Garden Blog - Top Tropicals
Date:
When Bigger means Better
Everybody loves shopping online nowadays, and plants are no exception. Buying plants by mail order is not uncommon anymore; it only takes one click, and luckily, there are many sources - from big shopping malls like Amazon to small backyard nurseries that sell their seedlings on eBay or Facebook - all delivered to your door. But plants are alive... So when doing your online plant shopping, you must ensure that you fully enjoy your experience and are happy with a healthy plant that a) doesn't die; b) recovers quickly; and c) starts growing fast, so you can see flowers and fruit as soon as possible.
The rule of thumb for shipping plants: bigger plants undergo shipping better, experience less stress, less leaf drop, and recover quicker than plants with smaller root systems. So when it comes to buying plants online, the bigger, the better. Unfortunately, many mail-order plant sources may sell you a tiny twig that has very few chances of surviving. Shipping is very expensive today, so shipping a bigger size plant may cost more than the plant itself.
Below is a piece of advice on how to make the best plant selection for your garden...
Photo above: Loquat trees in 3 gal containers.
5 important rules on how to buy trees online
1. Find a source with bigger plants. Check reviews, ask friends
for recommendations, inquire from the company about the size of their plants
and how they pack their plants for shipping.
TopTropicals offers well-established, strong plants with developed root
system, in container sizes 1, 3, 7, 15 gallon, directly from a tropical
Florida growing farm. Our unique plant-packing techniques are state of the art!
2. Price not always reflects the size and quality of the plant
TopTropicals offers many deals, discounts and sales, while still
providing the biggest and strongest plants grown in real tropical conditions.
3. Most fruit trees must be grafted to produce good fruit. Make
sure you are not purchasing a seedling when it comes to Mango, Avocado,
Peaches and some other trees with named varieties that don't come true to seed.
TopTropicals offers only grafted - Mango,
Avocado and a large number of other tropical cultivars.
4. Pick up when possible from the nursery your ordered from, or
get a delivery, instead of shipping the plants. A drive to the nursery will save you more time and money in the
future, plus you can hand-pick the biggest and healthiest specimens.
TopTropicals is open 7 days a week for your convenience. Visit our Ft Myers Garden Center or Sebring Farm to select the biggest plants.
5. Take advantage of X-Large size plant material if you live
outside the tropical zone and are trying to zone-push your tropical garden.
Bigger plants will establish faster and have more chances to survive cold winters.
Again, it will save you money in a long run (although bigger plants may be
more expensive, but their survival rate is much higher when it comes to cold
nights).
TopTropicals offers X-Large flowering and fruiting trees (7-15-25
gallons), and most of the varieties you see in our online
store can be custom-ordered in big sizes. Delivery and installation
available.
Photo above: Avocado trees in 7 gal containers.
Photo above: Magnolia champaca - Joy Perfume Tree in 25 gal container.
Date:
Cold protection for tropical plants
Pushing the limits of tropical gardening
The year is almost over but the winter is not. This Christmas weekend at our Sebring B-farm we had it down to 30F. As a tropical gardener, winter can be challenging, especially if you grow plants outside of tropical zones.
To protect your garden from the cold, consider the following:
1. Monitor freeze watches and be prepared to take action if
necessary.
2. Create temporary structures like mini-greenhouses using PVC pipes,
carport frames, or bamboo sticks to support covers.
3. Use covers such as frost cloth, cardboard boxes, blankets, and bed
sheets.
4. Use Christmas lights and other heating elements, including propane
heaters, to keep plants warm.
5. Add a layer of heavy mulch around plant trunks to protect them from the
cold.
6. Apply plant boosters that improve cold hardiness, such as Sunshine Epi,
Sunshine-Si, and Sunshine Superfood.
At TopTropicals B-Farm, we sprayed our plants with a special cold hardiness treatment Sunshine-Si and covered and wrapped everything we could. We also moved cold sensitive species inside greenhouses. All of our plants are looking great and happy!
