The best Rose to grow in Florida

First day

Over the years I have tried to grow Roses in my garden with very bad results. The combination of bad sandy soil, heat, humidity, too much rain and bugs galore does not give good results, I always end up with dead or sick plants and no roses.
I have one rose bush given to me by my father many years ago. This plant is perfect for Florida, it gives beautiful roses, it has no thorns, it never gets any of those common rose diseases like black spots and it takes very little care. I don’t know the name of this rose, it opens the first day in an off white yellowish color, by the second and third day it turns pinkish and by the forth day is all pick reddish color. The only problem with this rose is that is not very good for cutting.
Roses are my wife favorite flower and they remind me of my grandmother's garden in Cuba and the good times I had in that garden as a child. So I will continue to try to grow more roses, I wish I could find more like this one.

Second and third day

Forth day

Can you grow Daffodils in Florida?

I got this beautiful Daffodil plant for Valentines Day. I always been fascinated by this flower specially when I travel up north, but gardening in Zone 10b I figured is impossible to grow these beauties down here. To my surprise there is a Florida Daffodil Society and they have members growing Daffodils as far south as Orlando. So my question is if the plant can stand the Orlando summer heat they should be able to stand the Miami heat also, there is not much of a difference.
I took the day off from work today and got my hand dirty in the Garden. It has been a few days since I been out there, the weather was in the 50’s today (cold for us) but if turn out to be a very pleasant day.
After reading so many blogs this fall from Northern gardeners about planting bulbs for next spring I decided to dig up all the Day Lilies bulbs I have spread all over my back garden and planted them in a central location. It should look nice this summer, stay tune for pictures.
I also replanted Hollyhocks that I am growing from seeds, I collected on recent trip to Vermont this past fall. I have no idea the color the flowers, because the plants were dead by the time I got the seeds from some one’s garden.
Tomorrow we are expecting the coldest day of the year the temperature is suppose to go down in the low 40’s. That is very cold for us, I feel badly for all the tourists in town for the long weekend looking for the Florida sun.
Happy Presidents Day Everyone (For those of you overseas Monday is a Holiday in the US celebrating all past presidents)

Back home from the frozen tundra of NY.

White Begonia

Yesterday I returned from my business trip to New York City where the weather was in the mid 20’s and the windshield factor in the single digits.
When you live in Florida is always good to take a quick trip up North in the winter so we can appreciate how good we have here and we should stop complaining about the rain and the heat in the summer.
When you are away from your garden for a few days, you find surprises when you return. Like, my wonderful family forgot to water my hanging baskets for four days, the dog knock down one of my pots running after cats and no one bother to pick it up but on the bright side some of my plants flowered while I was away.

Here are some of the pictures.

Bougainvilleas

Update on my Starburst shrub.

Not Gardening Weather

No Gardening this weekend for the last four days a weather front has parked it self in South Florida and we had four days of constant rain and high wind and cooler temperature. I know, I should not complain compare with what some of you are going thru this is a piece a cake, but the reason we live in Florida is so we can enjoy the mild winters with no rain. We get plenty of that in the summer.
Tomorrow I am heading to New York City on a business trip, why my employer picks the middle of February to have a sales meeting in New York is beyond me. The good news is I will be back to Miami on Saturday and hopefully good weather to get in the garden and do some work. (After a sales meeting I am going to need all the time in the garden to get back my sanity)
What is in bloom in the Garden?

THRYALLIS, I have three of this shrubs planted in the front of my house, the flowers are a showy yellow in clusters at the tip of the branch, it flowers all year around but the best results come in the summer. Is a very aggressive shrub but once a year around this time it should be trim hard. I planted my to close the house, that is going to be problem when I’ll have the house painted the winter.

Super Bowl Weekend in Miami

Here it is finally Super Bowl weekend in Miami, if you have a lot of money you can take on all the festivities and don’t mind paying for the outrageous prices our local merchants are charging all our guests or you can also leave town and let the tourist be stock in traffic the entire weekend. As for me I’ll stay home enjoy my garden and tomorrow invite a few friends over for a Super Bowl barbecue party.
The pictures below is the view from my back porch,
I promised Carol from Indiana that this household will root for the Colts.
“GO COLTS”