My Adventures Turning My Yard into a Native Plant Garden
I really want a native plant garden. It’s great for the birds, the insects, the mammals, everyone! Currently, I have a few native plants (California buckwheat, California sagebrush, toyon, coast live oak) which the animals love, but I want to go big! Living in the mountains, my yard is basically half hill, where invasive Brazilian pepper trees have unfortunately taken root. We have three olive trees too, which provide habitat and shelter, but are not native. In addition, we have some crimson bottlebrush growing, which, once again, the bees and hummingbirds love, but is not native. While these plants are nice and do provide habitat for wildlife, native plants are more drought tolerant, help prevent soil erosion, and are all around just better for the environment.
So what’s my plan? I’m going to hopefully turn my yard into a native plant habitat haven and document it through videos for you all! This way, we can learn together about the importance of native plants and landscaping.
And hey, maybe you’ll try native plant gardening too! Please do, seriously. As you’ll see in the videos and such that I post over the next while, native plants are really the way to go. Creating native habitat solves so many issues like pesticide use, rat issues, water usage, and more. And hey, it’s fun and better for the environment.
The First Go… was not successful
Back in the summer, my family and I visited Hahamongna Native Plant Nursery in Pasadena to buy some native plants for our very eroded hillside. We got a pot each of Cleveland sage, desert globemallow, and sticky monkey flower. When we got home, we got to work planting them on the hillside, digging large holes in the most rocky soil I have ever seen. We made sure to space them out enough so that when they grew huge, they wouldn’t overcrowd. Things were going well for the first few weeks. We climbed up the slippery slopes to water them once a week and picked off any dead or dying leaves. The Cleveland sage had these really beautiful flowers and the desert globemallow was producing a few orange buds.
The vision was perfect: native plants, globemallow flowers, wonderful aromas from the sage. Native habitat and food sources for the sparrows, finches, jays, and more were sure to come. Only… what did come was intense heat that almost instantly killed the monkey flower. Despite the watering, the sage and globemallow weren’t looking too good either. I had done the research, but luck was not on our side. After a few months and some more disappointments, all three native plants died.
So what was it? Maybe it was the heat (planting in winter is ideal), maybe the plants didn’t retain the water well enough, maybe something else. But I was not going to give up on my vision of a native plant garden. I decided to take a second shot at it.
The Second Go… we’ll see
First Stop: Hahamongna Native Plant Nursery, Pasadena
So now it’s mid autumn and the weather is cooling down, SoCal is even expecting some rain! This time of year is ideal to start gardening. Once again, my dad and I drove out to Hahamongna Native Plant Nursery to pick up some native plants (otherwise known as “redeeming ourselves”). We got a pot each of black sage, white sage, and big berry manzanita. We also picked up three each of coast live oak and Engelmann oak trees, which are little sticks with leaves right now. We also harvested some bladderpod seeds while we were there, which we were told easily germinate and grow into these wonderful shrubs that birds and other animals love.
As part of documenting this native plant garden journey, we decided to interview the resident native plant expert and director of outreach and communications for the Arroyo Secco Foundation, Parker Davis, who was kind enough to let us record the talk for the video that can be found down below.
Next Stop: An Inspirational Native Plant Garden
After the interview with Parker, my dad and I drove to my friends Susan and Frank’s house in Pasadena. Frank and Susan are kind of local LA birder legends, they are two of the founders of Los Angeles Birders, a nonprofit, all volunteer organization that I am also part of. While I hadn’t been to their house before, I knew of Susan and Frank’s incredible native plant gardens. Needing some inspiration myself (and for my viewers of course), I emailed Susan if she’d be willing to do what essentially became an Architectural Digest Open Door show, and she agreed. Watch the video down below!
And now: A Native Plant Update for April, 2022
I’ve got around 40 native plants that have been in my custody for the past few months. Parker from the first video generously gave them to us. Even though the aren’t in the ground yet, birds like White-crowned Sparrows and California Towhees are already loving the native plants! My family and I are currently working with a native plant landscaper to help us figure out where the plants are going to go. Watch the video down below to see what plant species I have in store for my native plant garden!