Richard Lyons Nursery, Inc.

Rare & Unusual Tropical Trees & Plants, Flowering, Fruit, Native, Palm, Bamboo, Heliconia, Hummingbird, Butterfly

Versatile Brosimum alicastrum Overcomes an Identity Crisis

Over thousands of years, Brosimum alicastrum has attracted common names as easily as sugar water attracts hummingbirds. In Mexico alone, it is said to have more than 68 names in various local languages. Among the more common monikers are Maya nut, ramón, ojoche, ojite, ujuxte and masico/masica. Breadnut is yet another name for this species,…
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February 3, 2018 0

So You Want to Grow Cacao?

Cacao, a New World native, is one of the more alluring trees on the planet. Not only is it the source of something really delicious to eat, but it is also ornamental, producing colorful podlike fruits directly on the trunk and older branches of the tree. Folks in southern Florida have long admired cacao from…
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January 27, 2018 0

Some Ideas on Gardening in Southern Florida

The winter issue of the Miami-Dade Extension Connection, a newsletter published by the county’s extension office (IFAS), contains an informative article titled “Easy Ways to Grow Vegetables.” Since mid-winter is a great time to cultivate a home vegetable garden, Richard Lyons’ Nursery would like to direct your attention to setting up the garden for maximum…
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January 20, 2018 0

Firespike (Odontonema strictum)

Firespike can really fool you. You might think that a plant native to Central America would perform poorly in cold weather, but this species is capable of doing quite well along a huge swath of the U.S. running almost uninterrupted from southern South Carolina to southern Washington. And it’s beautiful to boot! This evergreen shrub, known botanically as Odontonema…
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January 13, 2018 0

A Few Words on Dealing with Winter Weather

Judging from some of the recent news headlines, one might get the impression that southern Florida is setting records for cold weather. Nothing could be further from the truth. The winter of 2009-2010 was the coldest since 1940, and there was another cold outbreak in December 2010, but since then we have had unusually warm…
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January 6, 2018 0