Native plants

We have a few ideas of how to farm this bone dry land, but we're just in the beginning of the design or evolution phase. We need to accomplish several things here. The most important goal for us is to stabilize our hillside.

http://www.thinkwalks.org/2010/01/12/main-gallery-434w350h/

It's misbehaved in the past, and it's not a given that the repair will keep the geography constant. Therefore, we want plants proven to prevent erosion and keep the dirt where it is. When we were first considering this challenge, we considered the usual suspects - around here, traditionally steep grades are planted in landscaping plants like ice plant, ivy, vinca, or juniper. A neighbor warned us that planting was not a good idea since when the ground gets waterlogged the plants add to the weight and increase the danger of a slide. As I read up on it (here and here, for example), I learned that, indeed, these alien plants (e.g. ice plant) do not help - their roots are shallow and they are heavy. But there are strategies that work, and there are plants that form extensive root systems while remaining light above ground - and that's what we want.

A second consideration for us is that our hillside will need to be drought tolerant. We haven't gotten our first water bill yet, but we're told it's the most expensive utility.

But there is another important factor for us: we need to avoid plants that will burn. We did manage to get homeowner's insurance but not on the first try - our location in the hills on the edge of town means that wildfires are a threat.  

What works best to solve all of these problems? Native plants. This region is hilly - there are plants that know how to cling to the slopes. here is a list of plants known to be beneficial in the erosion control department. Out of necessity, these natives have figured out how to live on minimal water, too. Plants that grow here naturally will do best here - seems obvious, doesn't it?  Of course, some native plants are high fire risk - so we'll avoid this list (p8). Yikes, we have several California pepper trees, and I love them. Evidently they will burn. Eucalyptus is also not good.

With all of this in mind, we headed to Ranch Santa Ana Grow Native Nursery and I came hope a happy camper with Salvia apiana (white sage), Artemisia tridentata (great basin sagebrush), Salvia mellifera (black sage) are the 3 at the left; Ceanothus hearstiorum (mountain lilac) and Eriogonum fasciculatum (California buckwheat, below) are already in the ground. There's a penstemon, evidently a good hummingbird feeder, and the remaining three (fescue grass, Heuchera/coral bells, and a sedum) are for planters.

One more thing - I want to attract hummingbirds and butterflies. Here, I am relying on the Salvia species, penstemon, coral bells, and I intend to find some Zauschneria (California fuchsia); once again Las Pilitas provided great info.

The buckwheat is really native - if I had known what I was doing I would have observed the thickets of it within 20 feet of where I planted it! These are the seeds, I guess; white to pink blossoms, also great for butterflies, bloom spring to summer.

Here they are, hard at work already, pushing their little roots out to stabilize our slope. The arrows will help you find them! Clearly a lot more plants are necessary, but this is a start, and it's a pilot project of sorts - if we find that certain ones do especially well in our microclimate here, we'll get more.