habitat friendly

Continuing with copying what I wrote for a website I created a few years ago. It was done during the spring of that year, so when I mention that a plant is in bloom, has ladybug eggs, etc. it's not true now in December. On the other hand, my toyon currently has beautiful red berries!

************

One of the most satisfying aspects of gardening with native plants is how beneficial it is to wildlife. Gardening with native plants means offering the trees, plants, and flowers that our wild neighbors have evolved with. For example, insects such as our native bees can be highly specialized, depending on particular plants for their survival. Over 1500 species of native bees are found in California. Having a variety of native plants in our gardens means attracting a variety of pollinators.

Butterflies can be particular too. Besides nectar, they depend on finding particular native host plants on which to lay their eggs. In deciding which plants to grow, you can also take into account what you would like to attract with them. For instance, if you would like to attract the pipevine swallowtail, you could plant the California pipevine. This is also a great way to get kids interested in natural science. They just might take an interest in the insects and bugs they see crawling and hovering around the garden. What attracts certain insects and bugs? What are their life cycles?

Being that I am trying not to worry about aphids this season, I am ecstatic to find that ladybird beetles are making a home on my California sagebrush. I am finding lots of their eggs as well, on the dry branches I am so glad I didn't prune back this year. My wild lilac is blooming now and I am looking forward to seeing the little bee that I saw laden with yellow pollen that I saw last year. Maybe it was a fly or some other kind of insect. Hopefully I'll get more butterflies this year as my garden matures. It's a lot more relaxing simply letting nature happen in my garden, rather than seeing a few leaves being eaten and reaching for the insect spray.

And then there are the birds. All of the insects that you are allowing in your garden are sure to entice them. Besides the insects, you can plant berry producing plants such as the toyon and the blue elderberry which are important wildlife mainstays in the garden. Nectar producing flowers will attract the hummingbirds. Native sages, currants, and gooseberries have flowers that bear the nectar that hummingbirds love, and when their flowers fade, will either go to seed or produce berries which will attract even more birds. Manzanitas, huckleberries, and native honeysuckles are also examples of plants that serve such double duty.

A great way to see existing native gardens is to attend a native plant garden tour, many of which take place during the spring in different parts of the state. In the southern part of the state, there is the Theodore Payne Native Garden Tour and up in the east Bay Area there is the Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour. The south Bay Area and up the peninsula has the Going Native Garden Tour. These tours are self-guided tours in which visitors are welcome at dozens of existing gardens that give ideas as to how to native plants can be used in the landscape. On one of my visits to a particularly beautiful and established garden, I enjoyed the sight of a family of California quail making themselves at home on a hillside, while I also heard the rustling of a lizard in the underbrush. When I managed to find it, I saw that it had a beautiful blue tail. A garden teeming with activity is so much more interesting.