The Banana Chronicles

I've always wandered aimlessly in the mornings in my gardens. These days, I have to concentrate on being aimless - which, although my chronic state - is a problem as my garden has set paths on a small lot. Anyway - during a'wandering this one day, I sense the presence of Something New. I feel IT: Red, pendulous, bigger than my head - and my head is nothing to sneeze at. I look up, and voila! (or more appropriately: AGH! (or OY?) I behold the glorious bud suspended, bursting mid-air: Floral fireworks. The Star Spangled Banana. Really more like Audrey II, the big-lipped nosher from Little Shop of Horrors ( must-see botanical rock musical.) Little banana plant of yore no-more. This, as the Jefferson Starship might say, is the Crown of Creation. This plant has realized its destiny.


It had gone unnoticed, starting out kind of sheathed, incognito, appearing to be another extraordinary leaf among many, but that day the spectacular banana flower surfaced through the (endless) pool of my oblivion, to my consciousness. Okay, I've gone all 60s on you. Now you know. Welcome, my Friends, to the show that never ends! But seriously - didn't some kind of prehistoric Something surface from the ooze to chow down on this plant's grandma's stem cells?

Anyway, over time, Seymour Banana Flower shot forward while it’s hind petals curled back revealing its hand: A jackpot of perfect fruit, playing peak-a-boo behind the curling red petals. They filled out, plumped, spiraling around the stem revealing Nature’s plan (see 60s note above) in each exquisite fruit.

I was invited up North at the end of October to visit a friend with a new house and wanted to bring some kind of “Floridy” gift. I was stumped up until the day of my departure when, during my morning ramble, I was halted in my tracks by the banana gang's cheerful (but admittedly silent) chorus bidding me “Top of the Morn!”(talking fruits?- Irish ones? - 60s again...)

Airport personnel realized my problems were clearly only of the horticultural variety and UP I FLEW, my carry-on bag alive with giant red banana flower, 3-foot long stalk and semi-ripened fruits. I worried about the rocking and the warmth of the over-head compartment. I wondered if I had unwittingly transported some evolving pudding.

But, no. The banana flower and progeny were sprung for presentation and were intact and suitably appreciated. Fruits still green, they were set on the fireplace mantle to be admired. I spent a day alone at Marcia’s house while she was at work. I lolled on the couch and literally watched those devils ripen over the course of my day. (Just throw in that aforementioned decade reference wherever you like - its always appropriate.)

That evening we stood in the shadows of the towering, autumn-painted maples in Marcia's yard and ate delicious Florida bananas. Bingo! Kumbaya. We are One.

I've since acquired a dwarf banana variety (Cavendish) which doesn't tower. I planted one little plant in the photo-op/children's garden. (bench, sand, then grandbabes, toys - talk about reaching your destiny!)


The other morning, there, right at eye level was the odd-looking sheath I had only imagined. Days went past, each unfurling the Awesome Truth. (Referencing should be happening.)

The babes and grandbabes are dragged out there just about hourly now to see where babies come from. In the sweetest way. (Better than the "doctor book" Emmalee and Taylor are so enthralled with.)

So, the fruits are fruiting, and this plant, with more energy than it knows what to do with, is sending out suckers (baby plants). We'll have to

wait months for the bananas to ripen, but I've been out there digging the extra plants and will be offering them for sale. It's Psychedelic BananaRama, Baby! Right from the ooze to youse. (I have not mentioned New Jersey once in this installment…) In time, I should have a few plants to mail out. Let me know if you want one.

How to Garden in Florida

I grow what I love - which is anything that is interesting, floriferous, edible, smelly - (in the good way.) If it gets flowers and won't hurt me, I want to grow it. I still grow some plants that were my dad's - and he stopped growing things a really really long time ago. It's kind of cosmic, really.

I moved from New Jersey (The Garden State) to Florida (Land of the Flowers) more than 15 years ago to be able to garden year-round. I rented houses for years, happily gardening in pots on patios. Eventually I bought a house, seeing in its ratty lawn the garden wishing to be set free. That garden now surrounds my house, the lawn mulched out of its miserable existence.

I became a Master Gardener, got my nursery license. I sold plants at regular plant sales from my home. I was always a gardener - Joni Mitchell’s “ Lady of the Canyon” who grew stuff. I've always tried to grow everything.

I'll show you my clipping: I considered it a RAVE review for being a great gardener - under arrest, but a great gardener… (notice the askew ceiling segment and gigantic cop.)

I've mostly cleaned up my act, but am still pushing the green stuff. My customers are as varied as the plants we can grow here. My customers are retirees yearning for the peonies and irises of home, but dazzled by the possibilities of our glorious climate. My customers are young couples just getting started gardening. Some of my customers are garden club members visiting my garden to see what can be grown here and some come for one last spree before they travel back up north.

I encourage them all - and you - to try something new. Gardening in Florida, we can grow our houseplants in the ground, for heaven’s sake! Geraniums can thrive for years planted in the right spot.

We can’t grow peonies, but we’ve got the beautiful Angel Trumpets (Brugmansia and Datura,) and sages and jasmines galore. I’ve got some water irises blooming in my pond and walking irises (appropriately) by a path. They’re different from their northern cousins, but they’re wonderful just the same.

