Garden Blog - Top Tropicals

Date: 20 Aug 2020

PeopleCats of TopTropicals. Cat of The Month: Greenhouse King

King continues being on top of the poll... thanks to his adventurous nature. This Purrrson just loves to travel! He likes driving and biking. How many times we pulled him out of customer's car or delivery truck!
Sure thing, he just did it again, joining contractor's team. Luckily he was noticed hiding in the back of the truck before the driver hit the highway!

ATTENTION VISITORS!

We are reminding you, please check your vehicles for cats before you leave!

On a bright side, King has been very helpful, helping to plant newly arrived plant shipment from Thailand.
For those of you who has been waiting for rare plants, after a long delay due to airlines lockdown, we finally got lots of rare stuff and it will be ready for shipping soon.
Please make sure to add to your wish-list these coming-soon rare plants, this is the only way we can ensure you will get notified when they are available for sale, on first come first serve basis.
These are limited quantities, high demand plants!
Don't miss your dream plant! Just click on "Notify me when available" and add your email to waiting list.

Limited quantities - will be ready soon
(planted with King's help)

- Amherstia nobilis - Pride of Burma
- Artabotrys siamensis - Climbing Ylang-Ylang
- Barringtonia acutangula - Indian Putat
- Barringtonia asiatica - Fish Poison Tree
- Bauhinia aureifolia - Fragrant Gold Leaf Orchid Vine
- Brownea ariza - Rose of Venezuela
- Brownea grandiceps - Scarlet Flame Bean
- Cananga fruticosa - Dwarf Ylang-Ylang
- Couroupita guianensis - Cannonball Tree
- Cyrtostachys lakka - Lipstick Palm, Red Sealing Wax
- Desmos chinensis - Ylang Ylang Shrub
- Dillenia philippinensis - Katmon, Philippines Elephant Apple
- Garcinia mangostana - Mangosteen
- Ixora congesta Thai Flame
- Melodorum fruticosum - Hot Lips Ylang-Ylang
- Monstera variegata Thai Constellation (available now for pick up only)
- Gustavia augusta - Heaven Lotus
- Posoqueria longiflora - Needle Flower Tree
- Rauwenhoffia, Melodorum siamensis
- Saraca declinata - Red Saraca
- Terminalia catappa - Tropical Almond
- Vallaris glabra - Bread Flower
- Wrightia vietnamensis - Dwarf

TopTropicals PeopleCat Club and Zoo

Thank you for supporting us in helping PeopleCat Community!
Make your kind donation today and receive a surprise gift from us! Every little bit helps. Thank you and God bless you and your pets!

Date: 7 Aug 2020

Healthy Plant Food

Q&A from Mr Booster

Plant food for a Star Fruit

Q: I have 2 Starfruit plants from you. One on the left is B10 has a lot of flowers but no fruit is developing. On the rite is Kenjeng. This one has no flowers at all. Both plants are growing very well. Plenty of sun and water. I am located in Boynton Beach Florida. So what to do?

A: Your trees on the pictures look very healthy, congratulations with a great care!
Starfruit, as well as other grafted fruit trees (like mango, avocado, etc) usually flower/fruit easily and readily while in pots in the nursery. Sometimes, once planted in the ground, they may reduce flowering or even stop flowering. What happened?
The answer is simple. In pots, we fertilize them on regular basis. In our nursery, we have fertilizer injector inline with irrigation system that dozes plant food with EVERY watering. In other nurseries, they may also use slow-release fertilizers, but it is still a regular routine to provide plant food to potted plants.
In the ground, especially in Florida poor soils, fruit trees may stop flowering or delay fruiting due to lack of nutrients, or dis-balance of elements in the ground. Without fertilizer, a tree may take extra time to develop bigger root system to reach out for necessary elements, and eventually will start fruiting anyway.
But we want it to fruit soon! The only way to fix the problem is to provide fertilizer on regular basis for a young tree. It is especially important during hot summer months when plant metabolism is fast due to high temperatures, plus nutrients may get washed away with frequent summer rains (like we have in Florida) even if you've added some fertilizer at time of planting.

You can use smart release fertilizer once a month during hot season, this one or similar:
Mango-Food - Smart Release Fruit Tree Booster.

