California’s Fascinating Native Plants-persons

Interest in native plants is growing, as gardeners seek new ways to make their gardens more water-wise and life-friendly. Native plants connect us to the land and its people. And our knowledge of regional plants owes a huge debt to the native plants-persons – the early botanists, naturalists, plant collectors and nursery-persons – who first documented and described these plants. 

California is blessed with an abundance of interesting people connected to native plants. From the 1800’s to the present, these native plants-persons have shaped our knowledge, use and conservation of regional plants.  We’ve featured some of the more interesting in our ‘Out of the Wilds and Into Your Garden’ lecture series over the years.  Many are little known, even to persons who work with native plants.

We learned many interesting stories in preparing these talks (they will probably be new to you as well).   And while the lives of some plants-persons are well documented, others required a bit of historical sleuthing and conjecture.  But all can serve as an inspiration and challenge to gardeners, landscape designers and life scientists.   What an amazing, curious and hardy group – may we live our lives half as fully as they!

·         Theodore Payne: the legacy of a CA native plantsman - http://www.slideshare.net/cvadheim/theodore-payne-2013

·         Lester Rowntree: legacy of an unusual California native plantswoman - https://www.slideshare.net/cvadheim/lester-rowntree-2014

·         Alice Eastwood: an unusual California botanist and her legacy - http://www.slideshare.net/cvadheim/alice-eastwood-2015

·         Mary Katharine Brandegee: an unique California botanist and her legacy - http://www.slideshare.net/cvadheim/katherine-brandegee-2016

·         Leroy Abrams and his Los Angeles flora: https://www.slideshare.net/cvadheim/leroy-abrams-2017

·         Beatrice F. Howitt and her life with wildflowers - https://www.slideshare.net/cvadheim/beatrice-f-howitt-talk  

·         S.B. Parish & W.F. Parish: amateur botanists in S. California - https://www.slideshare.net/cvadheim/parish-2018

To access slides from all of the 2009-2018 lectures in this series (covering a range of California native plant gardening topics) see: http://nativeplantscsudh.blogspot.com/p/out-of-wilds-and-into-your-garden-talks.html

We welcome your comments (below).  You can also send your questions to: mothernaturesbackyard10@gmail.com