Vero Beach: Mostly green landscape in winter? (Melbourne, Live Oak: real estate, house)

[SeaLark7]

I just discovered this forum, and want to thank everyone for their helpful answers to those of us planning to move to Florida ! We will be moving to Vero Beach from Ohio in the near future. In addition to wanting to escape the cold weather and snow, I also want to move to where the trees are green year-round. I know Vero Beach is at the frost line, but in recent real estate photos, the landscape still looks summer-like. I have never been to the Treasure Coast in winter, and wondered how many of the trees retain their leaves all year ?

[Jareb]

Originally Posted by SeaLark7

I just discovered this forum, and want to thank everyone for their helpful answers to those of us planning to move to Florida ! We will be moving to Vero Beach from Ohio in the near future. In addition to wanting to escape the cold weather and snow, I also want to move to where the trees are green year-round. I know Vero Beach is at the frost line, but in recent real estate photos, the landscape still looks summer-like. I have never been to the Treasure Coast in winter, and wondered how many of the trees retain their leaves all year ?

Live oaks lose some of their leaves in winter but most everything stays green including the lawns. It rarely reaches freezing temperatures in Vero and if it does it usually only lasts for a few hours overnight.

[SeaLark7]

Jareb, thanks so much for your reply ! I just hate the starkness of the winter landscape in the North, and it will be so nice to live where it is green all year round.

[Rabflmom]

Originally Posted by SeaLark7

I just discovered this forum, and want to thank everyone for their helpful answers to those of us planning to move to Florida ! We will be moving to Vero Beach from Ohio in the near future. In addition to wanting to escape the cold weather and snow, I also want to move to where the trees are green year-round. I know Vero Beach is at the frost line, but in recent real estate photos, the landscape still looks summer-like. I have never been to the Treasure Coast in winter, and wondered how many of the trees retain their leaves all year ?

Things stay pretty green through January or Feb., but if we do get a frost or freeze if ya don't cover the tropical plants you will lose them to the cold and they will look dead until you can trim after the last possible frost. The last 2 winters there has been more damage to palms. 2 years ago we covered and still lost a few of the trees(bottle palm and date palms) that were less than 5 years old in our yard. Last year we lost a big palm tree that is probably 20 years old.

If frost doesn't brown up the landscape in winter the lack of rain will bring in the yellows and browns of a Florida winter. Sometimes it is so dry during the early part of the year that we have brush fires either caused by lightning if we get a storm or a thrown cigarette along a highway.

One good thing about winter you probably won't have to mow the grass as often-unless you water excessively which can be costly.

[SeaLark7]

Rabflmom, thanks for the additional info. I am assuming that the area has few deciduous trees that shed all their leaves each winter, so even if the grass gets brown from lack of rain, most of the trees will remain green year-round.

[HarryWho?]

I was walking through a part of my neighborhood I hadn't been to before. I noticed a house that had two large dead trees in the front yard. It was oddly depressing. When I got closer, I realized that they were sycamores and had just dropped their leaves. Strange how out of place they seemed after living my entire life in the Northeast. Florida remains vibrant in the winter.

[Rabflmom]

Originally Posted by HarryWho?

I was walking through a part of my neighborhood I hadn't been to before. I noticed a house that had two large dead trees in the front yard. It was oddly depressing. When I got closer, I realized that they were sycamores and had just dropped their leaves. Strange how out of place they seemed after living my entire life in the Northeast. Florida remains vibrant in the winter.

One funny thing about Florida vegetation that you will learn......plants stay green even when they are dry and there is little rain. The year back in the 90s that the state pretty much caUght on fire and we had fire fighters coming from a bunch of other states to help put out the brush fires, I remember an article that quoted a fireman from New Mexico. He said he had the hardest time realizing that the palmetto bushes and such could be tender boxes for the fire because they were so green. He said he had never green vegetation catch fire so quickly.

Oaks will lose their leaves too, but not all at the same time like the sycamores do. Come early fall just like up North the sycamores start to change color and drop leaves. The Cypress will get sort of orange color after it cools down in Feb. too. Last year in Feb. I got some of the most beautiful fall color pictures along the beeline here in Florida.

[SeaLark7]

Now that I have been to Vero Beach in winter, I am relieved to say that the landscape is wonderfully green ! Even the Live Oak trees retained most of their leaves. I saw very few bare trees (and of course at this time of year it's hard to tell if they had shed their leaves or were, alas, dead). The only place I saw a noticeable amount of bare-leaf trees was along Interstate 95 as we drove toward the airport in Melbourne. But the Vero area was even greener and prettier than I had hoped, in the middle of winter.

[wireyourworld]

Crepe Myrtle and Mahogany also drop their leaves. Grass turns brown (goes dormant) unless irrigated. And its a constant battle between water management trying to control the water supply so people can drink throughout the dry season, and people who want a green lawn. You'll find watering restrictions of some sort throughout the season until rain starts again. Those on wells not so much, but those on city water. We are as "green" as we can be in the environmentally sensitive sense, and we don't water our lawn or fertilize, we are next to canals and fertilizer runoff is a big problem in the whole state. We only treat every six months for bugs, and that would be fleas as we have pets.

[Cindy S. Lynch]

I live in Vero Beach and have lost about 20 plants on my property brown, dead as door nails. I believe this was caused by our new lawn service spraying weed kill. They insist it was from the cold snap we had in 12/2011. Well, my plants have been in the ground since 2009 and I know we have had worse freezes in those years. I actually thought the couple of days in December were not that bad. Well, anyway what do you think, the weather or an unskilled laborer behind the weed kill spray? PS: Plants included were plumbago, african lilies, iris, hibiscus and a rose bush to name a few. So tell me, please.