Garden Blog - Top Tropicals

Date: 17 Aug 2025

How many cats in the tree?

Matilda's cat tree visitors at PeopleCats.Garden

😦 How many cats in the tree?

Three (don't forget the black tail with eyes upstairs)

🐈📸 Matilda's tree visitors at PeopleCats.Garden. 

#PeopleCats

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Date: 17 Aug 2025

The sunny show-off hummingbirds love

Caesalpinia mexicana - Mexican Bird of Paradise

🌞 The sunny show-off hummingbirds love
  • 🌞 Caesalpinia mexicana - Mexican Bird of Paradise - the sunny show-off you didn't know you needed. Many gardeners have popular and more common common Bird of Paradise Caesalpinia pulcherrima, with red flowers, but this one is rare in gardens.
  • 🌞 While most Bird of Paradise plants rely on looks alone, this one ups the game with fragrant blooms. From spring through summer, it's covered in butter-yellow flowers that stand out against soft, feathery foliage. Hummingbirds love it, and when the blooms fade, it makes woody seed pods that snap open like nature's fireworks.
  • 🌞 It's native to northern Mexico, which means it handles heat, sun, and dry conditions without a fuss. You can grow it as a compact shrub or let it stretch into a small tree. Either way, it’s easygoing, low-maintenance, and beautiful all season.


🛒 Attract hummingbirds to your garden

#Hedges_with_benefits #Butterfly_Plants

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Date: 16 Aug 2025

Breakfast of Champions

Breakfast of Champions
🐶 Breakfast of Champions

"Der Mensch ist, was er isst" - "Man is what he eats." - Ludwig Feuerbach, German philosopher, 1850

🐶📸 Sunshine and Mango, Top Tropicals Labradors, and their Papaya Tasting Table at Bfarm and PeopleCats.Garden. 

🛒 Explore Papaya varieties

#PeopleCats #Quotes

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Date: 16 Aug 2025

Variegated Chaya - beauty meets nutrition

Cnidoscolus aconitifolius variegatus - Variegated Chaya, Maya Spinach Tree

🌱 Variegated Chaya - beauty meets nutrition
  • 🌿 Variegated Chaya - Variegated Maya Spinach Tree or Cnidoscolus aconitifolius variegatus - is a showstopper in the edible garden. Its heavily cut, creamy-white variegated leaves look like they belong in a tropical ornamental bed, but this beauty is also a powerhouse leafy green.
  • 🌿 Native to the Yucatan Peninsula, Chaya has been a traditional food for centuries. Younger leaves (and a little stem) are cooked like spinach, simmered for at least 5-15 minutes to neutralize toxins, then served with butter, oil, or in soups. Once cooked, they’re loaded with protein, calcium, iron, and vitamins A and C - a true garden superfood.
  • 🌿 Fast-growing and low-maintenance, Chaya can reach 6-8 feet and thrives in full sun or partial shade. It's drought-tolerant, attracts butterflies and hummingbirds with its white flowers, and grows easily from cuttings. Perfect for food forests, permaculture gardens, or anyone wanting beauty and function in one plant.


🛒 Plant it, cook it, love it

📚 Learn more:

#Food_Forest #Remedies

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Date: 15 Aug 2025

If you can potty together, youre in for the long haul!

Cats Lily and Timo

🐱 If you can potty together, you're in for the long haul!

"Those who pee together stay together! If it's number 2 - it may be a rough relationship..." - Jamie McKinnon

🐈📸 Cats Lily and Timo are best friends at Top Tropicals PeopleCats.Garden. 

#PeopleCats #Quotes

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Date: 15 Aug 2025

Climbing 10 feet for Vanilla Beans!

Vanilla Bean Orchid - Vanilla planifolia

⭐️ Climbing 10 feet… for Vanilla Beans!
  • ⚡️ One of our Vanilla Bean Orchids at TopTropicals has big ambitions - it's already climbed 10 feet up a pine tree! We’re waiting (impatiently!) for those elegant yellow-green flowers, which will hopefully turn into vanilla beans.
  • ⚡️ Vanilla Bean Orchid (Vanilla planifolia) is the plant behind that sweet, comforting vanilla flavor we all love. It starts off like any potted orchid, but soon sends out aerial roots and becomes a climber, wrapping itself around trees or trellises. In its natural habitat, it grows high into forest canopies, but in the garden it will happily scale any sturdy support you give it.
  • ⚡️ Once established, it flowers and sets the long green pods we call vanilla beans. Growing your own is a lesson in patience - from flower to dried bean can take month - but nothing beats harvesting your own vanilla for the kitchen.