Photo above: Mulching mango trunks and using Christmas lights for cold protection
Read more about this special treatment plan: Cold Hardiness Improvement Kit.
Photo above: Temporary wrapping of a section of a greenhouse with a plastic or frost cloth protects from a windchill. It may also win you a few degrees even without a heater. In this particular case, according to our temp sensors, it was 30F outside, and 41F inside this "dome", no heaters used.
Sunshine Boosters:
Last chance to stock up
at a lower price!
Sunshine Boosters are natural, amino acid-based liquid fertilizers made with only the highest quality ingredients. Starting in 2023, the pricing for Sunshine Boosters will be adjusting to reflect the increasing cost of supplies. This is your last chance to stock up on Sunshine Boosters before the end of the year! Sunshine Boosters are safe to use year around, with every watering.
Don't miss out on this opportunity to get the best value for your money!
Use discount for even better deal:
22FOR22
for 22% off orders $220+
Min order $220. Offer expires 12-31-22
Date:
Healthy Plants: Q&A from Mr Booster
Feeding Indoor Plants
Q: I am moving all my potted plants indoors as weather is cooling down. I still have Sunshine Boosters that I got from you in Summer. Do I need to continue fertilizing and how often, or should I wait until Spring?
A: Indoor plants add a vibrant warmth to your home, and can even
improve the air quality. But most importantly, indoor plants give you access
to year-round gardening.
While majority of house plants are easy to maintain, they still require
proper care to thrive.
Too many gardeners overlook the importance of fertilizing plants indoors.
However, proper feeding is essential to grow healthy, vibrant plants. With
outdoor plants nature sends rain and a plant will send new roots to find food,
an indoor plant is limited to only what you will give it. That is why it is
essential to feed your plants a healthy nutritious meal even indoors.
Many granular and slow-releasing fertilizers will recommend that you only
feed your plants occasionally, but this is not the healthiest for plants,
since they need to "snack" every day to satisfy their daily nutrient needs. When you feed a plant a large meal rarely, it cannot absorb the nutrients effectively, leftovers creating build up in soil (it's called "locked up nutrients") and that is why we specifically designed our fertilizers to be a light, daily nutritious meal for your plants -
Sunshine Home for houseplants...
Date:
10 plants that can make you happy.
3D garden ideas.
3D garden ideas.
Q: Can you make my yard bigger and prevent it from freezing?
A:
Yes, we can make your backyard bigger by adding a 3rd dimension - trees as a upper level, shrubs as a second level, vines in between, low growing perennials below them. Add ground covers and potted plants as separate specimens in between in-ground planted trees and shrubs. One more separate dimension is orchids and other epiphytes that happily grow on the trees. This multi-level structure will allow you not only collect so many plants, but also maintain them in a natural environment, similar to how they grow in a wild.
As far as preventing from freezing - it depends. You can use greenhouse, cover plants, create microclimate under large canopies, etc. Some tropical plants are tolerant to light frost, once established. If it gets below freezing in your area for more than a few hours, and especially if you have numerous nights with frost throughout winter, we recommend to keep plants in pots (BTW, this way you save space and can collect even more!). Pots can be moved to protected area during cold nights. The more established the tree, the more chances to survive colder temperatures. You may also use propane heaters during cold nights.
We also use plant booster SUNSHINE boosters to increase plants cold tolerance.
Cold protection is a lengthy subject. Here is some more information on cold protection.
Also, we recommend to check out our magazine Tropical Treasures (about pushing the limits of tropical gardening) for a detailed article on cold protection.
These are specific articles on Zone-Pushing in different issue #s regarding dealing with cold. See downloadable issues:
(#1) Growing Tropicals in Nontropical Climate, Three Freezing Nights in Southwest Florida
(#2) Temperature drops - an alert or a rehearsal?
