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Flowers Aren’t Frivolous: French Marigold Benefits for the Garden

French marigold

Southern gardens are plagued by insect pests and harsh growing conditions. And even in other parts of the country, gardeners are looking for more natural and sustainable ways to deter pests and disease without the use of synthetic and dangerous chemicals. Enter companion planting, and enter one of the more famous flowers used for this technique: French Marigold benefits the garden in numerous ways.

Companion Planting

If you’ve been gardening in the 21st century for more than a couple of weeks, you’ve heard of companion planting. In short, this is the practice of planting mutually beneficial plants together in one space to support each other. It can also be the planting of herbs and flowers near vegetable plants that will support those vegetables in some way.

Complicated Combinations

One of my chief complaints about the practice of companion planting is that it can involve complicated combinations of herbs, flowers, and edibles. While I would love to go into a deep dive on the science of each, that will have to wait for next summer during the down season.

The subject of what to plant together and what not to plant can become mind-boggling. Add in a rotation schedule and you’ve got all the makings of a migraine.

I’m lazy and I like my gardening simplified. I plant diversely and densely and let nature sort it out. I like to think that if I have the basic makings of biodiversity and support my soil microbiology, it will all come out the way nature intends in the long run — even if I don’t’ get what I want in the short run.

This drives my family crazy because the ones that like to cook (or feed the rabbits from the garden) end up wandering around the whole yard trying for find what they’re looking for. No, I don’t have endless patience for labels. And no, I don’t plant all the same plants in one area so they’re easy to find and harvest.

That’s intentional. I figure that if my stepson can’t find the Pak Choy, then the slugs will also have some trouble finding it. The same goes with beans and aphids and cabbage and cabbage loopers.

We’re supposed to be the species with the big brains and the ability to generalize, after all.

French marigold
French marigold, Tagetes patula

Steady Go-To Companions

However, one thing I definitely do is to plant flowers (and sometimes herbs — I have trouble with herbs) within ALL of my vegetable garden beds. Flowers attract pollinators and predator insects that hunt down those cabbage loopers and aphids.

If I was to offer any recommendations to new gardeners in any zone, the first would be to plant seasonal annual flowers within EVERY single fruit and vegetable planting.

French Marigold Benefits

French marigold (Tagetes patula) has a reputation as the wunderkind of companion plants. Most of that reputation is well deserved and well documented.

Along with being available in a number of varieties for various applications, they’re also very attractive, with bushy foliage and bright, cheerful blooms. Best of all, they’re incredibly easy to grow and maintain.

I’ve grown French marigolds in both Central Ohio and Central Florida, and both times I’ve been impressed by their dogged resilience.

Pest Repellants

In short, French Marigold benefits include deterring root-knot nematodes, the bane of the Florida gardener’s existence. They’re also said to deter slugs and hornworms.

I can tell you from experience that they do NOT deter snails. Snails LOVE French marigolds. In fact, they make serve as an excellent trap crop for snails. I regularly find snails clinging to my French marigolds. I break the stem and carry it, snail and all, to my chicken yard.

Chickens LOVE snails. And they also like marigolds.

Tagetes patula
Tagetes patula from my garden

Methods to the Madness

It seems that French marigolds repel pests using different mechanisms, depending on the pest. Volatile chemicals in the foliage and flowers that give them their distinctive odor can sometimes confuse insects that seek their target plants through smell. Other insects may simply find the odor repulsive and unpleasant.

Another mechanism is through root exudates. Plants emit various elements through their roots in order to attract beneficial bacteria to trade nutrients. These elements include sugars, which the bacteria adore, and offer micronutrients and macronutrients in exchange with the plants.

And by no means the last method, some French marigold benefits include using the flower as a trap crop, as I mentioned above regarding snails. In fact, in the case of root-knot nematodes, there is some debate as to whether marigolds repel them through root exudates or simply attract them to themselves, thereby “trapping” them in their own roots.

White Fly Results

A 2019 study examined the theory that French marigolds will reduce whitefly populations in tomatoes. I’ve never found them on tomatoes, but my peppers always seem to attract a crowd.