📚 Learn more:

📱How to produce your own vanilla: secrets of hand-pollination.

🛒 Climb toward your own beans

#Shade_Garden #Container_garden #Food_Forest

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Date: 14 Aug 2025

The sun will rise

Mr B the cat

Mr B the cat

🔥 The sun will rise

"Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise." - Victor Hugo

🐈📸 Mr B the cat at sunset at Top Tropicals PeopleCats.Garden. 

#PeopleCats #Quotes

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Date: 14 Aug 2025

Homegrown coffee - the journey begins

Coffee tree - Coffea arabica

☕️ Homegrown coffee - the journey begins!

Coffee trees (Coffea arabica) that you saw blooming at Top Tropicals in May with fragrant, gardenia-like flowers, now in August - they are loaded with fruit! We will update on them once they turn red and ripe...

🛒 Start your own coffee harvest

📚 Learn more:

#Food_Forest #Container_Garden #Shade_Garden

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Date: 13 Aug 2025

🌸 Orchid Tree - Bauhinia: Winter Blooms & Year-Round Beauty

Collage showing Bauhinia blakeana with magenta flowers, Bauhinia variegata var. candida with white blooms, and Bauhinia monandra with pink speckled flowers; all suitable for gardens, with some varieties adapted to container growing if trimmed.
Bauhinia blakeana, Bauhinia variegata var. candida, and Bauhinia monandra – Orchid Trees in Bloom

Sometimes a plant stops you midwalk. Flowers so bright they almost glow, leaves shaped like butterflies — that’s a Bauhinia, the Orchid Tree. These fast growers bring color when many gardens are quiet, with some blooming in the heart of winter.

🌟 Why Grow Bauhinia?

  • Exotic blooms in colors from white to deep magenta
  • Distinctive leaves — nature’s own butterfly design
  • Many varieties flower in the cooler season
  • Fast growth, easy shaping, more blooms after pruning
  • Varieties for large yards, small gardens, and sunny patios
  • Tolerant of heat, drought, and poor soils

Bauhinia Care Tips

🌞 Outdoor

Full sun for best flowering, well-draining soil, deep watering once established. Light pruning after bloom keeps shape and encourages more flowers. Protect young plants from frost. During the growing season (Spring - Fall), apply a balanced fertilizer - like top-dress slow release fertilizer or controlled-release Green Magic. Liquid fertilizer Sunshine Boosters Megaflor can be used year around - to promote vigorous growth and abundant blooms.

🏡 Indoor / Patio

Bright sun (south window or outdoors in warm months), large pot with drainage, even moisture during growth, and a bloom-booster feed in season. Feed regularly with a balanced fertilizer controlled-release Green Magic. Liquid fertilizer Sunshine Boosters Megaflor can be used year around - to promote vigorous growth and abundant blooms. Bring indoors before frost.

🍂 Seasonal Note – Bauhinias are Deciduous

Bauhinias drop their leaves in winter — even in warm climates. This is normal and part of their rest cycle. Bare branches in the cool season will leaf out again in spring, often just as flowers begin.

📝 Quick choice guide

Shop Bauhinas

Watch videos about flowering trees

Date: 13 Aug 2025

Lilys guide to the good life

Cat Lily (Lilimon)

🌳 Lily’s guide to the good life

Lily (aka Lilimon) has officially settled into Bfarm life - and she's living it up!

She's claimed a fluffy blanket as her spot, where she purrs away while kneading it like she's making bread.

When she's not in her cozy corner, she's off exploring the indoor jungle, getting into shenanigans with the other #PeopleCats, or joining in on Catnip Parties and rolling around like the happiest cat in the world!

Life is definitely treating Lily well.

🐈📸 Cat Lily has a happy life at Top Tropicals PeopleCats.Garden. 

#PeopleCats

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