Blessed
with an abundance of land, water and sunshine and favored with mild wimnters
- south Florida is the nation's winter garden -
providing much of the vegetable consumed by Americans during the winter months.
Blessed
with an abundance of land, water and sunshine and favored with mild wimnters
- south Florida is the nation's winter garden -
providing much of the vegetable
consumed by Americans during the winter months.
The same factors that have contributed
to a vibrant commercial vegetable industry in southwest
Florida make it an ideal place to grow a wide range of healthty and delicious
vegetables in the home garden.
Statewide there are over 1 million vegetable gardens, these average 300 sq. ft. in size and supply vegetables worth $300 if purchased at the retail level.
Vegetable
gardens offer their owners a number of benefits:
Due to our unique soils and sub-tropical climate - gardening is a little different here and can be disappointing to the un-initiated.
Summer heat can be brutal, soils often provide little more than support to hold plants upright, insects and diseases flourish in our eternal summers and varieties that worked well back home are often miserable failures locally.
Despite
these challanges - vegetable gardening in SW Florida can be extremely rewarding
to those who learn how.
A wealth of information to get you started and help answer your questions is available from the University of Florida and can be found on the internet.
Vegetable Gardening Links at UF/IFAS
Gardening is the # 1 hobby in the United States. Try it - you'll like it!