A few experiments found that planting French marigolds alongside tomatoes reduced the whitefly population in the greenhouse. In this case, it was the volatile compound, limonene, these flowers produce that repelled the pests.

Root Knot Nematodes

Root-knot nematodes can completely destroy a once-thriving garden. And it seems that Southern gardens are particularly rife with this soil pest. I remember moving to Florida as an experienced temperate zone gardener in 1993 and being warned that they were public enemy number one.

The UF/IFAS website recommends French marigolds as a cover crop before planting. It posits that the action of alpha-terthienyl, a root exudate, inhibits the hatching of many nematode eggs. It also suggests planting them at least two months prior to your crop, and disking or hoeing them in is the most effective method. The site says interplanting isn’t particularly effective.

In my case, I grow year-round and successively. I don’t do cover crops on beds in production, so using marigolds this way wouldn’t work for me. Especially since I do no-till.

So, I simply interplant several marigold “crops” throughout the year and then crop and drop them on top of the soil at the beginning of each season. At the same time, I plant more marigolds throughout the beds.

I harvest seeds and plant them again later. I even sell them in my Etsy shop for very little profit so other gardeners can be sure they have the right type of marigolds.

As I vaguely recall, the action of nematode suppression in marigolds extends to about a meter, or three feet in diameter, so I make sure that I have at least one planted every yard or so, staggered throughout the beds.

Tagetes patula, French marigold
French marigold in my garden

Medicinal Uses

Because of its rich components of chemical constituents, French marigolds have a number of traditional medicinal and cosmetic uses, many of which could translate well today.

A 2016 paper suggests that the blossoms, containing the flavonoids patuletin, quercetagetin, and quercetin, help protect against oxidative stress and offer anticancer properties when used in an infusion (i.e., tea).

I’m not a doctor and don’t intend to play one on the internet, so make sure you do all your due diligence before compounding your own herbal medicinals. Some are harmless, some are effective, and some can prove quite dangerous.  

It’s important to remember that there are two different species of flowers we call “marigold,” with French marigold being “Tagetes” variety. There is also Calendula officinalis, also known as “Pot marigold,” which is used extensively in cosmetics.

Fortunately, while the common name is very similar, the two plants don’t resemble each other and have very different appearances.

Pot marigold, Calendula officinalis
Calendula officinalis , or “Pot Marigold”

Beauty and Function

Tagetes patula, French marigolds, offer a host of garden benefits. However, perhaps their most important quality is the beauty they add to the garden. Even if you’re immune to the superficial beauty of flowers, any dedicated gardener has to admit that the practical beauty of an increase in bee visitors is a spectacle to behold.

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Florida Gardening: What to Plant in October

what to plant in october

The rest of the country seems to be getting ready for winter. They’re unpacking their woolies and scarves and swooning over pumpkin spice lattes. But here in Florida, we’re still sweltering in the high 80s. And with Florida’s upside-down gardening schedule, you may be wondering what to plant in October.

Other Southern garden regions have the same dilemma. If you garden in New Orleans, Biloxi, or along coastal Texas, you know the gardening season has just really gotten underway.

That doesn’t mean it won’t get cold along the Gulf. It definitely will. But it usually doesn’t get cold enough to matter until late December or early January.

Last year threw us some curveballs. Temperatures dropped in Central Florida in late November, and it got REALLY cold in early December. Cold enough to matter. Cold enough to cover.

So, right now, in early October, the race is on to get roots in the ground and vegetables well established enough to survive any surprise cold snaps.

Knowing What to Plant in October

I’ve drawn data from several sources, especially the University of UF/IFAS website. But I’ve also been collecting data from other sources, including experienced gardeners and nurseries that include expanded selections far outside the limited one provided by UF.

There exists a plethora of exotic edibles from far-flung regions with the same climate and similar conditions. Why not take advantage of those resources?

Other regions that seem to mirror our unique gardening environment include parts of Southeast Asia, Central America, South America, and coastal areas in Australia.

I’ve drawn planting suggestions from gardeners and farmers in these regions as well, for those like me who like to experiment with new and interesting vegetable varieties.

