I recently checked in on a design and installation from earlier this year. This was a Florida native habitat design intended to create resources for local wildlife while also adding a culinary herb garden to an existing orchard row for these homeowners who are also gardeners.
This established community, in East Central Florida is in an area that historically would likely have been along the boundaries of mesic flatwoods and hammock communities, before development.
Project Goals:
- Create a new native plant garden to support pollinators and other wildlife.
- Create something beautiful that the neighbors would also enjoy on this visible corner lot.
- Freshen up the space underneath an existing orchard row with new plants and modern edging.
- The homeowner is a gardener herself and knew from the beginning that she wanted a layered “matrix” planting which we did! You can read more about the base layers in this previous post.
Here are some of the highlights from the garden site visit in July, about four months after installation.
A mature Southern Live Oak tree graces the street corner. Live oaks are a keystone species in Florida’s ecosystems, providing habitat, food and serving as a host plant for hundreds of caterpillars, including the Horace’s Duskywing butterfly.
Photo above: A Horace’s Duskywing butterfly (Erynnis horatius) visits a Cutleaf coneflower. In the caterpillar phase, this species of butterfly feeds exclusively on the leaves of various species of Oak trees.
The layered plant palette for the new garden was created to provide larval food sources for insects and flowering resources that would span the seasons.
Photo above: The red flowers of Scarlet hibiscus (Muenchhusia coccinea) have started to open attracting butterflies and hummingbirds. The flowers open for one day but each plant produces multiple flowers.
Photo above: Roundleaf thoroughwort (Eupatorium rotundifolium) is starting to bloom adding a fresh pop of white to the garden. It’s visited by native bees, wasps and butterflies. Birds eat the seeds.
Photo above: The lime green leaves of False nettle (Boehmeria cylindrica) lack the stinging hairs of some nettles and provide a larval food source for the red admiral butterfly (Vanessa atalanta).
Photo above: A monarch butterfly nectars on a stokes aster (Stokesia laevis).
Photo above: Cutleaf coneflower (Rudbeckia laciniata). The yellow flowers in summer are popular among pollinators.
She wanted to freshen up her existing row of fruit trees. A couple of the trees didn’t make it through the freezes we had this year. During the design phase, I showed her a picture of the culinary garden at Bok Tower, a public garden in Central Florida that my own family loves to visit.
She loved the clean lines of the straight borders and the lushness of the fruit trees under planted with vegetables and herbs. So this became our inspiration!
Photo above: The culinary garden at Bok Tower (January 2, 2026) was a source of inspiration for my client’s own culinary garden.
We knew going in, with the end-of-season, currently available herbs we had to choose from, that many wouldn’t last throughout our hot humid summer months, so we planted lightly, without too much investment in the herbs. But we did create a solid border of resilient Florida native ground covers to frame the space. When the cooler fall temperatures arrive, she can easily pop in her favorite winter loving herbs and vegetables. 
Photo above: Thai basil in the homeowner’s culinary garden near the fruit trees is holding its own during Florida’s hot humid summer.
She has a row of fruit trees that include a Pomegranate and a new Guava to replace what was lost in the freeze.
Photo above: The pomegranates are coming in. Fruit trees curated by the homeowner. She said she enjoys harvesting and preparing pomegranate juice from the fruit. I love that.
Photo above: After! Wide view of the gardens in July. Everything is filling in.
Pollinators are being fed. Birds are being fed. People are being fed. A little more habitat has been created and a little more lawn removed.
Homeowners like her give me hope. What if half the people in our neighborhoods did this? Even if just a quarter of the people did this. Think of how much more home grown food people would have. How many more pollinators would we start to see again? How much more support would we be providing for birds and other wildlife.
Thank you to this homeowner for taking this step in creating change and inviting me to be a part of it. - Andrea