Thea Gavin compiled this article about OCCNPS Conservation Chair, Elizabeth Taylor.

Environmental attorney Elizabeth Taylor has been a CNPS member for eight years. She brings her experience with the UC Irvine School of Law’s Center for Land, Environment and Natural Resources; San Diego Coast Keeper; and the Surfrider Foundation to her work as chair of the OCCNPS Conservation Committee.

Q: What does your native plant journey look like?

Some of my favorite childhood memories are annual summer trips to Donner Lake in the Sierra Nevada. To this day, the smell of mountain pine forests gives me a deep sense of well-being. I feel fortunate to have grown up in such a richly biodiverse state, and I think early exposure to nature through family camping trips is what led to my interest in studying ecology as an undergraduate at UC San Diego and later pursuing a career as an environmental attorney. 

In college I participated in the UC Education Abroad Program in Costa Rica and studied tropical ecology while living at a research station that was situated in the Wilson Botanical Garden. The garden and adjacent forest are part of the La Amistad Biosphere Reserve and the diversity of native plants (more than 2,000 species) is astounding. Learning about and observing first-hand the complexity of the rainforest—from the soil and forest floor to the canopy—was truly a memorable experience, and it inspired me to seek a career in conservation. 

Sierra Club was the first conservation organization I joined back when I was a teenager, and I will always remember backpacking as a high school student with a Sierra Club trip to Bandelier National Monument in New Mexico.

A few years ago I participated in the California Naturalist Certification course through Preserve Calavera in north county San Diego. The instructors and guest lecturers were excellent, and I learned so much about the incredibly biodiverse habitats of our region. I enjoyed it so much that the following year I completed the Central Sierra immersion course at UC Berkeley’s Sagehen Creek Field Station. There are programs with partner institutions throughout the state and I highly recommend it. 

I worked as a staff attorney for UC Irvine School of Law’s Center for Land, Environment and Natural Resources and did some work on Habitat Conservation Plans. I presented our findings at the California Invasive Plant Council annual meeting several years ago. More recently I have worked with Surfrider Foundation to halt hard armoring of our coastlines and encourage living shorelines that incorporate native vegetation. 

Q: What native-plant-related projects are you working on?

I have a lot of ideas that are still in the brainstorming phase. For example, I would love to recruit volunteers here in San Clemente for native plant restoration of our coastal dunes that are currently overrun with ice plant. I think it would be a great project for high school students, seniors, and everyone in between to build community and learn about their local flora and fauna, while also building coastal resiliency through living shorelines. 

I would also like to get involved at the state and county level to replicate what San Diego County has done and introduce native plant landscaping legislation/ordinances. It would be such a boon not just for native plants but also the wildlife that depend on them. 

There are also so many opportunities for partnerships with other organizations. I have been involved with Surfrider Foundation’s Ocean Friendly Garden program and would love to see collaboration with CNPS to help it spread across the state.

I converted my own yard about eight years ago when I moved to San Clemente, and it’s a joy to watch the seasonal changes and wildlife the native plants attract. Tree of Life Nursery is such a wonderful resource, and we are fortunate to have easy access to so many beautiful native plants. I love them all but am particularly drawn to Ceanothus and Salvia.

_{San Clemente front yard native conversion. (Photo by E. Taylor)}

Q: What is one thing you have learned about native plants that you didn’t know when you started this journey?

There are so many things! I could spend years reading all the books on my list and watching all the CNPS webinars. Recently I read Suzanne Simard’s Finding the Mother Tree and found it so fascinating. It’s a lifelong learning process and it just gets better and better the more you dig in! 

Q: Any native plant encouragement to share?

I always encourage friends and family to just get started planting natives. Don’t be afraid to tear out exotics—it’s so rewarding to watch your garden transform and really come to life with birds and pollinators and lizards and all the rest. I do not have much of a green thumb and tend to ignore my plants for long periods of time, so I love that native plants are so resilient and usually thrive with very little effort. We are fortunate to live in a region with such a rich palette of native plants; it is so important to support the biodiverse web with the foundation of plants that have co-evolved with local wildlife. 

This time of year I love to gift native plants and seed to friends and family. It really is the gift that keeps on giving!