Choosing and Maintaining Tropical Plants in Florida: Your All-In-One Resource
Choosing outdoor tropical plants in Florida is like being a kid in a giant candy store.
Look, chewy red Twizzlers! Sweet Tarts! Whoa, look at all the Ring Pops! I want cherry! No, wait, watermelon! No, wait, blue raspberry!
Except you, as a mature adult, are saying, Look, a hibiscus! An African Iris! Whoa, look at all the crotons! I want ‘Magnificent!’ No, wait, ‘King of Siam!’ No, wait, ‘Dreadlocks!’
If you think choosing tropical plants for Florida landscaping is exciting, you’re totally right.
Tropical plants offer the ultimate vacation resort vibe, turning your ordinary backyard into a luxury oasis. And there are thousands you could choose.
But there’s more to it than slipping on that cherry Ring Pop.
Which plants to choose? Where to plant them? How do you make sure they thrive? What happens to them if it gets too cold? What if you love them so much you want to stay home and gaze lovingly at them and miss work?
That last one’s on you, but as for the rest of this, settle in with some Twizzlers and let’s get to it.
Table of Contents
1. Selecting Tropical Plants for Florida Landscaping
2. Incorporating Tropical Plants Into Your Landscape Design
3. Best Practices for Planting Tropical Plants
4. How to Maintain Tropical Plants
5. Seasonal Care for Tropical Plants in Florida
6. Troubleshooting Common Issues with Tropical Plants
7. The Benefits of Hiring Professional Landscaping Services
1. Selecting Tropical Plants for Florida Landscaping
Here’s where the fun starts — choosing the best tropical plants for your backyard.
Hmmm. Crotons? Definitely. Ixora? Absolutely. Blue Daze? Gotta have it. Pygmy date Palm? Adorable! Yes, please.
OK, this could be a problem, unless you have about 15 acres to work with. Once you realize how many amazing tropical plants are out here, you’ll want everything.
How to narrow it down?
Fortunately, a few guidelines will help.
What are the light conditions in your yard? Mostly sunny? A lot of shade? How much space do you have? How much maintenance do you want to tackle? How will you use your yard? How important is curb appeal? Do you have dogs who will be romping in the yard? (Make sure you avoid plants that are dangerous to pets.)
Answering these questions will help steer you to the best tropical plants for Florida landscaping that suit your exact yard.
Here are a few sure bets to get you started:
Full Sun Tropical Plants for Florida
This is pretty easy — lots of tropical plants love sun.
Just start listing outdoor tropical plants and they probably love sun: crotons, ixora, African iris, bougainvillea, pentas, lantana.
You get the idea. Full sun tropical plants in Florida? This is an easy one.
Tropical Shade Plants in Florida
This might surprise you — quite a few outdoor tropical plants are happy in the shade.
Variegated Shell Ginger. Wild Coffee. Wart Fern. Coontie. Iris ‘Regina.’ Firespike. Philodendron Wilsonii.
This could be a problem. You might want all of these. Variegated shell ginger is a shade-loving stunner, with boldly striped yellow and green foliage and clusters of sweetly fragrant white and pink shell-like flowers.
Wild coffee produces cool red fruit that looks like coffee beans. Firespike’s regal spikes of red flowers attract hummingbirds and butterflies.
Good luck with this.
Low-Maintenance Outdoor Tropical Plants
Some plants go easy on you, practically taking care of themselves:
Pick Self-Cleaning Palms
A self-cleaning palm means that the older, dead palm fronds will fall away from the trunk on their own — no need for pruning.
Palms that aren’t self-cleaning require occasional pruning to remove the brown fronds after they die. Here are four favorites:
- Foxtail palm, with fluffy fronds that look like the bushy tail of a fox.
- Christmas palm, nicely sized so it doesn’t overwhelm a smaller yard.
- Royal Palm, towering regally at heights of up to 80 feet.
- Montgomery palm, known for its compact size and arching fronds that hang like a canopy.
Blue Daze
Brilliant blue flowers that open in the morning and close up in the evening cover this easy-care ground cover that loves the heat and sun.
It makes a stunning mass planting ground cover. This one tops the list for amazing outdoor tropical plants.
Beach Sunflowers
These cheerful outdoor tropical plants are tougher than they look. Native to Florida, they love our sandy soil and they’re fine with dry conditions.
They even reseed and spread on their own. Just sit back, relax, and enjoy them.
