We Palm Beachers love our golf courses.

But our beautifully manicured fairways and greens often harbor a chemical cocktail of toxic pesticides and herbicides. Day-to-day interaction with these chemicals, through the skin or inhalation, has been linked to severe health conditions.

Most of us recognize and appreciate Banyan trees, but few of us understand their importance to our environment. banyan, ficus aurea, is another name for strangler fig or golden fig and is one of only two native ficus species in Florida (ficus citrifolia, the short leaf fig, is the other).  It is one of the most interesting trees in a North American Everglades tropical hardwood hammock.

When I was growing up, one of my dad’s favorite expressions was, “Don’t just leave; leave it better.”

This is a story about bougainvillea, one of the more beautiful, but perhaps least understood plants here in Palm Beach.

The brunfelsia are blooming now and all’s right with the world — or at least the garden.

Members of the Nature Conservancy spoke at the Four Arts last week abut the Enduring Earth Project, an exciting initiative that aims to protect and conserve 600 million hectares (1.5 billion acres) of land worldwide by 2030. This is an area larger than India.

Once upon a time, there were local farms that produced our meat and produce and we purchased either directly from them or from our local grocery stores. Vegetables were grown in soils that were nutrient rich from farm compost, not grown hydroponically with chemical supplements

Many of you may not realize that Florida is one of the few states in the eastern U.S. that still contains large intact wilderness areas.

We have just learned that the iconic monarch butterfly may be placed on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s endangered species list. The significant decline in the numbers of this beloved species, renowned for migrating thousands of miles across North America, is due to habitat loss and the widespread use of pesticides and herbicides throughout its natural range.

Coming from a family involved in real estate for decades, I have always believed that good development should be synonymous with sustainability.

Fall in Palm Beach can’t quite compare to New England’s dazzling display, but there’s still great color around if you know where to look.

Purple passionflower or Maypop, Passiflora incarnata, has a wonderful fragrance and attracts numerous pollinators, including butterflies, bees, and hummingbirds

I’m writing this on Mother’s Day, because while we honor our biological mothers, we have long been neglecting and even abusing our universal matriarch, Mother Earth.

There were two significant events at the end of April that have the capacity to transform the character of Palm Beach.

The first zebra heliconian butterfly arrived earlier this past week to great celebration among the ‘littles’.

PHOTOS: Spring offers garden options, but say no to insecticides, pesticides

Spring has arrived, and my garden is a riot of color and activity.

Brilliant yellow flower clusters adorn the Bahama senna (Senna Mexicana var. Chapmanii), and I am hoping to spot some amazing caterpillars of the orange-barred sulphur butterfly that it hosts.

The Garden Club of America presents its prestigious Montine McDaniel Freeman Medal each year to a native plant of exceptional beauty, interest, and importance to gardens across the country.

When Martha Stewart was asked to define happiness at a recent Palm Beach luncheon, she didn’t hesitate with her answer. If you want to be happy for a year, she said, get a husband (It was a mostly woman’s event). If you want to be happy for a decade, get a dog. But if you want to be happy for the rest of your life, start a garden.

Not so long ago, Palm Beach was home to a plethora of delightful songbirds: painted buntings, song sparrows, palm and yellow rumped warblers, purple martins, cardinals, marsh and house wrens, kinglets, gnatcatchers, meadowlarks, woodpeckers, finches, and Baltimore orioles were all common visitors here; the island was alive with their music. Now, we are lucky to see the occasional dove or house wren.