North Florida

October begins the limits on planting out in North Florida, unless you have a greenhouse or a nurturing microclimate on the coast and a south-facing wall.

Cold-weather vegetables should do well, but be prepared to cover anything tender you planted out last month:

  • arugula
  • Asian cabbages
  • beets
  • broad beans
  • broccoli
  • cabbage
  • carrots
  • cauliflower
  • celery
  • chicory
  • chives
  • collards
  • English peas
  • fennel
  • French tarragon
  • green onions
  • kale
  • kohlrabi
  • lettuce
  • mizuna
  • mustard onion
  • sets
  • parsley
  • radish
  • rapini
  • rutabaga
  • salsify
  • shallots
  • spinach
  • strawberry crowns
  • turnips

Central Florida

The weather is still fine in Central Florida, and still warm enough to sneak in a few warm-season crops like tomatoes, summer squash, and melons.

Thankfully, it also gets cool enough for those plants to begin fruiting, as well. It’s also cool enough to consider planting herbs, peas, and lettuces.

  • arugula
  • Asian cabbages
  • beans, bush
  • beans, climbing
  • beets
  • broad beans
  • broccoli
  • cabbage
  • carrots
  • cauliflower
  • celery
  • chives
  • collards
  • cucumbers
  • daikon
  • English peas
  • fennel
  • French tarragon
  • green onions
  • horseradish crowns
  • kale
  • kohlrabi
  • lettuce
  • mizuna
  • mustard
  • onion sets
  • parsley
  • potatoes
  • pumpkins
  • radish
  • rapini
  • rosemary
  • salsify
  • shallots
  • snap peas
  • snow peas
  • spinach
  • strawberry crowns
  • summer squash
  • thyme
  • tomatoes
  • turnips
  • watermelons

South Florida

Summer vegetables are still a go-to for October gardening in South Florida. With few, if any, frosts, risk-taking gardeners can continue to plant out nearly anything their heart desires.

It’s still too warm for cold-loving plants like snap peas and some brassicas, but you can start these undercover to plant out next month if you like.

  • Asian cabbages
  • beans, climbing
  • beets
  • broccoli
  • Brussels sprouts
  • cabbage
  • carrots
  • cauliflower
  • celery
  • chili peppers
  • chives
  • collards
  • corn
  • cucumbers
  • eggplant
  • English peas
  • fennel
  • green onions
  • kale
  • kohlrabi
  • leeks
  • lettuce
  • mizuna
  • mustard
  • onion sets
  • parsley
  • peppers
  • potatoes
  • radish
  • rapini
  • rosemary
  • sage
  • shallots
  • southern peas
  • spinach
  • strawberry crowns
  • summer squash
  • thyme
  • tomatoes
  • tropical spinach
  • turnips

What to Plant in Florida Month-by-Month

For planning ahead for the Florida growing schedule, please check out my Florida Gardening Planner on Amazon. It provides a month-by-month list of edibles to plant out for every month of the year for the three regions of Florida (Zones 8, 9, 10), plus handy planning and garden design tools to help you move step by step for a productive gardening year.

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September Planting: Fall Gardening in the South

fall gardening means cool season brassicas like cauliflower

September heralds the beginning of the main gardening season in the South — at least for Florida. The temperature finally tapers off enough that cool-weather plants can survive the heat of midday. And bonus points: it’s still fine enough for warm-season crops. Fall gardening is the prime reason Floridians can garden at all.

What to Plant in September in the Southern Garden

If you’re wondering what to plant this September, don’t tarry when it comes to sowing summer vegetables. It’s still not too late to start tomatoes, eggplant, summer squashes, and tropical spinaches, like Okinawa spinach.

Depending on your zone, if you can get these warm-season vegetables well established before your first cold snap, you can usually overwinter them by covering them whenever nights drop below 35°F.

With night temperatures in the 70s, you can also start planting those brassicas, which is a relief. Some, like broccoli and cauliflower, take quite a long time to grow, so the earlier you start them, the better.

