is a cul de sac, sometimes i dont lock my doors. the house i rent out down the block though i wouldnt want to live in. being from Queens i enjoy living in a more vibrant community really.

my older brother lives in old Ft Lauderdale. he has a Mexican type Villa on a beautiful property. there are alot of colonial old style houses their that are beautiful. some parts of Palm Beach are like Beverly Hills. Gorgeous but property taxes are a bit much. what i dont like is their cities and living around alot of Condos, it just seems so plastic and pre-fab.

well anyways i wish you good luck selling your house, its a tough market here. make sure to plant some Northern fruit trees and keep us updated, dont mind that its a Tropical forum.

Bryan

Mangokush,
I can appreciate evrything you just said. I lived in phoenix for three months and hated it! what you said about the meth is 100% accurate. I got shot at my first day living there. Whoever it was wasn't trying to shoot me but the bullit wholes in the stucco were inches from my body. The violence was terrible. Mericopa county was defintly not for me. I thought it was the greatest before I moved there but I didn't see the real Phoenix until it was too late. I loved the sun and the mild winters, the sunsets over the mountains were gorgous and even the hot hot summers didn't bother me. What you said about the grass is always greener is very true. I also can indentify with the numb body parts. I was feelin that today even though I know parts of my feet and legs were numb because of my back. I am having surgury in March. Trust me Mango, I wish I was livin down there. I love the Tampa area, especially the old part. The heat is my best friend and I would grow every tropical fruit I could get my hands on. I will be living there before I turn 45. I don't care what I have to do I will do it somehow. I cannot see builing a greenhouse to hold all my tropicals and paying huge heating bills when I could just buy a house with 2 or 3 acres and plant them all out. BTW Jay sent me two dragonfruit cacti. One needs to be rooted. I can't wait for th at to get goin and fruit! I also have tamarind seeds comin in the mail plus not this Monay but the following I will be buying another citrus tree. I can't wait for August, then it will be my turn to go to Florida.
Andrew

Hi, Lycheeluva you think its sucks to live zone 6/7? try living in zone 3 here in Canada

The older I get, the more I love life in my zone 7, relatively short subarctic winters and long subtropical summers.

Tasty,
No way in hell would I want to live in zone 3. do you grow vegetables in summer? Just wondering how that would work. You would have to have some fast maturing crops! I couldn't imagine growing tropicals outdoors in the summer. They must spend a very brief time otdoors. Well thats not true either. My tropicals go outdoors when the temps stay above freezing and even when summer ends and fall begins ileave them outdoors. My tropicals adapt fairly fast. I said it before but I left the majority of them out when the nights were still just above the 32 degree mark. We just have to be more creative when trying to maximize tropical tree growth. I leave most of my plants on concrete so the heat from the sun will heat the pots up. the only problem I have found with that is the need to water every other day unless we have good rain!
Andrew

thanks for all your responses guys- enjoyed reading them- holy moly- bill mees of lychees online just told me that you can buy farmland in parts of florida for $1500 an acre!

where?

Hi:
I grew up in the Caribbean (latitude 20 N). I then lived in SE FL for several years, and I've lived in NE FL for about 10 years now. I've also visited places like NY, NJ, PA, and Colorado) both in winter and summer).

I have to say that I really like the climate in NE Florida the best for human living. Here, you get about six months of *hot* weather, about four months of very comfortable weather, 1/2 months of cooler weather (need pants and long sleeves some times), and around 15 days of cold. So, you can go to the beach for six months, walk your dog and ride horses for four months, and own winter clothes and sit by the fire for two months. Not bad!

Of course, every time I have to cover up my tropical plants I wish I lived about 400 miles south!!! I will probably get tired of protecting things eventually, but for now, it's kind of fun growing things that everyone else does not have and pushing the zone limits... Besides, after every winter I get some new space in my yard!

Oh, the constant bitter cold just sucks. I really could not imagine living in a place like Colorado all
winter.
I take hot over -25 any day!

Mostro,
How about 1 degree. That is what it is today. Can't stand this crap any longer. The problem isn't just not being able to grow tropicals outdoors year round but OMG the older I get, the more my body aches from this cold crap. My body is retaliating against me living here!
Andrew

Yeah, 1 degree is around 66 degrees less than my current temperature here in FL/Jax.

