All For Gardening
Edible Gardening

The Garden in July – our EDIBLE YARD in North Florida.



There aren’t many ‘market’ vegetables that love the Florida summer heat and humidity. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t food to be grown! Every yard, at any time, can be an edible yard.

Okra, peanuts, sweet potatoes, moringa, cassava, chaya, longevity and okinawa spinaches, cow peas, butterbeans, galic chive, sugar cane and many more, aren’t adverse to the Florida summer environment.

All those listed and and then some, are tucked in throughout our garden and chicken yard in North Florida.

While winter is an amazing time to grow conventional vegetables – the Florida summer edible ‘jungle’ look is worth the vegetable set-back.

When we started out we had nothing but large pecan trees with grass underneath. Now, almost 6 years later, it’s an edible ‘jungle’ paradise with annual and perennial food and pollinator plants scattered throughout. I mention a lot of them in the video, but of course forgot to mention a whole lot as well. 🙂

To witness the return of an eco-system (albeit on a small scale) is mind blowing and immensely satisfying. So many birds! Skinks, toads, lizards, butterflies, but especially the enormous variety of insects we now have.

We still battle stink bugs (for lack of natural predators), and the occasional surge of army worms. But due to the increase of nesting birds, the army worms seem under control most of the time.

To see how I keep stink bugs and army worms from ruining tomatoes and peppers. Check out this video. The baggie method works against pickle worms on cucumbers as well.

 Happy growing! 🙂

24 Comments

  5. Heidi S

    Omg I'm so jealous!! Gorgeous and so yummy!! I'm adding more edible trees every chance I get to my yard hopefully some day it can look like yours!! I'm in North Florida too so I wanted to see what could grow here and you gave me some great ideas! I just love loquats I ate them as a kid and enjoyed I have 3 growing all from seeds and two are at least 4 feet tall can't wait till they produce!! Also I love how everything is growing so closely to each other my hubby is all weary about planting things too close but I'm like Hey if it grows it grows nature will do it's thing! Lol Good luck with all ur plants😀

  8. Manja Warner

    What an inspiration! Love the natural form of your gardens. Lots of delicious and nutritious food for humans, critters, and cycling it back to the earth as well. That's a beautiful symbiotic relationship you've built there. Kindred spirits. 😍

  9. E

    You have done an amazing job Anita! We had similar garden in Bulgaria. Here we have deer and they eat everything. We have to fence an area for a garden. They even jumpe over the neighbor's fence and ate his veggies💖

  13. Kody Nettles

    Your farm is beautiful, thank you for the tour. I'd be interested in acquiring trimmings to root, I live outside lake city

  14. liciaberry

    Your garden is absolutely magical, and an inspiration! We're in north Florida as well…where are you all?

  19. positivelybeautiful1

    I have been watching many edible garden videos and finally, I just got approval from my HOA to pursue the project. Tim and Amanda from “Eat Your Garden Jax” will help me with this project. So, I randomly were watching gardens from SD CA and around the country. Finally, it dawned on me search for local ones, and I’m so happy to find yours! I’m now more comfortable than before to see this will work for me, as I do not have a green thumb. I will learn. Thank you.

  21. Kathleen C. Star Valley

    Hello! I love your garden ! I’m moving to Live Oak this summer and I’m so excited to see the variety of plants you grow. What do you do with Moringa?

  23. Dieter Karaluz

    Wow! Just found your channel… And you are growing Moringa and Chaya in zone 8b? I'm in Dixie county… Hope you don't mind me stealing some ideas from you…

Write A Comment

Pin