African Iris
It’s hard to believe this spectacular flower should be part of a low-maintenance landscape design. It’s like a precious jewel in your landscaping, a six-petal white flower with a smaller four-petal blue-purple flower that emerges in its center. It’ll wow you.
Tropical Flowering Plants in Florida
Can’t get enough flowers? No problem. Some plants bloom nearly year-round.
Bougainvillea
This pretty plant will bloom all year if it’s in full sun, offering you an explosion of stunning colors — pink, magenta, purple, red, orange, yellow.
Hibiscus
How many times in a row can you say “wow” without feeling ridiculous? Hibiscus will test you.
Its flowers can be up to nearly 10 inches in diameter at maturity and come in a wide range of colors, from white to red, pink, yellow, and orange. They’re stunning, and they’re the ultimate tropical paradise flower.
Ixora
One of the best flowering tropical plants for Florida, Ixora flowers throughout the year, offering clusters of tubular flowers in bright red, orange, yellow, pink, or white that last between six and eight weeks, giving your landscape long-lasting color.
This compact, densely-branching shrub works great as a hedge, border, screen, or specimen plant.
It’s a sure thing.
2. Incorporating Tropical Plants into Your Landscape Design
Outdoor tropical plants are key players in your backyard tropical paradise.
But you don’t just plant a row of plants and call it good. You integrate them into your landscape design to highlight features, soften hard lines, add color and interest.
Those tropical plant beauties aren’t designed to stand alone. They should be part of a comprehensive design plan for your perfect backyard tropical oasis.
Get started with a few ideas:
Pretty Up Your Pergola
Pergolas are already pretty but adding climbing flowering vines like jasmine that grow up the posts and onto the structure overhead makes them a lush escape and extends your garden.
Add hanging planters of outdoor tropical plants overhead for an extra layer of luxury. Suddenly, you have a whole new leafy garden oasis.
If you prefer a tiki hut over a pergola, keep outdoor tropical plants in mind here, too, for layers of tropical luxury.
Pool Plants, Please
A pool without plants is just a big hole filled with water. Add Florida tropical plants and it’s a luxurious destination with vacation resort vibes.
Think palm trees. Colorful tropical flowers. Giant planters for impact.
Your Fountain Needs Frilly Friends
Don’t let your fantastic fountain stand alone. Surround it with lush outdoor tropical plants that make the whole area a must-see focal point.
Add tall plants behind it as a leafy backdrop and bright low-growing flowers in front to attract attention. Hibiscus, maybe, or a dramatic split leaf philodendron.
Soften the Hard Edges of Hardscape
Paver patios and walkways are the hardworking backbones of your landscaping. But hardscape is, well, hard.
Tropical plants for Florida landscaping swoop to the rescue, with ground covers that can snuggle up to patio edges and big majestic beauties that pack planters for interest.
Why think about all this now? You thought you were just pondering plants.
It’s actually best to plan your patio and its surrounding landscaping at the same time. That way you can shape the patio around the plants, plan your seating so you appreciate your plants, incorporate walkways through the plants.
Then, it all works perfectly together, and you have something beautiful to look at from your patio, right away.
Plus, when you consider your entire landscaping as a whole, you can think about all the features you want that will complement those beautiful outdoor tropical plants.
3. Best Practices for Planting Tropical Plants
If you lived in the rainforest, this would be easy — amazing outdoor tropical plants would just burst out of the ground all around you in a fantastic spectacle.
Of course, there would also be monkeys, and they can be a pain.
Better to plant your own.
When it comes to outdoor tropical plant care, what you do at the very beginning when you plant them really matters.
How to give your outdoor tropical plants a great start?
Check out these tips:
Boost the Soil
Make sure your new outdoor tropical plants have nutritious soil to start out.
Till in some rich compost with the topsoil and add some granular fertilizer so it’s ready to help your plants thrive.
Pay Attention to Spacing
Those crotons might look small and cute now, but remember, they grow. And grow. Outdoor tropical plants in Florida seem to grow before your eyes.
When you plant your outdoor tropical plants, keep in mind the size of the plants at maturity, not now. The plant tag will tell you. You have to leave room for when the plants get bigger.
Don’t Forget the Mulch
Hardwood mulch conserves water, keeps weeds from easily sprouting and as it decomposes over time, adds nutrients to your soil. Outdoor tropical plants in Florida need all of that good stuff.