I’ve found a lot of success with the Piracicaba broccoli, which is a heat-tolerant, non-heading variety. I’ve grown it as late as May, here in 10a, and unless you really feel the need for big broccoli heads, the flavor and quality are superb. Best of all, these guys really deliver! They can take some time to start producing, but once they do, you’ll get tiny little broccoli heads for months and months and months.

Piracicaba broccoli and tomato harves

Speaking of Strawberries

Halfway through September is when you should decide whether or not to grow strawberries this year. Summer has not been kind to last spring’s plants, and I only have myself to blame.

I’m normally a lot more attendant on helping my strawberry plants get through the Florida summer. I use organic fungicides and relocate them to keep them from scorching. But this year, with the addition of the nursery and the chickens, they fell to the bottom of the priority list.

Many nurseries will have bare roots on sale, and some will even have starter plants as well. Check back later in October, as I’m sure I’ll have some on offer this year. And if I don’t, there are many local nurseries near you that can assist.

Grow ALL the Veg!

A quick list of veggies you can start in September includes cabbages, both the Asian cabbages like bok choi and Napa, and the boring old round-head types.

You can also start some of the sturdier leafy greens, like mustards, arugula, kale, and chard. Depending on your zone and microclimate, it may still be a tad too hot for lettuces, except for those bred specifically for hot climates, like the Hawai’ian Manoa and Israeli Jericho Romaine.

It may be worth the risk if your family eats a lot of lettuce, as mine does. Especially if you do loose-leaf types with a cut-and-come-again approach, including succession sowing.

fall gardening vegetables like beans and cabbage

Fall Gardening in Florida Offers So Much

Along with both cool and warm-season vegetables, the fall gardening season is also an amazing time to plant flowers.

Why flowers?

They’re pretty, they add color, they offer charm and beauty.

They’re also a critical boost to local wildlife, likes bees and butterflies, wasps and other beneficial insects.

lady bug on squash leaf looking for aphids to eat

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I Did a Thing: Garden Planning

I’m really pretty dreadful at garden planning. I’ve tried — but I always forget to write things down, or I can’t find my notepad, or I’m covered in dirt and can’t find a pen.

Usually the latter.

This year, I made it impossible NOT to plan by creating a Florida Garden Planner and publishing it on Amazon. This, I figured, would mean no more excuses for NOT planning ahead.

I’ve been gardening in Florida for several years now, and I can tell you that a successful harvest requires a few key paradigm shifts:

  1. Be willing to try new fruits and vegetables that are not currently familiar to you.
  2. Learn the right season to plant each of the vegetables you enjoy.
  3. Take advantage of the year-long growing season by planning ahead for succession planting.

My hope is that this garden planner helps you do all three of these things.

From extensive research and my own experience, I’ve provided a list of various edibles you can plant out each month.

As you can see, September is a pretty busy planting month for Florida.

Inside the Garden Planning Journal

I’ve also added some record sheets so you can track each of the varieties you grow to see which ones do best in your garden. I love cherry tomatoes, but this year I’m trialing Sweeties vs. Gardener’s Delights to see which ones I prefer.

I’ll log their germination time, requirements, days to maturity, and the weight of the harvest.

The biggest stumbling block for me right now is that I was trained by very strict teachers. They told me NOT TO WRITE IN BOOKS. So, I’m STILL struggling with putting things down.

Should you decide to purchase one of these garden planning logs, you can find a link on the right hand of this post.

Feedback Please

If you have any suggestions or requests for other elements you’d like to see or use, please let me know. I’m always happy to get suggestions.

This garden planning journal includes grid sheets for bed layout, calendars for coordinating with other scheduled projects, and a week-by-week calendar for sowing, planting, and other garden projects you’d like to accomplish.

It starts in August 2021, because every Florida gardener knows that the planting year starts in August/September. It runs to December 2022, so there’s plenty of room for all your veggie garden planning for several seasons.

As for me, I’m ready to pre-order my strawberry crowns for planting in October.

What are you going to be planting in your fall garden?

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Summer Cover Crops: Time to Rest the Veggie Beds

use summer cover crops in the and take a break from gardening

Recent decades have seen an explosion in new discoveries about soil health and its impact on agriculture. On a smaller scale, home gardeners are learning how to better nurture the microbiology in their gardens for better yields. In most North American gardens, that means keeping the soil covered during fallow times. But here in the South, when gardening is a year-round affair, your best bet is to take advantage of summer cover crops.

