It's amazing what a few days of hot weather can do!

Growing tropical plants and loving hot weather go hand in hand, you can't have one without the other (for the most part!). In my yard just a few days of hot weather is all it takes to really bring out the beauty in my tropicals. The flowers are healthier and more abundant and the cannas, bananas, ginger, elephant ears, and palms are really starting to grow.

In this post I'm going to show how much the plants can grow with just a few days of heat! Prior to this week, we hadn't seen an 80F day since March in my yard and we didn't get into the 90s since last September. So the heat was a long time coming! In case you're interested in the specifics about the weather (what good meteorologist wouldn't have a post without some weather data in it!), here are the numbers from my backyard...

Date - Hi/Lo
5/25 -  91/55
5/26 -  89/62
5/27 -  85/66
5/28 -  92/69
5/29 -  85/67

So as you can see, lots of heat and equally as important for good growth, warm nighttime temperatures. To start here are some before and after comparison photos. The "before photos" were taken on May 25th and the "after" photos were taken on May 28th (yesterday).

Before (watch the Ensete Banana)

After. It's still looking ratty from the springtime wind, but now it has a new fresh leaf and another on the way.

Before shot of the mandevilla planter. The pink mandevilla flowers were sparse and the yellow mandevilla flowers (actually Pentalion luteum - but always sold as mandevilla up here) were not opening at all. 

After. The vines are happy as can be and twining up the poles at a rate of an inch or 2 per day!

Before. My Magnolia Ashei was growing well, but the flower bud was not budging for several weeks.

After. A few days of hot weather was all it took to bust open that flower! This picture was actually taken just a day or 2 later (I'll be revealing the flower in a seperate post when it completely opens up). You can see how much the bud swells in just a day or 2.

That's all I have for now, but if you click on the "month" tabs to your right, you can see the progress of my plants yourself as the hot weather intensifies. Thanks for looking!