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Part 1 - Florida-Friendly Landscaping

© Teresa Watkins

"Water, water, everywhere and not a drop to drink," so goes the famous line from The Rime of the Ancient Mariner written by the English Romanticist Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

Florida's sultry peninsula also has abundant water with ocean coastlines, the Gulf of Mexico, tens of thousands of lakes and wetlands, but soon, if we are not careful, there won't be a potable drop to drink. The state of Florida's 27 first magnitude springs produce 8 billion gallons of fresh water a day with commercial use and residents of Florida using 7.7 billion gallons daily inside and outside the house.

Our subtropical climate on a arid, subdesert latitude gives us one environmental advantage over any other country or state: we produce more fresh water than anywhere else in the world. Water is our precious commodity and one that we need to be proud of and better stewards of. Homeowners know they are on water restrictions, that there is a water crisis, and most people want to do the right thing. Homeowners are concerned that if it's hot outside aren't the grass and plants hot, too? Don't they need to have more water?

Creating a Florida-friendly landscape that is aesthetically attractive, relatively carefree, and holistically healthy may sound daunting and unattainable, but with a few gardening basics and design tips, your landscape can be the environmental envy of the neighborhood.

"Florida-friendly landscaping" is the key phrase used by the press, practical landscapers, and the academic community to educate welcomed snowbirds, native Floridians, and the new families that have found our subtropical paradise. Half of the 7.7 billion gallons of water bubbling up daily is used outside in irrigating yards, or as I note in my landscaping workshops, on weeds. People really do water their lawns to make them green, or so they think. I love to ask my audiences to raise their hands if they drink water. With all hands raised high in the air, I then slyly ask, "How many of you are green?" Watering doesn't make any plant green ― watering is necessary to keep the plant hydrated so it can go through the process of absorbing the nutrients that allow photosynthesis to occur which manufactures chlorophyll, which is green. The stunned look on their faces is exciting to me because that means "the penny has dropped" as they begin to understand one of the essentials of gardening: 0verdoing anything isn't good.

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