Creating a Tropical Garden

[donner]

Hi everybody I am thinking of creating a tropical garden once the winter is done.The thing is I live in Vancouver and I have been wondering whether anybody else who lives there have tried this before.If you have it would be great to get some suggestions. I would also like to have a garden shed so that the tools would be easily accessible. I have already shortlisted a few from this site ( http://inthebackyard.ca/ ). Any inputs on this would be great.Thanks in advance.

[LivingParadise]

Welcome! I think we're going to need a lot more information...

Your idea is cool, and having previously lived in cold climates, I understand the desire to want to achieve it. But what types of plants do you want? Are you trying to fruit things? Do you want tropical vegetables? Are you just looking to have tropical ornamentals so you can have a pretty yard in the summer?

Are you purely looking for plants that will thrive in-ground during the short summer you have, and not die through the winter? Or are you going to keep all of them in containers and move them back and forth, inside during the cold and outside when it's warm? Or are you considering a greenhouse, like many here have?

It's hard to give advice if we don't know whether you want to be a zone pusher and try to grow/fruit tropicals outdoors, or if you're actually looking to do container or greenhouse growing so the plants always have some sort of warmth and controlled conditions. Or if you're just looking for tropical flowers and things to come up in the summer time. And what plants you specifically want will make a big difference in how to go about it.

[darkcoolboo]

You can try some tropical-esque things, like using black lava rock, but it's hard to emulate the sprawling, wild look of a 'tropical garden' without actual tropical plants. Most tropical-like plants die at zone 5. But, don't forget that Google is your best friend, no offense, like this website I just found. http://northscaping.com/IZArticles/IS-0096 You are better off looking for this sort of info on temperate based gardening forms, like Gardenweb. Try some Hostas.