I am trying to find out what plant community an undeveloped area is in. It is just north and east of Bogart Park in Riverside County. (Near Banning and Beaumont.) The elevation varies from 3,465' to 4,030'. What would your guess be as to community? I know Banning and Beaumont are listed as Coastal Sage Scrub and Chapparal, but I'm wondering if the elevation will make a difference in the types of wildflowers and plants that will grow here. Thanks for any help you can offer.

the property could be southern oak woodland in the valleys/north slopes, coastal sage scrub on east facing/north slopes and chaparral every where else
they change with aspect, elevation and soil depth
an acre could have all three

How's everything? Working too hard, I presume. I have a project in Oakland that I'm finishing up and I got to wondering if you would consider this "near the coast" or not. I see it as coastal scrub minus the direct influence of the ocean (has a nice view of the bay, though). I'm planning to replace the lawn with ceanothus Mt. Vision.

yes coastal
Layfatte gets more interesting

The plant community pages are really impressive!  Are you thinking of more prominently featuring them on the home page?  The text is tiny and lost behind habitats.  Are you getting many hits directly into the community pages?

there are significant numbers of people looking at the plants community names they MAY end up being more 'rockwall' pages, redoing the pages was a combo of helping customers and going after those keywords I could get too.

I have read most of your on-line articles about oak trees but I am
still confused as to which variety I have in my area.

I live in the Bear Valley Springs community of Tehachapi, Kern County.
The elevation is between 4300' - 4500'. Do you know what variety of
deciduous Oaks are in this area?

I have also noted that the leaves on my oaks have red colored small
spines attached to the leaves. Is this a problem parasite?

I was removing the mistletoe from the trees when I noticed them.

I look forward to visiting your nursery soon as I am beginning to landscape my place and would like to keep as native and drought
tolerant as possible.

Wow! Thanks for the fast reply. Look forward to seeing you soon.

Valley oaks(Quercus lobata) are in in area along with Blue Oaks(Quercus
douglasii) and Kelloggii(Quercus kellogii)
The blues will be on dry slopes and in the drier valleys(usually clay),
lobatas will be in the warmer wetter valleys(usually not clay), Kellogs will
be in small spots, usually on north slopes associated with seeps You will
also find hybrids all over the place and many of the hybrid dumosas
everywhere.
it's normal, the weeds can often put the trees under stress and trigger it,
the drought has also messed with them(do not water them!)
the mistletoe is a keystone plant for the birds, leave it unless it gets big and bad.

you're in a tough spot, bring pictures! You can't just plant there, we need
to know if possible what is in your EXACT area. The cold sinks there are
brutal.

This weekend I attended the New Mexico Xeriscape Conference in Albuquerque,
NM. (Never fear, I paid for it myself. Ask Valerie what it takes for a
public employee to be allowed to travel out of state at agency expense.)
While there, I saw a number of Southwest Native plants that are summer water
adapted as that is the time of the year rainfall happens there. Most of
them were closely related to the species that live in our area. What do you
think of promoting these other Southwest natives in our area? It seems they
would adapt well to ordinary garden care and some summer irrigation better
than some of our local natives. These also did not seem to have the summer
dormancy that so many of our residents find so objectionable. If I were
revegetating an open space area, I would choose local natives from within
the watershed. but my goal with commercial and residential sites is to find
a native (however you may chose to define it), drought tolerant landscape
that people like and can manage without killing the plants. Do you by
chance now carry any natives from other areas of the Southwest?

Please let me know what you think about natives from other southwestern
areas.

Most of them were closely related to the species that live in our area. What do you think of promoting these other Southwest natives in our area?

It seems they would adapt well to ordinary garden care and some summer irrigation better than some of our local natives.
These also did not seem to have the summer dormancy that so many of our residents find so objectionable.
Do you by chance now carry any natives from other areas of the Southwest?

Please let me know what you think about natives from other southwestern areas.


I am one of your best customers here in the San Diego area and have a yard
full of natives. I have lost a few, mostly due to the fact that I live on
scraped down hardpan. I do not even have an irrigation system except for a
hose that I use to spray my natives with once a week in the heat of the
summer a la a light summer rain like we see a little further inland. Rest
of the year, I water when they look like they need it. Not everyone is as
happy with this look as I am. I am looking for any type of plant that takes
less water and that is not invasive for our less skilled customers. I'm
just trying to reduce the grass and impatiens.

But thanks for your opinion.
I am one of your best customers here in the San Diego area and have a yard
full of natives. I have lost a few, mostly due to the fact that I live on
scraped down hardpan. I do not even have an irrigation system except for a hose that I use to spray my natives with once a week in the heat of the summer a la a light summer rain like we see a little further inland. Rest of the year, I water when they look like they need it. Not everyone is as happy with this look as I am. I am looking for any type of plant that takes less water and that is not invasive for our less skilled customers. I'm just trying to reduce the grass and impatiens.
Do you by chance now carry any natives from other areas of the Southwest?

Thank you Bert. Keep up the good work.

yeach
































right, that's the point, we should use California natives and cut off
most of the summer watering.



























at very little water, mostly washing the foliage keeps most out of
dormancy. The New Mexican species have a dormancy also, just a different
period. If the customer insists on over-watering we'll give them a marsh
and create a habitat for wetland species.

