Our weather is "swinging" more in North Alabama zone 7B. All winter and spring, there were high temps for a day or so and then very cold. It stayed cold and rainy all through May. May is usually nice, but not this year. When the weather finally turned hot, it was cold one day in June, then 80* the next. since then has stayed very hot and humid. We really didn't have a spring and went straight from February to July.

Sherry, the "no spring" happened here this year too. I love the spring, so it was frustrating to only get a short period of nice weather before it started getting really hot and rainy. The rainy season generally doesn't start until June, but this year, it POURED all during May.

I've had a number of infestations, starting w/ chili thrips a few years back, then snails, then those horrid leaf notchers and now what seems to be massive colonies of some new-to-me brown ants that keep invading the house and creating swathes of nests surrounding the house. I have seen them elsewhere too, like in the park at work. The nests appear similar to fire ant nests, but they are not fire ants.

I credit these infestations to a lack of very cold winter temperatures, which would keep the insect populations down. Diseases seem more prevalent as well, possibly carried by these pests.

& oh yes, the torrential rains! Seems as if we never get any nice gentle rains any more, just deluges, which thankfully don't seem to last very long, but drop oceans of water in just a few minutes.

I have lived in florida since birth. The summers of my childhood up into my teen years you could always count on a summer storm in the late afternoon aroud 4 or 5pm. Then those dried up and those count on summer rains stopped coming west of i75. I have always wondered if the interstate and the heat rising from it somehow interferred with the weather patterns.

The last two springs have been really wet with water sitting in the yard but this summer is the wettest summer i ever remember. Water has stayed standing in the back third of my yard. The ditches have not drained in months. The skeeters are just crazy. On the plus side my water bill is lower as i don't need to water my potted plants.

Deb, I don't like to sound pessimistic but global warming is happening right before our eyes!

Carol, that is a very pretty picture!

Carolb, I thought that it was only in my garden the ants problem, for the first time in my life I had ants biting my feet twice!!! And I had shoes on, now I won't go to the garden without socks.:)

Silvia

Silvia, I take a lot of photos to get one good one LOL. And that silly fountain that has absolutely nothing to do with me makes this hillbilly place look a whole lot grander than it is.

I've had lots of ants this year, too. Should have said that in my earlier post. I've treated the mounds - following the ant bait instructions to the letter - and still, the next day, there is a new mound, one-to-two feet away. Sigh. And I've been bitten, too. I always wear socks with my sloggers, too. There are two brand-new mounds yesterday that I need to get after.

Carol, I know how it is with the pictures, you have to take a lot to get something that you like.:)

Don't be shy, your place is very well taken care of and in good taste. And I know that requires dedication.

In the beginning when I noticed the ants, I started treating them with the hot water bath, then I got tired of that or busy. These days I walk the garden very carefully and looking down so I don't step in a mound again. I am not going to let them bite me for the third time, oh no!

I have heard that boiling water is very effective. I don't have a tea kettle and may have to pick one up the next time I'm at a thrift store. ...

Hey, wait... EUREKA! You know what, I do have a tea kettle! I have my mother's! A nice old something-or-other from the 50s or 60s in a box in the back bedroom. I will try boiling water.

Carol

I use diatomaceous earth for fire ants. I was spraying them with Demon, but that stuff is expensive, and I use DE for other things in the garden as well. You have to stir the pile and let as many come out as possible, then dust over them. The dust has to get on them. It usually takes 2 times to get rid of them, and even then, they usually just move somewhere else, but at least it's safe, and it gives silica to the plants, which is good.

I am mildly allergic to fire ant stings and have a low tolerance for them in my yard. They are the only critter that I feel that way about.

They still make Amdro, don't they? When sprinkled very lightly on and near a mound, the ants will search out the particles and take them back to the deep innards of the nest. The chemical is eventually fed to the developing larvae and the queen. At that point, the entire colony is dead.

Hot water, assorted contact insecticides, and DE can never kill a colony. Fire ant tunnels consist of a large network of horizontal channels that connect a series of chambers. The only way to get rid of the population is to entice the worker ants themselves to spread the stuff far and wide.

Fire ants will pack up and move at the slightest provocation. People think that hot water works because the ants have moved, not because they're dead. When applying Amdro, the mounds should be approached carefully and the product applied gently without disturbing the inhabitants. In a very short time, the bait will disappear inside and the ant population will be eliminated.

I have heard that boiling water is very effective.

Nah, at worst they take the kids and move over a few feet, but mostly they seem to think it's spa day.

For fire ants I've had good luck with Extinguish Plus which works similarly to Andro. I used to buy It from an exterminating business but have also found it on Amazon.

Speaking of fire ants, I miss Diazinon.

Climate in Florida seems to varie greatly from what I see. It seems to rain very regularly in West Palm Beach and fort Lauderdale for instance, even in winter. Actually I researched their climate and they're catergorized as a rainforest climate with no real dry season, while here in St. Pete it's a Savannah climate with long periods of dry weather. I'm considering one day moving as I can't stand the long dry season here, my soil is just nearly always dry and having to water so very often by hand is becoming too much.

I was just talking to my friend about the weather in my area this summer. We both find it's been a mild summer in my area. Most days have been 90° or below while last summer it seemed like every single day was 95° or above. I just checked next weeks forecast for my area and we have most days only in the mid to upper 80's.

Florida_Joes, are you in a microclimate, because according to this map, you should be Humid Subtropical like most of Florida. The Savannah i much further south, down around Naples.

Up here in N. Florida, we aren't supposed to have a dry season, yet we do.

It seems St. Pete in general borders humid subtropical and "tropical" savanna. Idk if I'm in a micro climate but I am in USDA zone 10a just as Naples is. All the same plants thrive here as there.

Florida_Joes, When I lived in North Port, I was so close to the border of 9b/10a, that I could grow a lot of 10a plants. When they redid the maps, the border moved up enough to include North Port. Living on the border is great, because you have many more plants to choose from.

I still stand by sprinkling grits to rid your yard of fire ants...i have no fire ants in my yard.

Pea - I put some bacon grease on my grits to attract them. They love grease.

DirtyGardener, unfortunately I have no success with much more cold Hardy plants. I've never seen a peach or pear tree that had actual fruit on it anywhere here. Even figs seem confused about when they should start/stop growing so they just sit there confused all year long.

I think it's how very dry (precipitation wise) and sunny my winters/springs are here. Some winters it rains once all winter long. There's no real chill period either unless you count like 3 or 4 hrs a year.

Tropical things like sapote and custard apple are super productive on the other hand. My starfruit tree fruits three times a year. Some mango varieties fruit twice a year here. Papayas fruit for most of the year.

Florida_Joes, yes, I miss my tropical fruits a lot. Don't talk to me about starfruit! One tiny tree and I couldn't even give them all away! I read somewhere that one starfruit tree is enough for the entire neighborhood, and mine surely was.

There was one person on here at some time who lived in your zone and was able to grow the low-chill fruits like apples and peaches. My ex-roomate managed to get a tropical peach tree to grow, but it never bore well.

Honestly, I moved up here because I wanted to grow more temperate fruits, and danged if everyone isn't growing citrus! It's insane! Well, at least figs do well. My neighbor in North Port had a fig that refused to grow as well, but her Brogdon avocado and mango bore like mad. I don't know which I would rather have.