2016 Native Plant Garden Tour & Photo Contest

Join us for our annual self-guided tour to native gardens in Palm Beach County!

This year the tour consists of six private homes in Boca Raton and Delray Beach

At each property there are guides to answer your questions, plant lists available, and most of the plants have labels.

NEW THIS YEAR! Are you a shutterbug? Do you love taking photos of life in the garden?  We are having a PHOTO CONTEST!

The winning photograph will be The Picture of the Month and will be displayed at the entrance to the Palm Beach Photographic Centre Museum in downtown West Palm Beach. The winner will also receive a membership to the Palm Beach County Chapter of FNPS. If already a member, the membership will be extended for another year. The top six images will be featured in our Dahoon newsletter.

Each person can submit up to 6 digital images, taken only at the gardens on the day of the tour. (Complete contest submission details are available at  each garden or can be downloaded from this page. Scroll down and click on the forms to download the PDF).

The six gardens on this year’s Native Plant Garden Tour include:

Balosie Garden
520 NE 34th Street  Boca Raton  33431

Twenty years ago this was a typical 1960's landscape that featured ficus, hibiscus and areca palms. Through trial and error, research, and the help of native plant professionals, the Balosie’s are establishing an urban landscape that benefits both the natural and human inhabitants. Some handsome natives that are now featured include Bahama Strongbark, Florida Boxwood and Bitterbush. Now birds and butterflies abound! “Our garden is an extension of our home, and as with most gardens, it is an evolving work in progress”.

Tramell Garden
271 NW 8th Street  Boca Raton  33432

Inspired by a lecture given by Doug Tallamy at an FNPS Annual Conference, Judy has transformed her yard piece by piece, from a traditional Florida landscape of sod and exotics lacking much wildlife, to a garden full of life. All the sod has been removed and over 70 species of wildflowers, trees and shrubs have been added. Almost like magic, the landscape has become an environment that is alive with more than 25 species of birds, bees and butterflies, including a thriving colony of atala butterflies.

Furman Garden
1100 SW 17th Street  Boca Raton  33486

Nine live oaks, a large laurel oak, and several gumbo limbo trees frame this corner property and set the stage for the Furman’s restored native garden that is distinctly “old” Florida. The flowers and berries of Florida boxwood, bitterbush, locustberry, wild coffee, wild lime, marlberry, satinleaf and many other trees, shrubs and vines attract and support a wide variety of native birds and butterflies. Of special interest are the chiggery grape vines winding their way through the live oaks: red-bellied woodpeckers feast on the berries and butterflies love the flowers. By design, there’s always wildlife on the wing visiting this garden, including ruddy daggerwings and atalas, and a very special winter visit by a summer tanager for a meal of beautyberries.

Martin Garden
20300 Hacienda Court  Boca Raton  33498

To breathe wildlife into her half-acre property, Eileen started by removing 3 large Ficus trees and 14 Areca Palms that took up space while providing little for birds and pollinators. She began by planting a variety of native trees and shrubs along the fence lines, providing privacy for her and food & shelter for the native wildlife. Today, only three years later, there are more than 100 different native plant species thriving throughout the landscape – including Fetterbush, Torchwood and Eileen’s favorite, Cinnecord. An assortment of bees, butterflies and birds now call this native paradise home.

Casamento Garden
17839 Crooked Oak Avenue  Boca Raton  33487

This magical landscape, 25 years in the making, is inspired by the scrub, pineland and coastal habitats of Southeast Florida, and also has elements of Key West and Sicily, the original homes of Susan and her husband Sergio. There’s a white and silver garden, a hot-colored garden for hummingbirds, a small sunken fern garden plus edible shrubs and fruit trees scattered throughout.

Wilson Garden
2325 Greenbrier Drive  Delray Beach  33445

A tangled mess of brazilian pepper, melaleuca, air potato and other invasive plants once shielded this house from a busy road. Ten years of sweaty but satisfying labor and the installation of 800+ Florida native plants of over 130 species has transformed all but a small, remaining section of that invasive thicket into a handsome garden with charming, peaceful paths weaving through beds of Florida native plants alive with butterflies.

How to Get Tickets for the Native Plant Garden Tour:

The cost to participate in the annual Native Plant Garden Tour is $10 for non-members and free for FNPS members and children under 13. The PHOTO CONTEST is free with admission.

Tickets can be purchased with cash or check at any of the gardens on the day of the tour.

For more information, please call 561.247.3677

Here is the submission form for the PHOTO CONTEST. Click on either form below to download both pages. This submission form is required for entry. 

Here's a map of the gardens with directions to each from major highways. There will also be a map at each garden and directions to get from one to the other.  Click the map below to download as a pdf.