Plus, it just plain looks great.
Shoot for a solid three inches of mulch. And aim for a fresh delivery twice a year, in March, then November, so your mulch always looks — and works — great.
Give Those Babies a Drink
Once you plant your outdoor tropical plants, they need a good long drink.
Proper watering at the beginning is super important. In fact, we won’t warranty your new tropical plants unless we can set your irrigation controller to water them seven days a week for the first two weeks, then three to four times a week for the next two weeks, depending on the type of plants.
But don’t go overboard. Yes, Sarasota water restrictions allow you to water new plants as much as you want for the first month, but frequent watering is a bad idea.
You want those tropical plant roots to have to reach deep into the soil for water, so they develop into deep strong roots. Water all the time, and those roots can be lazy, easily finding water right at the surface. Then they become shallow and weak. That’s not a good quality in plants. Or romantic partners.
4. How to Maintain Tropical Plants
You’re now the proud new owner of four crotons, 14 Ixora, nine African iris, seven Blue Daze and a fantastic thing called a Giant Ice Plant.
Yikes, now what? Keep them alive, please.
Here are some important tips:
Irrigation, Irrigation, Irrigation
We’re repeating ourselves for a reason. Proper watering is super important for outdoor tropical plant care.
After that first four weeks of extra watering for your new outdoor tropical plants, settle into a normal watering schedule — two days a week in the winter and three days a week in the summer.
It’s not enough to have an irrigation system, set the controller and forget it. Here in Sarasota, the weather can be wacky.
Systems need adjusting 6-8 times a year, allowing for rainy periods and finicky temperature changes. Sometimes, that means three times in one month. Who can keep up with that?
Make sure you have a Sarasota landscaping company that stays on top of irrigation maintenance, so your outdoor tropical plants stay well-watered and healthy.
Fertilizing: Why Are Florida Outdoor Tropical Plants So Hungry?
Sarasota soil is sandy (say that five times fast) so those precious nutrients flow right through it.
Maintain your tropical plants by staying on top of fertilizer throughout the growing season — four times a year.
Some landscaping companies do just four plant health care visits a year, based on those fertilizer needs.
At Tropical Gardens, we do six visits. You want those two extra visits so we can keep an expert eye on things, to spot any insect problems before it’s too late to treat them. Bugs attack fast.
Companies that visit just four times for outdoor tropical plant care tend to blanket plants with pesticide and hope the plants are fine between visits. That’s not great for the environment. We’d rather keep a closer eye on your plants and act as needed when we spot early signs of a problem.
Your bonus: peace of mind.
Pruning and Trimming Outdoor Tropical Plants
Pruning and trimming are two different things and both are important in outdoor tropical plant care.
We can’t stress enough how important proper pruning is, and how dangerous bad pruning is — especially for tropical flowering plants in Florida.
That hibiscus that should offer you spectacular 10-inch flowers? Not if you keep pruning it. Some homeowners and landscape maintenance companies trim hibiscus shrubs every month. Big mistake. That cuts off the new buds.
Tropical Gardens Landscape crews trim hibiscus a foot from the ground in spring and a foot from the ground in fall. That sets the scene for bountiful blooms.
Pruning is trickier than it looks. You need detailed knowledge of exactly what to prune when, how much to trim off, and when not to prune at all.
You want a Sarasota landscaping company with outdoor tropical plant pros who know when each shrub sets its flower buds, so the buds don’t get pruned off. Prune at the wrong time and you won’t have those stunning tropical blossoms so important for your tropical paradise backyard.
How to Maintain Tropical Plants? There’s More
Weed control. Zapping hungry pests. Staying on top of ugly diseases. Keeping your palm trees healthy.
Outdoor tropical plant care is a whole thing. Your best bet is professional plant health care to stay on top of your plants’ many needs, including that all-important skilled pruning so those Florida tropical flowering plants bloom right on schedule.
5. Seasonal Care for Tropical Plants in Florida
Your outdoor tropical plants typically cruise through the seasons just fine, thriving on their regular watering, fertilizer and pest control.
Then winter comes along. Uh oh. What happens to Florida outdoor tropical plants in winter?
Most of our plant material will do just fine. But you might notice some alarming changes with your outdoor tropical plants if we get a sudden cold snap.
Your palm fronds might turn brown. Your crotons might drop their leaves.
There are some outdoor tropical plant care tips for winter protection, from covering up annuals to timing pruning and fertilizing just right.
