When a photo is of a painted plant is any of it real? This was on the side of a building on Las Olas Blvd in Ft. Lauderdale. Copyright 2018 Pamela Breitberg
The plant on the wall is art; the plants on the ground against the wall are real. However since it’s all captured digitally is any of this real?! Copyright 2018 Pamela Breitberg
This delicate bloom can withstand the harsh shoreline environment including winds and waters. Copyright 2017 Pamela Breitberg
Time on the beach, for me, includes checking out the plants on the inland edges. My newness to the area had me assuming that this thick, prolific mass was native to the area. Closer study has taught me this is not the case.
Natal Plum (Carissa macrocarpa) is the African relative of Florida’s native Coco Plum. Both species live on the sandy shores. Both have edible plum-like fruits. Natal Plums’s invasive character includes spine tipped leaves which are oft overlooked with focus going to their graceful year-long blooming white flowers and reddish fruit.
After flowering the Natal Plum fruits emerge here, still too unripe for eating. The “plum” is the only non-poisonous part of the Natal Plum. Copyright 2017 Pamela Breitberg
Ready to eat Natal Plum. Copyright 2017 Pamela Breitberg
Autumn activity. Copyright 2016 Pamela Breitberg
Autumn is a busy time for nature. Perennial plants and insects prepare for the changing, slower, colder, winter months.
Submissively aggressive, the Obedient Plant (Physostegia virginiana), has several heavy-duty survival traits. This perennial is quick to spread in the garden, yearly claiming wider and wider territories. If that trait is not enough for its survival, each flower has the ability to move around its base stem when brushed. Passersby, accidently too close, will not harm the flower, ensuring the plants ability to be a prolific seed producer, ensuring future new plants. Try it, the next time you encounter Obedient Plant; see how easy it is to move the location of the flowers around its base!
Obedient Plant, copyright 2014 Pamela Breitberg