Great pics, Melanie! I love the caterpillar in her nest.

I have passionflowers on my big vine, too. Unfortunately, although they do make lots of nice fruit, I rarely get any because my squirrels have developed a taste for them. The neighbor on the other side of the fence gets lots of fruit because he has a dog that keeps the squirrels at bay, but on my side they chow down! Passiflora 'Purple Possum'.



A couple with pretty leaves, Caladium 'Pearl' and Canna 'Tropicanna'.

I'm just gonna leave this here and remind people of two things. First, 99% of the time, nature does not require your help. Second, if you do feel the need to move a tortoise or turtle out of the road, make sure you take them to the side they were headed. They have a keen sense of direction and if you point them the other way, they will turn right around and go back the way they were heading. http://gawker.com/floridians-w...

This is a road rescue from last year. I did just that, took it to where it was heading.

Thanks, Melanie. I didn't know that! I've seen people stop on the road to rescue turtles, but have never had to do it myself yet. I think that is maybe part of the 1% of times nature needs our help, mostly because we put the dang roads there.
My White Geiger is blooming, also the crazy little Walking Iris:

Elaine, I agree. I think the only reason nature needs our help is that we've messed it up to begin with. And good going, Pam! Just keep them going in the same direction. The cool thing about Floridians is that they're pretty used to people jumping out of their cars to do this. I once saw all four northbound lanes of Dale Mabry Hwy. stop so someone could rescue a Gopher Tortoise. And no one honked a horn! Can you imagine that happening up north? I used to get honked at in Philly for crossing the road when it was actually my turn to cross the road. I guess I wasn't moving fast enough for them.

Felt more like summer than spring today.
Growing in my garden this afternoon:
Angel's Trumpet


Coleus & Sweet Potato Vine


Bird houses on trellis, hiding two connected rainbarrels


One of 5 dahlias I found at Wal Mart - cheap. If the blooms last through the summer, it will be worth the $4.98 investment. They don't normally grow well in this part of Florida


Ivy Geraniums on pedestal

All very pretty, Elfie.

Yes, lovely pics to start my day.
Spring is so tiring! I got another 20 bags of mulch spread yesterday. Sprinklers running this AM so a good excuse why I can't lay more this AM. The front bed is about done, except for the section with thousands of Amaranth seedlings only up about 1". Don't want to smother them with mulch. Hopefully, in about 2 weeks, I'll be able to get in there & start transplanting them. I would like to get them growing out back in the "wild" section of my yard.
Haven't even started the side bed or the strip btwn house & sidewalk. I'm saving that for next week!!!! I'm having company end of April & early may so would like to have nice looking gardens by then.

Elfie, Your garden must be spectacular in person ... I love all your gorgeous pictures!

Oh Jean, that just keeps me going. I just put the back seats down in the car so I could go up and get a good 20 bags of mulch to start putting over a sandy pathway. Its just so dry and sandy, the leaves are not working. I though...O I dont want to mess with this mulch, its just the start, but Im going to. Anyone send rain! O my, I just remembered I have a pretty large camellia I have to get a hole ready for and plant. I keep waiting for rain,, but I guess Im just going to have to keep a hose on it.

As a kid (and a Tampa native), I literally never understood that "April showers" saying. Everyone knows it doesn't rain here in April.

Uh oh, Melanie the forecast says it's going to rain this weekend . . . and we had thunder and showers two nights last week! It may not be getting hotter here, but we sure do seem to be seeing "climate change" don't we!

Here's another dependable weather forecaster - known as the Thunderstorm Orchid, it popped out two spikes' worth of buds last week, after already blooming in mid-March. Also, loving the Thunbergia's little purple tubas.

I sure hope it rains. The last couple of times it missed us. I'm getting tired of watering the plants. Granted, I don't have to drag the hose as far since Dad installed one right by my butterfly garden. Still, I hate feeling like I'm melting as soon as I step outside. And it only gets worse from now on! Well, until about October, anyway.

We got perhaps an inch early, early this morning, so perhaps you'll get some of that front. We get down to 50'ish tomorrow and Sunday AM and then back into spring-like temperatures.

It's very dry here and rain is predicted for tomorrow and Sunday ... keeping my fingers crossed!

plantladylin said:Elfie, Your garden must be spectacular in person ... I love all your gorgeous pictures!

When you move to Sebastian you will have to come and visit the garden(s).

Just waving at everyone. Hard to navigate this site, but I'm catching on.
Sidney

Sidney. It just takes time to get used to the site but you can ask any questions over in the Site Talk forum. You can probably ask them in any forum because the people here are really nice, but that's the best place for technical type questions on how to use the site. Don't be a stranger to the Florida Forum, though! Also, we expect pictures! Okay, we like pictures, but we don't demand them. Feel free to pop in and tell us what's going on in your Florida garden this spring!

orchidgal said:
When you move to Sebastian you will have to come and visit the garden(s).

Elfie, I'd love to visit your gardens and have you visit mine once I get to Sebastian and get things going!

I enjoyed hosting the regional Master Gardeners on Thursday. What was supposed to be a one hour show-and-tell, about what I grow and how I started my tiny plant business, ended up being a two and one-half hour tour. There were several pictures posted on FB but I look like a dork in all of them. I guess I need to ban cameras/smart phones when I host people!