Periwinkle in the Fall

Vinca is a genus of flowering plants in the family Apocynaceae, native to Europe, northwest Africa and southwest Asia. The English name periwinkle is shared with the related genus Catharanthus.

September in central Florida is still bright, sunny, and hot. The high temperatures are a little lower than August, but it still gets in the 90’s. We continue to have almost daily showers in the evening as fronts filled with moisture come ashore from the Gulf of Mexico.

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June Garden During Heat Wave

Central Florida is usually hot and sunny. Even during December and January when we can go down to freezing once in a blue moon, we usually have warm, sunny afternoons. The heat wave that crossed the country finally came down to Florida. Yup, I recognized it as more like August weather for us. When I first moved to Miami back in the 1970’s, it took a while to get used to the summer heat. For the last few years here in semi-tropical central Florida , August has become such a hot and humid place. It seems worse than previous years. I have been staying in a lot and when I go in the garden, it’s early morning. Last Saturday I walked briefly in the yard at 9:30 am, and it was bright and hot. The temperature was 86 degrees F. The afternoon will go into the 90’s with a heat index of more like 104 F. My house faces east and the garden is Florida full sun on 95% of my yard. Mornings are worse in the front yard. Afternoons are worse in the back yard. My photos are mostly from the side yard and back yard today. I hope you enjoy the flowers.

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January Flowers

The weather here in central Florida was mild at the beginning of the month. Then when that big snow storm blew over the southeast, it brought a cold front down to us. Here in my area we had our lowest temperature so far this winter. Our low Tuesday night was 39 degrees F. Above us the counties had freezing temperatures.  Below us it was a little warmer. Unfortunately the south west side of Florida had multiple tornadoes and some areas had extensive damage.  No damage in my area just a wild cold rain with high wind gusts.  After 2 days of cooler temperatures, our highs and lows went back up.  I still have flowers growing and I’m happy.

 

 

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November Monday Morning

I live in central Florida which has a semi-tropical climate.  Over last weekend a cold front came down to Florida, and we had over a day of gray skies and rain.  The lows dropped to 50 degrees F for the first time since last winter.  Our highs have been about 62 degrees F for a few days.  As usual the gray skies blew away and we have beautiful blue skies again.  (By Wednesday the high was 77 degrees F.)  These photos were all taken Monday morning around 10:30 AM. The air is cool and the sky is blue.

 

 

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