Caesalpinia is one of the more interesting genera of ornamental trees belonging to the pea family, known botanically as Fabaceae. There is considerable disagreement about the number of species in the genus – it’s somewhere between 70 and 165 – but Richard Lyons’ Nursery will acquaint you with three that have proven desirable and reliable in…
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Today Richard Lyons’ Nursery takes a look at the Tamarind Tree. At first glance, Tamarindus indica would seem to be a strange appellation for this wondrous tropical tree. After all, it’s native not to India, but to tropical Africa. So this nomenclatural dysfunction must just be the result of some sloppy botany, right? Well, it’s not as simple as that.…
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Seminole Pumpkin (Cucurbita moshata) is called the wild squash of the Everglades. This is a native Florida pumpkin which the Seminole and Miccosukee tribes cultivated before the Spaniards arrived in the 1500’s. They would plant the seeds at the base of dead trees and allow the vine to grow upward with the fruit hanging down…
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Thirty years ago I had a neighbor who long before had been a writer for The Miami News. In 1926, her boss gave her a plum assignment – the lead story in the women’s section of the issue for Sunday, September 19. The young reporter chose to write a piece about home remodeling, ordinarily an upbeat topic. But on the day…
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The rainy season in southern Florida is the time of year when precipitation comes not from cold fronts passing through the area, but from the combination of heat and moist air. It is generally considered to span the period between May 20 and mid-October, a time when dew points are consistently above 70°, an indicator…
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