One of the times I visited Colorado it was -20 degrees, my face, ears, nose, hands, feet, body, brain, etc, were either numb or hurting badly. The snow would literally stick/freeze on my face and I was not even sure I had my feet anymore. I am sorry, but that kind of weather is not meant for humans!

Been to Colorado on quite a few vacations. Great place....to ski. With all due deference to the folk here in Florida that Lisa mentioned in her posting, I've been in parts of Denver where the folks I encountered were not exactly my first choice of people to be my neighbor. That being said, mountains are wonderful, but unless you like growing various types of pine trees, not too much to get excited about horiculturally (at least fruit wise). Colorado is definitely on my "nice place to visit for a change of place" but I would not be happy with it as a steady diet. I guess it is another example of "to each his or her own." All I know is that when I walk out in my yard in the early morning and smell the citrus blooms, lychee blooms, mango blooms, etc.......it's hard for me to think that there could be that much better of a place to be at that moment.

Regarding farmland in Florida for $1,500.....I've not seen anything like that anywhere near me. Maybe somewhere up in the center part of the state or in reclaimed swamp land which floods regularly. I'd be most interested to hear where this as well.

To all those people who are so unhappy with where they are currently living--stop complaining and MOVE!!--This thread is getting tedious.

i dont think its tedious to read, well maybe your post a bit. paragraphs people.

What did I say that irritated you so?! That people who are so unhappy with where they are living should move! Try incorporating some grammar and punctuation into your posts and I might be willing to respond in paragraphs.

nj- i dont think your complaint is valid- if you find the thread tedious, it is very easy for you not to read it. Its extremely difficult for me to uproot my family and move, and in fact, i wont do it until the kids are outta the house- so fo rnow, i have to content myself with annual visits to FL and other exotic locations, and the odd rant on forums like this. Sorry if this bothers you.

Harry- will ask Bill where he was referring to- I'm sure it was not Palm Beach or Hollywood!

Florida is a known landing spot for empty nesters (and Canadians too tasty).

Well,theres always northern california's SF bay area (here comes the speil!) It can be nice(even 70's) until mid Dec,then winter kicks in through Jan..pretty much 58h-45l or so,some rains. But,by Feb,the longer days bring back the nice 60's,even a few 70's, by April rains really slow and its sunny much more than not and then by mid May our mild bay breeze summers-75-80h, 55-59l kick in..and that lasts to November. RARELY do people use air here even though 15 minutes inland it can be scortching hot. The bay area is like an island in nor cal.
So,you can grow all types of subtropicals together and all manner of high cloudforest species. Only the ultratropicals are out. So you can have Avocado,but not Breadfruit..and only people pleasant summer temps. You can get a great tan in San Jose at the south end of the bay..summers ave,a very nice 82h and 60l.
I live here and biggest drawback is old home and small lot. I better buy a lotto ticket.

I agree with stan. I love living in the bay area. Growing stuff like apples, cherries, pluots, peaches, kiwis, cherimoya and mangos.

We really have about 2 months of winter with the lows mostly in the 40. I had 1 night under 30 and my mango trees and cherimoya were fine without protection.

No walmarts anywhere nearby. I feel very lucky.

I love the SF/bay area. My Dad lives 20 miles south of SF, but the only drawback is the real estate market. You guys are still pretty high on home prices compared to FL...luckily for you guys you haven't seen the 40%-50%(some even more in certain parts of FL) drop in home prices. So unless you're selling from a good market to buy in a good market...the price difference can make it financially impossible, especially if you are retirement age or close.

Hey Mangokush,
I got your back with njoasis. I think if people want to be critical of other peples opinions maybe they shouldn't post here. The people that are regulars here are encouraging and friendly and people that want to be negative shouldn't even be here!
Andrew

Andrew my season is way too short from may to early october usually I have to grow early vegetables and fruits but I still grow tomatoes and watermelon, berries and other things. My citrus only get out side from late June to Early Septemeber im surprised there still living.

Tasty