Along the Gulf Coast, in areas like Houston, New Orleans, and all throughout Florida, winter is an excellent time for farming and gardening. Although the rainfall may be a bit scant, the pest and disease pressure drops so dramatically that it’s worth it to irrigate.

This means that many Southern gardeners may miss a chance to sow important cover crops to restore organic matter to the soil. In other areas of the country, winter is the time for keeping plots fallow or sowing cover crops like hairy vetch, sudan grass, or clover. No one wants to leave a perfectly good garden bed fallow during its most productive season. That’s where summer cover crops come in.

Summer Cover Crops Are Effortless

In the South, summer is a great time to set your garden beds to fallow mode. While you may not be able to plant cool-season cover crops like winter rye, there are great alternatives for our warmer, wetter climates. As well as restoring structure to your soil and feeding the microbiology, it’s a good time to get out of the sun and avoid heatstroke. Summer cover crops don’t need weeding or watering.

Grab a mojito or a sweet iced tea, and let the bees and bugs have their time in the sun.

Finally Got That Round Tuit

In a previous post, I wrote that I would show you how I put a garden bed to rest for the summer. Although I am running pretty late this year, I did finally start to put the beds to, well, bed.

The first step was to put The Girls to work, digging up the weeds, aerating the soil, eating some bugs, and perhaps even leaving a few nitrogen bombs behind.

Adding Amendments

After letting the chickens loose a few times on the target bed, I add a few soil conditioners and some organic matter to the bed. The first bed is particularly deficient, because it’s a new area on top of what can only be called sand, rather than soil.

Because it will be sitting fallow for about two months, I won’t be digging it in. I’m going full Lasagna mode on this one. I normally prefer a no-dig approach to vegetable gardening for several reasons.

The first is because our barren, sandy Florida soil is already sparse with worms and other organisms that I don’t want to risk them by cutting through the turf and topsoil.

The second is that our heat index is usually around 110°F and our humidity around 90%, so the less I have to do outdoors, the better.

Alfalfa Meal

I have recently discovered the many benefits of adding alfalfa to the soil. It makes a wonderful fertilizing tea. A few scoops in both potting soil or garden beds provides slow-release nutrients.

Studies have found it to be just as effective as fish emulsion and other organic fertilizers. The advantage is that alfalfa meal is a whole lot cheaper and smells a great deal better.

Alfalfa also contains a chemical called triacontanol, which acts as a growth stimulant in other plants. Studies testing triacontanol on plants found that it shortened plant dormancy and increased trunk size and bud development by 100%, and leaf and foliage production by over 200%.

This is one of my fallow beds with the alfalfa pellets.

I use pelleted alfalfa, sold for cattle and horses, at my local feed store. I like the Standlee brand in either organic or non-organic. The upside is that we can also feed it to our rabbits. For smaller areas and container plants, Down to Earth and Espomo both deliver quality organic products.

Do check around and find a feed store near you to source alfalfa meal or pellets for gardening. You’ll spend half as much and most likely you’ll be supporting a small business in your community.

Kitty Litter

Yes, kitty litter — basically, clay.

If you live in an area with heavy, cloying, clay soil, you definitely don’t want to add more. However, I live about a mile off Tampa Bay, and our sandy soil drains quickly. Many thirsty plants can’t drink deep enough before it filters through.

I started adding plain, scentless kitty litter to the soil last spring and the results were truly remarkable. I found that I didn’t have to water every single day just to keep things from wilting.

I also added a small dose of Epsoma Bio-Tone Starter. While there is plenty of organic matter going into this bed, Bio-Tone contains beneficial fungi and bacteria to assist in plant growth.

Because it’s the rainy season, and because bacteria and fungi grow pretty prolifically on their own in this climate, I just added a small bit to innoculate the soil and get it started.

Compost

along with summer cover crops, I add more rich compost to the vegetable beds

Over the last three years, composting has become something of a sacred mission in our house. Family members come to me with food scraps and ask me where to place their offerings.