(#5) Dealing with cold snaps, Cold hardy beauties
(#7) When winter is around the corner, Growing exotic Cordyline in colder climate
(#8) When the weather outside is frightful
(#9) Winter champions
(#11) Ready-for-winter checklist for in-ground plants
(#13) Winter checklist
(#18) Dealing with cold damaged plants
You may also order hard copies.
If temperatures drop below freezing in your area, remember to add Heat Pack to your order!
10 plants that will make you happy.
Everyone wants to be happy. Did you know that growing plants is not only fun but can also make you happy? In our new series we will introduce to you 10 plants for your tropical collection that will make you happy.
Visit our Facebook, YouTube Channel and stay happy!
Check out this video: 10 plants that will make you happy. Plant # 1 - Rose Apple.
Stay updated with TopTropicals Videos by subscribing to our channel at YouTube.com/TopTropicals and get our latest video news of what's fruiting and blooming!
Date:
Overwintering Adeniums outside of tropics
Q: We bought several adenium plants from you. We are moving to the Denver area of Colorado. How can we make sure the plants survive? Should we use a green house?
A: Adeniums are perfect container plants, and house plants. They can be easily grown outside of tropical climate. During winter, Adeniums drop leaves and go into dormancy which makes it easy to keep these plants in a dormant stage in a warm location of your house, or possibly even in well-lit spot of garage (with a window), with temperatures above 50-60F.
Here in South Florida, during time of cold, when chances of freeze are high, we move our own Adenium collection into lanai, with plastic sheet protection around lanai.
In colder climates, Adeniums can be kept indoors as house plants during winter. There are some requirements/tips for you:
- Temperature. Move Adeniums indoors when temperature starts dropping below 45F.
- SUNSHINE. Use SUNSHINE boosters to improve cold resistance of Adeniums, and essure healthy plant throughout winter. SUNSHINE-BC formula is specifically designed for plants with caudex, and bonsai.
- Water. Reduce watering to minimum, especially when plants drop leaves - this means they went into dormancy. Once a week light watering is enough. Water very carefully during cooler months. When it is hot (85-100F), excessive water usually won't harm adeniums: it will be partially used by a plant, and partially will evaporate. Especially be careful with water when temperatures drop below 65F - then tropical plants simply stop growing process and go dormant. Once adeniums start losing leaves, this is a sign to reduce watering to once a week to once a month, and in very small quantity (couple tablespoons per pot).
- Light. Bright light is not necessary, but do not keep them in dark either, even if all leaves dropped. Good light is necessary to maintain healthy stems and caudex. Keep in mind, the less light, the less watering too. Ideal spot is a windowsill, however if your space is limited and all windows occupied by other "leafy" plants, location close to window will be enough as long as watering is reduced, to avoid rot. We keep our big collection specimens on a roofed porch during winter, where level of light is very low. Last winter we haven't lost a single plant due to low light. They take shade pretty well considering minimum or no water. However bright light is always better - it creates healthier environment for a plant. We all know about space limitations for our large collections, especially in winter. So if you can afford a bright spot for adenium during winter - the plant will be lucky!
- Soil. Use only well drained mix with much higher content of perlite than you would use for most tropical plants. For adeniums, we use mix with 30-40% of perlite in it, while regular mix has 10-15%. Adeniums like alkaline soil, unlike most of tropical plants (hard to say what else likes alkaline... Ficus for sure!). This means, regular mix with high content of peat moss may cause root rot. To increase alkalinity, you may add dolomite. Here in Florida where we have natural supply of shell rock handy, it is easy to add some shell to a potting mix (shell sand, rather than quartz sand). We always add a few large shells on top of a pots with a big specimen. Besides increasing soil pH (making it more alkaline), shells look very decorative.
- Fertilizer. No fertilizer until Spring when plants start showing new growth and new leaves.
- Move your Adeniums outside in Spring, when chances of freeze are zero. More sunlight and air circulation is beneficial for breaking the dormancy and providing plants with a quick growth start.
