Yellow Pollen Coating Everything
For a few weeks each spring, Central Florida turns yellow. Most of it rinses away — but the part that does not is what feeds the growth you will be looking at all summer.
When it happens and what it is
The heavy yellow-green coating is predominantly oak pollen, and in Central Florida the main run is roughly February through April, peaking in March. Pine adds to it slightly later.
Given how much live oak canopy covers Orlando, Winter Park, Maitland and Longwood, these neighbourhoods get it worse than most of the state.
It coats everything horizontal first — cars, pool decks, patio furniture, window sills, screen enclosures — then settles into the texture of stucco and the mesh of screens.
Why it matters beyond looking untidy
Pollen is organic material. Once it settles into stucco texture, screen mesh or paver joints and gets wet, it becomes a food source for the algae and mildew that grow through the rest of the year.
Screen enclosures suffer most. Pollen loads into the mesh, holds moisture against it, and gives mildew a substrate — which is why cages often look dramatically worse in early summer than they did in winter.
So a spring pollen wash is less about the yellow and more about removing the fuel before the growing season starts.
What not to do
Do not book the wash mid-season. Washing during peak pollen drop means it is yellow again within days. Wait until the drop has genuinely finished.
Do not just hose it off screens. Water pushes pollen deeper into the mesh rather than clearing it. Screens need a cleaning solution and a proper rinse.
Do not pressure wash a screen enclosure to clear pollen. Same as always: pressure stretches and tears mesh, and rescreening a panel costs more than the cleaning.
The right timing
The best value visit is late April into May, once the oak drop has finished. You clear the accumulated pollen before the summer rains and heat turn it into algae growth.
Cleaning before or during the peak is largely wasted money — you will do it again. If your pool cage or deck is unusable mid-season, a deck-only rinse is reasonable, with the full clean scheduled afterwards.
For homes on our Crown Club schedule, we build the spring visit around this so it lands at the right point in the cycle rather than an arbitrary date.
Questions we get about this
When is pollen season in Central Florida?
When should I book a wash?
Does pollen actually cause damage?
Why does my pool cage look so much worse after spring?
Related: Mildew on a pool cage · Outside house washing · all FAQs