Talk of The Villages Florida - View Single Post - Things Not To Plant in your yard.
View Single Post
 
Old 02-20-2021, 07:50 AM
davem4616 davem4616 is offline
Sage
Join Date: Apr 2017
Posts: 2,659
Thanks: 545
Thanked 4,155 Times in 1,328 Posts
Default

Add "Boston Fern" to the list

after a tour of the canals over in Mt Dora and seeing all the beautiful Boston Ferns along the banks we waited and waited for Home Depot to have them....bought three one quart plants and planted them in the front beds along the house

well in six months they were approaching four feet across....the bark mulch needed to be refurbished and I had a contractor coming to do that, but I figured I'd knock the ferns back with a 'weed wacker' beforehand

trimmed two successfully, when I went to the third for some reason I paused and decided to go at it from the side...within moments
an unseen 5+ foot gator that had been laying under the fern came scooting out across the front walk way (this is within 6 feet of our front door).....

he must have come from two streets over where there's a preserve....scared the living you know what out of me that something that big was hiding in our front bed (my wife is behind me yelling 'pocketbook, pocketbook, I hosie, pocketbook) we laugh about it now, but not at the time

When the landscaper came he told me that gators love to rest in Boston ferns....yes I had him take them out