Every year we time our visit to the Keys so we can attend the Upper Keys Garden Club garden walk. Each year five different gardens are opened to the public for a tour. It is both a joy and humbling experience to attend. A joy because of the collection of exotic plants that are on view are amazing. Humbling because with the exception of a handful of plants, I have no clue of what is what. This is in contrast to the gardens in the North where on a good day I can identify 9 out of 10 plants. Down here, 1 out of 10 is more the average.
But I don’t let my lack of knowledge discourage me and am amazed by the diversity of native and exotic plants that grow down here.
For instance, bromeliads are tiny table plants up North whereas down in the Keys they get to the size of a large motorcycle with a flower to match. Bunches of bananas, coconuts and papayas hang up high tempting me to grab one. And the small prickly pear caucuses that grow up North are the size of full grown Japanese maple trees here.
In looking at the gardens on tour, they fall into two distinct categories: landscaped and gardened. The landscaped gardens are as neat as a pin and weeded to an inch of their life. These gardens are pretty but often have little diversity of plants, textures and colors. They seem as if they were done in a single shot.
The gardened, as I call them, are the product of love and time by gardeners who work on them incrementally as time and money permit. They have a much more complex texture, colors and plant selection. They are not immaculate but well cared for. In these gardens we need to take a couple of loops to sample everything in the ground and pots.