It is really easy to find a California native for the particular
problem. There are 5000 of them and many are very adaptable. Our
customers don't lose plants because they do not use drip(a plant
killer)and do not amend(another killer). Losing plants has not been a
problem. You might want to find whose plants they are losing, and how
they are losing them. Generally the public treats a native like they do
a petunia and then wonders why it dies, if we know they'll treat it as a
petunia we'll sell them riparian plants, but that defeats the water/use
issue, doesn't it?
It seems you've falling into the bear pit of 'natives die", 'natives are
hard', 'natives are short lived'. These are all true if the grower
doesn't do his job, and the garden practices do not change. Native
landscaping looks like a park with 1/10 the inputs if done right.
Many of the California mountain and desert species are multi-state, many of the riparian species are world-wide.

Not a suggestion or a problem...

We're moving in December from Crescent City (Redwood rain forest) to Weldon, in the Kern Valley.

The property has a couple dribbly wells for 2-3 acres, so I can't garden the way I'm accustomed to.

In all my reading about Xeriscape, nobody EVER talked about the plant
communities and the interdependencies, and rarely is anyone specific
about BOTH water requirements AND cold hardiness, much less anything
else.  It seems everyone's main concern is how to have a border and a plot of lawn with less water.  Our lot is two-thirds granite boulder, lawn is an absurd idea.

I have a website, so I know how much work you have put into this one.
Thanks very much for making this information available.  It will save me lots of dead plants, lots of water, lots of money, and most of all, lots of discouragement from trying the wrong things and failing all the
time.

Thanks for your reply...

My Dad used to grow great veggies on this lot.  After north coast gardening, I'm looking forward to a REAL tomato.  And NO SLUGS!!  We are inheriting it, and know something about it from visits.

Not Forest Service, my husband is a teacher for the Dept. of Corrections (Pelican Bay State Prison) and is being laid off, so we're "retiring".   I'm a self-employed musician, so I can go anywhere, since musicians don't earn much anywhere.

The most exciting idea I got from your website is:

There is a seasonal creek running through the lot ( our back neighbor is the Domeland Wilderness ). Runs about October through June.  Never dreamed that some pretty nifty stuff could still get to the water in the summer.  There are even some very large boulders and some shade!! (And rattlesnakes) So I am scoping out stuff on your site, trying to figure out what can be done.  Don't really want to change much, just add some nice suitable plants to the dried up weeds.

Have you hiked all over and taken the photos on your website?  You sure must know a lot about California.


PS Once we're settled in, I'll probably get some stuff from you to get
started.

Thanks for the nice comments.
Eureka to Weldon. Forest Service?

Weldon is not a bad climate, and you can do a full veggie garden at 2-3 gallons a minute.

If you have one of those three second per hour and half wells, you can
still do a mini garden.
There are a few native plant nuts in the area. You might want to look
around before you separate the nuts, there are some survival types that
may think you're an agent...

First of all--thanks for this website. It has really been helpful.
I am director of a program called .... Our goal is to
help our communities (the Mojave and Colorado deserts of CA)
appreciate and protect ancient native plants. We are setting up a
community network to educate and inform people as to legislation and
resources (or the lack of them) in the area. We also do educational
programs that stress the benefits of planting natives, especially
long-lived natives, and the reasons against indiscriminate blading of
lots and larger developments.

I would like to highlight one of your interesting mycorrhizal
associations--that of older native's fungal partners providing a grid
of nutrients and water that feeds the whole plant community. With
some of our older natives like juniper, Joshua trees, yuccas, pinyons
and oaks used as examples.

Two questions:

Is it correct to suggest that, if not removed from the
landscape, older plant's mycorrhizal partners will nourish the soil
for newer plantings?
Do you have any suggestions for more research on this subject?
Also, do you have any info. on what is lost in the way of soil health
when whole lots are bladed?
Thanks for the quick response. One last question:

If a lot is bladed, removing all plants, what do the micorrhizal
organisms feed off of and how long can they remain viable?

yes, if the new plants match the mycorrhiza, otherwise the fungus dies and all nutrients are released. That's why the farms grew great crops for about fifteen years, then had complete failure.
look at our reference pages under Perry and the Allens as above you shouldn't worry about mycorrhiza, it is part of the community and in > >>the background unless killed.

> >>Bromus, Erodium and all sorts of weeds are the main problems in the

> >>desert. The spread of weeds has allowed the desert to burn, and die.

I was hoping someone could recommend shrubs native to the Santa Cruz Mountain environment that grow to about 3 to 10 ft high, flower and/or seed, but are "deer resistant" in regards to the foliage. I was looking at the native azaleas and rhododendrons, which are spectacular, but I fear those are not resistant. Is that true? Any input would be appreciated.  FYI, it is a classic redwood area; sloped, low light and wet in the winter.

Thanks, and also fyi, if I can identify such plants, I imagine I would be a very good customer.  I need to clear a lot of overgrown and too closely spaced doug firs that the former owner intended as a Christmas tree farm, and I want to replace them with lower and flowering native shrubs.  I'll probably need dozens.

look at
http://www.laspilitas.com/deer.htm
and
most of the manzanitas
Arctostaphylos silvicola Ghostly Manzanita Santa Cruz Manzanita. in particular

also
Ceanothus Blue Jeans Holly Leaf Mountain Lilac.
Ceanothusrigidus  Snowball Description/Order

Ribes sanguineum glutinosum Pink-Flowered Currant.