A Sage and A Buckwheat in Every Garden

A Sage and A Buckwheat in Every Garden

Buckwheat Brings Butterflies

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  • What is Milkweed?

    What is Milkweed?

    Milkweed is a flowering plant named after a milky latex substance that is exuded when the plant tissues are damaged. Milkweed’s scientific name (genus) is Asclepias, named after Asclepius, the Greek god of medicine. Milkweed is the host plant for monarchs because the caterpillars rely solely on milkweed for food. The latex in milkweed plants […]

    E. Wallace

    July 27, 2021
    Gardening with Native Plants, Monarchs and Milkweed
    california native plant society, gardening, milkweed, monarch caterpillars
  • A Chemical-Free Garden for Monarchs

    A Chemical-Free Garden for Monarchs

    Is it possible to have a beautiful garden without using pesticides and herbicides? In my experience, it has been easy to have a healthy garden that doesn’t require chemical pest control. Reducing our reliance on chemicals protects butterflies, and invites wildlife to step in and manage the unwanted insect population. Birds feed their offspring mostly […]

    E. Wallace

    July 19, 2021
    Gardening with Native Plants, Monarchs and Milkweed
    gardening, Nature, pollinators
  • Simple Support for Western Monarchs

    Simple Support for Western Monarchs

    Every winter, volunteers travel to western monarch overwintering sites to count butterflies roosting in trees near the coast. Last winter, fewer than 2,000 monarch butterflies were found overwintering along the California coast. Compared to 1997, when it was estimated that more than 1 million monarch butterflies overwintered, the numbers from the 2021 count were historically […]

    E. Wallace

    July 13, 2021
    Gardening with Native Plants, Monarchs and Milkweed
    milkweed, native milkweed, nature gardening
  • Monarchs Arrive for Summer

    Monarchs Arrive for Summer

    Have you noticed monarch butterflies flying around your California yard this summer? Western monarch butterflies are an iconic butterflies that delight us with bright orange plumage, black stripes, and white polka dots. They are so large, they cast a shadow when they fly overhead. After hearing about the historically low overwintering monarch butterfly count last […]

    E. Wallace

    July 7, 2021
    Gardening with Native Plants, Monarchs and Milkweed
    california native plants, milkweed, western monarchs
  • Butterflies in the Air

    Butterflies in the Air

    Summer is here and the birds and butterflies are abundant among the native trees and shrubs in the garden. As I was writing this post, I noticed a pale swallowtail butterfly settling on a California coffee berry (Frangula californica). I took a break from the blog, stepped outside and captured this photo of an adult […]

    E. Wallace

    July 15, 2020
    Gardening with Native Plants, Monarchs and Milkweed
    california native plants, flowers, pollinators
  • Summer Buckwheat Blooms Bright

    Summer Buckwheat Blooms Bright

    It is July, the height of summer in Southern California, and buckwheats are blooming with thousands of showy white flowers. I took a walk this morning at my favorite local park, O’Neill Regional Park in Trabuco Canyon. Many of the spring-blooming plants are hunkering down in the 90-degree heat, but California buckwheat (Eriogonum fasciculatum) is […]

    E. Wallace

    July 7, 2020
    Buckwheat, Gardening with Native Plants
    birds, native plants, pollinators, western monarchs
  • Buckwheats Around Town

    Buckwheats Around Town

    A Buckwheat in Every Garden was created with the hope that sharing a free native plant with gardeners would help improve habitat for birds and pollinators in home landscapes throughout Orange County. We recently reached out to people who picked up a free buckwheat to see how their new buckwheat plant is growing. Here’s a […]

    E. Wallace

    May 8, 2020
    Buckwheat, Gardening with Native Plants
    birds, butterflies, pollinators
  • Powered by Insects

    Powered by Insects

    Did you know that most birds gather insects every day to nourish themselves and feed their offspring? Many people believe birds can survive eating seed from bird feeders, but most birds need insects to provide digestible protein for energy, migration, and breeding. A baby bird’s tender digestive system needs soft, fat-filled proteins from insects and […]

    E. Wallace

    April 22, 2020
    Buckwheat, Gardening with Native Plants
    birds, california native plants, gardening
  • Garden While Spring is Here

    Garden While Spring is Here

    Tree of Life Nursery in San Juan Capistrano and Roger’s Gardens in Newport Beach are open and have free buckwheat plants available for pick-up (while supplies last). When you go to pick up your free buckwheat, consider buying a few extra native plants to install in your garden this spring. Tree of Life Nursery is […]

    E. Wallace

    April 9, 2020
    Buckwheat, Gardening with Native Plants
    birds, Buckwheat, bumblebees, Nature
  • Befriending the Bumble Bee

    Befriending the Bumble Bee

    Did you know that honey bees were imported from Europe and are not native to the United States? In California, we have about 1,600 species of native bees, and 26 of these are bumble bees. The bumble bee is the largest and gentlest of all the known species of bees. The queen bumble bee hibernates in the winter, […]

    E. Wallace

    April 1, 2020
    Buckwheat, Gardening with Native Plants
    crotch’s bumble bee, flowers
  • Buckwheat Buddies

    Buckwheat Buddies

    Some folks who planted their free California ‘Dana Point’ buckwheat are searching for plants to keep their buckwheat company. This is a great idea because California native plants help each other thrive as they share micorrhizal fungi through their roots. When California native plants share space, it makes life easier because they don’t need much […]

    E. Wallace

    March 25, 2020
    Buckwheat, Gardening with Native Plants
    gardening, mallows, salvias
  • My Interview with the LA Times

    My Interview with the LA Times

    Jeanette Marantos, garden reporter for the LA Times, called me in mid-February as I was returning home from a landscape restoration project I work on in Trabuco Canyon. Marantos asked me to provide a short list of the best native plants Southern Californians can plant in their home landscapes, and also why it is important […]

    E. Wallace

    March 10, 2020
    Buckwheat, Gardening with Native Plants, Monarchs and Milkweed, Vera’s Gardens in Trabuco Canyon, White Sage
    birds, Buckwheat, bumblebees, california lilac, la times, manzanita, native plants, Nature
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