Hi, Bill! Congrats on the babies due this summer, that takes the cake on growing!

You must post photos of the little ones.

I'm originally from NYC and find growing in S. Florida a real challenge. Most of what I've tried to grow from my past, have not done well here.

Still a work in progress!

Welcome to the forum and please keep us updated.

Jane

Welcome Bill! You might want to put your growing zone in your name line so we can best advise you. Florida has different growing zones and the suggestions can vary

based on your area.

Growing veggies in Fl. is a whole new learning curve so I hope you're prepared.

Congrats on the new twins coming.

Hi Bill

Welcome to the Florida forum! Congratulations on your new gardening projects and your growing family, hope to see all about that in future pictures...

Every place in the world is different than other and you just have to learn what works in your area.

For me gardening is not only fun but very important in my life.

Silvia

Welcome, Bill. Yeah, your zone is really important since there are a lot of very different growing areas in FL.

Here are two very useful resources for veggies in FL:

http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/vh021

and

http://www.growables.org

Welcome to the forum Bill! As everyone says gardening in Florida is so different than up north. Most of us trasplants learned to forget pretty much everything about gardening up north versus gardening in Florida.

The links above are the best! Great info to get you started. Also if any of your neighbors are gardeners you might want to ask them what they grow. Another good way to get started. Other than that if you type a word, say "tomatoes", in the "search in gardenweb" box at the top of the page it will bring up tons of posts.

And of course ask questions here. Lots of very knowledgable folks to answer them.

Hi Bill, welcome to Florida and the forum! Congrats on the babies, it will be fun for you and them to learn about Florida gardening together :)

I'm a transplant from Ohio. I've been in Florida 10 years, first in Williston (9a) in north central Florida and now in Englewood (10a) in SW Florida. It took me several years to finally quit trying to grow plants down here that thrived in Ohio (I so desperately wanted to grow my bee balm, tulips, foxgloves, lamb's ear, etc). While July and August can be brutally hot and humid in Ohio, Florida's summer is generally 8 or so months long. Many of my Ohio plants couldn't handle the heat and humidity that long.

In addition, in Williston I tried to grow all the tropical plants that I thought were cool (birds of paradise, citrus trees, etc) and was sure that I would have my own tropical paradise soon. Wrong! We got several hard freezes each winter and my sandhill property's "soil" was pitiful. Now, just 1 full zone further south in Englewood, those plants thrive and I have a jungle!

I think the most important things I can recommend are:

- improve the soil in your entire garden (not just the hole the plant is going in) with manure, compost, fertilizer, etc based on your plants' needs for the best chance of success.

- try planting natives whenever possible as they will be easier to grow since they are acclimated to our beautiful state

- here or anywhere you live, plant nectar and host plants to attract pollinators like butterflies, bees and even hummingbirds so that you have a better chance of fruit and vegetable production. In addition, your girls will learn to identify and love the many cool creatures the plants draw.

Sorry for rambling on. Good luck on your new adventures!

Rhonda

Thanks Bea! Glad you added that because I was going to but my train of thought derailed lol

I have fond memories of my toddler in the garden! I wish you as much joy as both the garden and the child gave me! Best luck with it too!. the hardest transformation for me was reprogramming the beginning of gardening season. For the firs few years, I'd begin tilling and seed starting in March - which is about 6 months too early in S FL.

Hi Bill welcome to the forum, the forum is a great resource spend some time reading and do searches on it you will be amazed at how much you can learn from old posts. Also what part of Florida it makes a big difference on what and how to grow.

New pics of all my gardening soon

Thank you all so much for this info, I love in sunrise Florida so gonna look up what zone that is now, but in basic terms, it’s hot here all the time. It’s nice going into my first forum ever to recieve so much love from the community upon entering. Looking forward to getting to know everyone

I didn't look it up, but I think Sunrise Broward county is in zone 10A. Considered South Florida in some of the links above. If you plan to veg. garden this summer, you'll be limited to just a few options. I'll e putting in sweet potatoes in a couple of months. I'm going to try collards this year too, so I"ll have to look up when to plant those seeds. It';s too humid and hot for a lot of vegetables - as it doesn't even cool off at night.