We’ve got pinks: begonias and Lisianthus. And blues: Plumbago and Blue Daze. We've got orchids blooming under our Oak trees. We've got sunlight on the sand and plenty o' nuthin' and so much more.

I encourage you all, whether gardening here in Florida or where-ever, to just keep an open mind. Be brave. Go for quantity and you’ll end up with quality. Plant everything you like. Move it if it isn’t thriving. Give it away if it’s still not suiting you or if you have extras. Compost it if its not fit for human consumption. (My garden looks great. You don't see the plants that didn't make it. )

Plant til the sweat runs down your legs and the fire ants run up. Run to the shower. Wait 'til its cooler and plant some more! You’ll end up with plants that fit your style and your location. You'll end up with a garden. Who could ask for anything more?

Selling Plants at the local Flea Market

I was in need of The Next Big Thing. You know how things get sometimes… I was too sad to lift my head up, brought to my knees (very bad posture.) But gardening saved me once again, to the point that I had loads of plants needing to get gone. I found my way to a local flea market here in Venice, putting money down to reserve a booth space. There was a brandy new one they had just bricked and awninged tucked outside next to a main entrance.




Pay attention to the innocent-looking air conditioner lurking shark-like at the rear of the picture.

My first weekend at the flea, I brought the houseplants and cuttings I had been planning to sell at an unfortunate business venture wherein friendship and faith took a dive. (Have I mentioned the Jersey Connection yet?) I did okay and made my booth fee back. I was so happy to be in my little booth. My January birthday happened that weekend. Life got good again.


Buddy, a retired nurseryman who spent all day every day at this (weekends-only) market, looking after things, saw the germ, the gem, the seeds contained in that first weekend. He knew how to make that tiny space WORK. And I knew enough to listen to good advice.


The following week Bud built up the booth. He brought in his own umbrella’d picnic tables. He hung lattice and shelves. We went and scoped out the competition: GIANT STORES (you know who they are). He told me what plants to order and from whom. When the plants came, he watered them and tried to teach me how to keep things flowering and looking good in the dusty, windy conditions at the flea market.

I added the unusual/weird plants I love so much: The odd succulents, the houseplants-gone-wild, I was now growing in the ground… I bought small ones and grew ‘em into great big ones. I had Coleus to fear! The new varieties grow in sun and shade. They do grow well in the ground here in Florida, but nurture one in a great big pot and Whoa Baby! As my daughter says, “It’s GI-NORMOUS!”

I stocked Australian tree ferns (Sphaeropteris cooperi) and Desert Rose, (Adenium obesa). I had the paddle plants (those flat-leaved succulent Kalanchoe thyrsifolia) that proved to be a best-seller.

As well as harboring our year-round residents, Venice and Englewood, Florida play host to escapees from the north from October through Easter. Buddy knew they’d want color for their winter homes. We stocked the little booth with hundreds of geraniums and hanging baskets. Like Kevin Costner, we built it and they came. And they could not resist trying to take a bit of heaven back home, packing plants up in luggage, trunks and campers to be watered nursed and prayed along until the danger of frost passed in New York, Michigan, Maryland.

I gave "pregnant onions" (Ornithogalum longibracteatum) away to kids who expressed any interest at all. I know those plants are pregnant with possibility (lots of baby bulblets growing under oniony skin) and the kids will have the beginnings of garden fever.

I had robust rosemary plants in one-gallon pots I was able to sell for $3. I told my customers about the two four-foot lollipop-shaped fragrant rosemary shrubs growing at the entrance to my house. (This sounds a little formal. Believe me, its not.)

My home garden was earning its keep. If anything self-seeded at home, I dug it, potted it, and eventually brought it in to my booth. One week it was sunflowers nodding under the umbrellas and Mexican blanket flower (Gaillardia) literally volunteered their way into pots and on out into the world. I noticed Cosmos had seeded itself in the really rough gravel of the parking lot adjacent to my booth. Florida, Baby!

But.
When summer came the owners of the market turned on the air conditioner in their office which was on the other side of the wall we shared. They were inside, air conditioned. The exhaust from their AC piped right into my booth outside making being in that booth a death-defying act. Then they began the paving of the new parking lot adjacent to said booth, the area roped off with yellow hazard ribbon. Couldn't get near the stinkin' booth. During my enforced retirement, my daughter was shopping there and heard them selling my plants, advertising the great bargains over the loudspeakers.
Leave us say, (yes, still from New Jersey), that the police were involved. They stood guard as my daughters and I reclaimed my plants. I'm banned from the flea market.

So, I'm working from home again. Insert picture of Mackauley Culken here - I type and watch the birds in the bird bath and the passion vine climbing at breakneck speed up a trellis (and a rose vine) outside my window.

I dash outside for breaks and get in some swing-time. On weekends I’m pushing the petals from my really fantastic home garden at occasional plant sales. I lay in wait, needing and wanting some company, writing here to all of my new imaginary friends. I'm spreading the word that gardening can get very exciting here in the Land of the Flowers. Oh, and call me if you wanna buy some plants!