Then, we got a paper shredder! Saturday nights are a blast now!

Composting is the single most effective way to feed your garden and reduce your carbon footprint.

My Summer Cover Crops

Summer Cover Crops don't have to be expensive

Yep, a cheap bag of black-eyed peas from Publix!

Last year, I planted Cowpeas that I got from the garden center in a Ferry Morris or Burpee package. They cost me about $5 and I only had enough for a small area of my garden. They grew well. The aphids LOVED them. I did not.

So, this year, I spent $1.50 on a bag of black-eyed peas from the grocery store. That way, I won’t have to feel guilty if don’t eat any of them.

More Compost, Plus Biochar

There is no such thing as too much compost.

This layer of compost also includes some biochar I made that has been charging for about two months.

Hay There!

I watered everything in well and dropped a light covering of hay to keep the soil cool, retain moisture, and try to fool the squirrels.

There has been a lot of controversy about the use of hay and straw in the garden. More specifically, gardeners are finding that some of the hay they’re sourcing has been sprayed with the herbicide Grazon or aminopyralid.

Apparently, there is no killing this stuff! If you put it on your garden as a mulch, it will kill everything you grow there for years.

If you buy manure from horses or cows that have eaten hay sprayed with aminopyralid, it too will kill everything you use it on for years.

I’ve been lucky so far. But, I’ve also been careful.

According to No-Dig Guru, Charles Dowding, you can test for this contaminant in any hay, straw, manure, or compost you buy before destroying your garden:

Time to Chill

From now until I plant out starts in September, I don’t have to think about that garden bed. No watering, no weeding, no cares, no worries. I’ve finally learned to stop worrying and love the summer.

According to experts at the University of Florida, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, other good summer cover crops for Florida and other Gulf Coast areas include legumes like Indian jointvetch, cowpeas, hairy indigo, sun hemp, and velvet beans. You can also use grain plants like sorghum and sudangrass, if you’re also looking for a huge amount of biomass at the end.

Whichever way you choose to chill this summer, feel free to give your garden a summer vacation without guilt. After all, unlike most of the U.S., we can garden all the way through the other months of the year.

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What to Plant in June in Florida

Stick to tropical plants when you want to plant in June in Florida

Nature has such a sense of humor! In my last post, I said (confidently) not to bother with a vegetable garden in June in any part of Florida. It’s too hot, too humid… too buggy! So, I had no idea what I could advise to plant in June in Florida, since I’ve found it to be a futile endeavor.

So, what else should happen than to be blessed with a surprise crop of oncoming cucumbers — a vegetable, I must add, that I have rarely grown successfully.

cucumbers in June in Florida

This variety is a complete beast! They’re called Sweet Success, and as long as you can trellis them, they will certainly perform.

With that admission, it’s also important to note that I didn’t plant them in June. I planted this in late March and this is their second cropping after suffering a dry spell.

You may have quite a few fruits and vegetables to harvest in June if you’ve taken care of your garden or simply been lucky. But there are still very few things to plant out.

It may be that you’re finally reaping the rewards of planting three months ago — or even three years. Our bananas are getting fat, and our Barbados cherry tree is dripping with fruit.

But if you don’t have a harvest, is there anything you can plant in June in Florida?

Some Unfamiliar Names

In almost all zones in Florida, you can plant a few exotic varieties of fruits and vegetables, even in the high heat of summer. Look for Southeast Asian and Central American edible plants to expand the variety you grow and eat.

I’ve tried quite a few of them, and if I’m completely honest, there are many I don’t like. There are also quite a few that I don’t like enough to fuss over during days when the heat index is 105°F and the humidity is 98%.

Fruits and Vegetables to Plant in June in Florida

One of the reasons I don’t think about planting some of the unfamiliar vegetables I do like in the summer is because I often plant them in late spring. However, there are a few you can start in June, and even July.

And the advantage is that our summer rainy season should help get them started. So, you won’t have to stand outside in our dry April, coaxing them to life with a garden hose.

