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| Waterlily "Tina" |
The tropical waterlily Tina has been blooming like mad, in spite of the fact that I haven't fertilized it in over a year. "Her" pot is in a half-barrel nestled in the dappled shade of a Fiddlewood, one of the most valuable plants in the yard because of the partial shade it affords.
A clump of chalky-blue Elliott's lovegrass has sprung up beside the waterlily pot, thriving from overspill. Grackles swoop down from the fiddlewood to bathe here because they can perch on the rim of of the pot within a pot, throwing out arcs of water with every wingflap. The grass loves it. I have the frame for an old hanging basket over the waterlily crown to keep them from destroying the plant, but when the grackles are active, I need to add water to the pot every day, and the grass gets a little drink in the process.
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Elliott's Lovegrass in Bloom |
Dwarf golden dewdrop, Duranta repens, is also good for cooling things down. Lucious racemes of white-edged, deep purple flowers droop from arching stems. I have to keep it in a pot to protect it from root knot nematodes, the bane of southern gardeners, and an especially bothersome pest in South Florida. If it is in full sun, the leaves get too yellow, so it needs some dappled shade to let the flowers and foliage thrive.
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| Golden Dewdrop |
Duranta used to be considered a Florida native, but isn't classified as such now. At any rate, it is certainly "Florida friendly" in terms of water and fertilizer usage. There is a non-dwarf form, but given the small size of the yard, I need to look for small varieties. The plant's name comes from the golden seeds (poisonous) that follow the flowers. A member of the Verbena family, it is highly attractive to many butterflies. It blooms periodically throughout the year. I have moved its pot beside and a little in front of another Tina waterlily in the front yard. I like the effect of the branches drooping over the water, and I hope the purples will "talk" to each other.
Blue porterweed (Stachytarpheta jamaicensis), another member of Verbenaceae, would be my choice if I could have only one nectar plant. It attracts not only many butterflies and other insect species, but also hummingbirds. We see very few hummers, only during their spring and fall migrations, but they love the blue porterweed almost as much as the traditional red flowers like fire bush coral honeysuckle, and red geiger. (I remember hummingbirds nectaring at the blue balloon-flowers (Platycodon sp) I had in a rock garden in Georgia).
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| Native Blue Porterweed |
It is hard to convey the beauty of blue porterweed in a photo or small drawing, since each flower spike has only 3-6 pale blue flowers open at a time. Each plant produces multiple spikes, though, so a mature plant, or even better, a clump of porterweeds, will have an abundance of blues dancing above the foliage.
There is a great deal of confusion in the trade over blue porterweed, and many nurseries unwittingly purvey a non-native form, Stachytarpheta urticifolia. This plant does attract butterflies, but also gets woody and scraggly with time. It has a minutely quilted leaf surface, and its flowers tend toward purple. The native porterweed has much smoother leaves, blue flowers, more compact habit, and smaller stature. Naturalist Roger Hammer has been instrumental in clearing up the confusion, at least within native plant circles.
I treat it as something like a long-lived annual or short-lived perennial. I cut it back when it starts to decline, but eventually it is easier for me to pull out the decadent individuals and foster the new ones that have sprung up in the yard. Without grass competition it self-sows actively, but not so much that it becomes a nuisance.
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| Carpenter Bee(?) on Native Blue Porterweed |
Under very wet conditions the leaves may be attacked by a fungus. I have been able to keep this under control by pruning or removing diseased plants. The porterweeds at a nearby nature center where I volunteered years ago were sometimes attacked by a stem-boring insect, but so far the ones in our yard have been free from this. They do get mealy bugs and spittle bugs, especially the older plants, but essentially are trouble free. They are growing scattered throughout the yard, and also in large pots.
Since we still have had no rain for over a week, fungus is the least of my worries. It rains all around us, and most days the skies get gray and even livid purple, with thunder and some lightning, but it passes us by with nary a sprinkle.
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