If your plants get zapped, chances are they’ll grow back.
But you have to be patient. Once spring arrives you should notice new growth.
6. Troubleshooting Common Issues with Tropical Plants
Something weird is going on out there with your outdoor tropical plants.
Leaves are curling. There’s gross black sooty-looking stuff on your leaves. Your palm tree’s fronds are more yellow than green.
Is it aliens from outer space? Did a garden troll curse you? Did you forget to pay your landscape maintenance company? (Oops.)
There’s a lot of stuff out there ready to attack your precious outdoor tropical plants. And it’s pretty tricky for homeowners to figure out what’s to blame.
It could be aphids laying their eggs on leaves so the hungry newborns can suck the life out of your unsuspecting plants.
Maybe white flies are on the loose.
Is it mites? Mite be.
What are those weird red spots on your Ixora’s leaves in the winter? (Hint: it’s hungry for micro-nutrients.)
Something’s obviously munching your beautiful bougainvillea, but even when you peer at it with a magnifying glass, you can’t see anything. What the heck? (It’s bougainvillea looper, the tiniest of tiny green worms, and they only come out to eat at night.)
Also, if things have gotten so bad out there that you’re peering at your plants with a magnifying glass, you need professional help. (Of course, we mean expert landscaping help.)
Get on board with a comprehensive plant health care program, and experts will catch things like damaging insects and undernourished plants early, before the distressing damage is done.
We know how to maintain tropical plants so they thrive in your backyard tropical oasis, with six targeted visits a year to nab everything from pesky white flies to extra hungry Ixora — and the many potential problems in between.
7. The Benefits of Hiring Professional Landscaping Services
Sure, you could go scoop up some outdoor tropical plants and plop them in your garden and call it good. You might feel pretty proud of yourself.
Then, they start to grow too close to each other, looking smooshed and unhealthy. A horde of some ugly little pests swarms in and starts munching their fantastic, and apparently tasty, tropical leaves. Three plants die, and you have no idea why.
It’s starting to look like a Stephen King horror movie out there.
Time for Sarasota landscaping services. Here’s why:
Pros Really Know Their Plants
You want your residential tropical landscape design to thrive from day one, and that means choosing the right plants in the first place.
Pros know the best tropical plants for Florida landscapes, including exactly what plants thrive here in Sarasota, and which ones will do great in your particular backyard tropical paradise.
They know about proper spacing for each plant, so your magnificent Areca palm won’t outgrow its space and your spectacular Ixora hedge will fill in perfectly.
Do you know how to plan your Florida outdoor tropical plants so that flowers and plants have staggered bloom times? That way, your landscape will always look great, with plants blooming year-round, with intriguing foliage mixed in that always looks cool.
We do.
Pros Make It Easy
Let’s be honest, you don’t have time for this complicated outdoor tropical plant care stuff.
Leave the planting, fertilizing, pest and disease monitoring to the experts, who will show up at the right times with the right care to keep your Florida outdoor tropical plants healthy and thriving year-round, for years to come.
A Landscape Designer Will Help You Get It Just Right
A good designer will help you choose the right outdoor tropical plants by asking you a ton of questions.
What colors do you like? What colors do you hate? Are you interested in impressive curb appeal out front? Or is it more important to have a backyard tropical oasis to enjoy in private or with family and friends?
Do you need privacy from noisy neighbors? Do you have four dogs?
The answers will help make sure your residential tropical landscape design really works for your lifestyle.
Your Landscaping is More Than Just Plants
Yes, we’ve been talking all about outdoor tropical plants here, but remember the part about how those stunning plants work with other great landscaping elements to create your perfect backyard tropical oasis?
You want landscaping services in Sarasota, FL that can do it all, so things go super smoothly.
Sure, they’re pros at picking plants. Do they also do irrigation to make sure those precious plants get efficiently watered? Do they install paver patios, pergolas and tiki huts to complement those outdoor tropical plants?
Will they smoothly transition from designing and installing your Florida landscaping to taking care of it with a comprehensive landscape maintenance and plant health care services plan?
These are all great topics to discuss at your landscape design consultation.
You want to hire Sarasota FL landscaping services who will make this easy, so you don’t have another hassle on your to-do list.
We can’t wait to get started.
Give us a call or fill out our form today! Our team of Sarasota designers can’t wait to help you create a backyard tropical oasis for your home or vacation rental property.