But the most effective way to get a tropical tree to flowering and fruiting, is frequent applications of liquid fertilizer. We use Sunshine Boosters with every watering on our plants. They work great even on hard cases and weak plants, and you see the difference in a matter of weeks, sometimes even days.
We recommend the following fertilizer that contains all necessary elements for young fruit trees: SUNSHINE C-Cibus - Crop Nutrition Booster

SUNSHINE C-Cibus - Crop Nutrition Booster from Garden Series, or Combo Total Feed Collection - all nutrients in just one bottle, for fruit trees and edibles.

Date: 10 Mar 2020

Meet PeopleCats of TopTropicals. Cat of the Day: King the Hobo

"Live, travel, adventure, bless, and don't be sorry." - Jack Kerouac

King, who has been famous with his ability to get in trouble, without a doubt is the Cat of the day, week, and month. His recent adventure went above and beyond our expectations. King decided to take a ride.
He jumped inside the truck of our supplier from Homestead, for very innocent reason: inspect the quality of plants delivered. No questions asked, he did his job.
Next thing we remember was the driver calling us on his way to Homestead: "Looks like I have your cat in my truck, and he is pretty happy with the ride!"
Luckily, the discovery of the Hobo happened pretty quickly, before the truck left Ft Myers area. So King did not get all the way to Homestead as he planned, his adventure was interrupted. He was dropped off at Edison Estate Botanical Garden. The director Eric happen to know TopTropicals well, just visiting us a few days before for the Leap Year Celebration event. He kept King in his office until Onika came to pick him up.
What an adventure!

Dear visitors of Top Tropical Garden Center! When leaving our Nursery, please check your vehicles for cats! Apparently, they like to travel!

Thank you everybody for supporting us in helping PeopleCats. Every dollar you spend on TopTropicals plants is split between plant growers and PeopleCats who help us become better people.

Check out the Video: and more Cat of the Day stories.

After his adventures, King is resting with his pet mouse. Mouse is alive, and no animals were hurt during the adventures.

Date: 27 Feb 2020

Meet PeopleCats of TopTropicals. Cat of the Day: Lucky Abu

"You will always be lucky if you know how to make friends with strange cats".
Colonial American Proverb

- our last Cat of The Day Itembi started with this quote... and guess what, it proved right again!..

Right around the corner from TopTropicals, in the woods, Kristi noticed a skinny poor cat... she looked so miserable, just bones and skin... she could hardly walk and looked injured. And yet she had 2 kittens following her! The Cat Family could use some meal and a warm home. Unfortunately they seemed to be feral and wouldn't let Kristi pick them up.
Compassionate Kristi spend couple days brainstorming how to save these poor PeopleCats in need. She ended up setting a trap and... bingo! The first Little Purrson found its forever sweet home at TopTropicals!
...The cat groomer Lindsey came home from school. First bath time... the kitty smelled like poop! Soon the bath time was over... Full of fleas, and it's a boy!

She named him Abu. Just like the delicious exotic tropical fruit! Or, a mischievous Aladdin's Monkey companion ;)

We will send you updates on Abu and hope that his Mom will join him soon at TopTropicals Cat Paradise!

Remember that every dollar you spend on TopTropicals plants, is split between plant growers and PeopleCats who are our all-time companions and helpers in our daily hard work! We thank our customers for buying plants and thank our PeopleCats for keeping us cool, kind, and happy!

Check out the Video: and more Cat of the Day stories.

Lucky Abu: from rags to riches!

Being trapped in a cage for a few hours is not so bad if you have your own petting staff!

Date: 29 Jan 2020

Meet People of TopTropicals. Pea Cock of the Day: the Orchid Guard

Recently we started to reveal the secret about who works behind the scenes on TopTropicals project; you have already met our editors and their assistants: Marina with Tilda, and Alex with Sonya. Today's story is about a Magic Peacock who works in orchid greenhouse of Eleanor Wilks - our photographer and tropical plant journalist in New Zealand and Australia. The watermark EleNZ you see on pictures of Australian flora - is Eleanor's!
Today Eleanor is sharing with us pictures of this amazing bird that helps her around her Orchidarium.
This young Pea Cock showed up one day in her backyard from nowhere and set up his living quarters in a tree. She asked around: no one was missing a peacock... so she took the Pea in and now he is in charge of her orchid collection. After a day of a hard work, Pea comes home to the back porch, waiting for Eleanor to sing him a good-night lullaby. Pea won't go to sleep until everyone in the house is ready for bed and the lights turned off. What a responsible house guard!

Check out and more Cat of the Day stories.