Yard Long Beans

These are one of my favorites to grow in the summer heat. They start out a bit slow, which is why I plant them in April. However, you can pretty much plant them any time of year in Central or South Florida.


buy seeds on amazon.com

Note that you WILL need a trellis and you will need one a lot taller than you could possibly imagine. You’ll be rewarded with a constant flow of delicious meaty-textured beans until December for your trouble.

Sweet Potatoes

This is another one that I generally plant long before June, so I never think of it as a “summer vegetable.” Especially considering that it takes four to five months to harvest. I usually grow my own slips from store-bought organic varieties. It takes about two to three months to get healthy slips.

I usually plant to get slips started in late winter so I can start planting in March. This way, I can plant out the slips in succession, which gives me a harvest of sweet potatoes starting in July thorugh December.

However, if you can get your hands on some slips, you still have time to plant them out for harvest in November or December. The summer heat won’t faze them if you get regular rainfall.

Calabaza Squash


buy seeds on amazon.com

This Caribbean veggie is remiscient of pumpkin, but can take the heat. This is the first summer I’m growing it, so the jury is still out. I planted mine out in May, but my sources tell me you can still plant it in June. It looks delicious, and I sure hope mine proves to be.

Alternatives to Plant in June in Florida

June might also be a great time to plant something other than edibles. Add some important companion plants to your garden, or draw in pollinators and other beneficial insects with herbs and flowers.

Marigolds

Tagetes patula, or French marigolds (which are actually Mexican marigolds) work in several ways to improve your garden. They’re not just cheerful and easy to grow.

Marigolds have been known to help deter root knot nematodes — something most Florida gardeners battle regularly. Planting a swath of French marigolds in your future fall tomato bed is a smart idea for summer.

They also attract bees, which is usually a good enough reason for me.

buy seeds from our shop

Tropical Milkweed

The skies over the gardens of Florida are filled with happy, frisky Monarch butterflies, looking to make more happy, frisky Monarch butterflies. What they’re looking for are milkweed plants, the singular host of their caterpillar.

There’s a lot of controversy about the use of Tropical Milkweed, since it isn’t native to the U.S., but is to Mexico and Central America. One of the key issues is that it tends to increase the chance of them getting a parasite called “OE” (Ophryocystis elektroscirrha).

This parasite is not a good thing and can result in deformed wings in adult butterflies that is nothing less the fatal. Tropical milkweed, because it doesn’t die back here in Florida, can increase the chance of them contracting this condition.

The problem is compounded by the fact that much of Central Florida and all of South Florida enjoys a year-round population of Monarchs that do not migrate to Mexico with their fellow butterflies. It’s warm enough for them to winter over here.

The advantage to Tropical Milkweed (Asclepias Curassavica) is that it germinates well and grows quickly in our subtropical climate. This means you’ll have plenty of monarch food in time for hungry catepillars. Other milkweed species — even Florida native milkweed — can be difficult to germinate and grow too slow for the current year’s brood.

The solution is very simple — cut back your Tropical milkweed to about 2 inches tall in October or November. This will cause the die-off of the parasites and reduce the infection. Also, make sure you have other nectar flowers on hand for them over winter.

But Tropical Milkweed is certainly a beneficial flower to plant in June in Florida and will bring color to your garden.

The Florida Garden Summer Lull

The gardening bug can often turn into an obsession. If you’re relatively new to gardening, you may feel compelled to keep planting through the summer. The COVID-19 lockdowns and subsequent panic over food supplies has meant a lot of new backyard growers in Florida, the U.S., and world-wide.

If you’re a long-time gardener but new to the state, you may find it weird that hardly anyone is planting corn and tomatoes and taking advantage of all this sunshine. That’s because we’ve learned to avoid heat exhaustion and sun stroke.

You may feel like you’re missing an opportunity if you don’t find something you can plant in June in Florida. There are a few things to keep you busy, but preparing for the main even in fall may be more productive.

See all the grass you’re cutting? Compost it! Rest the soil under some cooling mulch. Sharpen your tools, order your vegetable seeds, order your flower seeds, and plan your next season. If it helps, you can even start sowing starter tomatoes next month.

The main event starts in September.