’Tis the Season for Plant Sales
Plant sale hauls are the best kind of hauls
Fall has finally arrived, and if you’re looking to get into California native plants, there is no better time to dust off those gardening gloves and bring your dream garden plans to life.
As I’ve mentioned in previous articles, a bulk of my plants are from local (relatively speaking) nurseries specialized in California native plants. These are great options if you want to get started at any particular time of the year, but if you happen to be reading this during autumn, keep an eye out for plant sales. It appears that most plant sales in the California native plant world happen starting in fall, and they can be a good way to jump start your garden. My own garden owes a lot to a spring sale at the Fullerton Arboretum.
If you are new to the scene and would like to find plant sales in your area, check out the local arboretum or garden first. The Fullerton Arboretum and California Botanic Garden in Claremont are great options, with the latter having a production nursery that is open from Fall-Spring. Some nurseries will have a seasonal sale, like Theodore Payne up in Sun Valley, although keep in mind that these nurseries are usually open year round. You should also check out your local California Native Plant Society (CNPS) chapter and see if it is organizing a plant sale.
My local CNPS chapter is the South Coast one, and I managed to completely miss that their fall sale was going on up until the last moment. I think this might be the case for a number of other chapters, but the sale operates via online order, which has its drawbacks and benefits. I went to the chapter’s website and filled out my order a few hours before it was set to close, relying on the running wishlist of plants that I keep on a spreadsheet to compensate for my procrastinating ways. The order would be ready for pickup the next weekend over in Torrance, at the Madrona Marsh Preserve and Nature Center.
It was nice to have plants to look forward to at the end of the week. I was even able to talk to my boss about the sale, because there was no way I was going to make it to the weekend without bringing up native plants at least once. When I sent in the order, I was given a pickup time of around 1 PM. Come Saturday, I got into the car with my best friend and headed over excited to bring some new plants home. I have never been to the Madrona Marsh, and unfortunately I was not able to spend any actual time there on this outing, but it looked interesting enough to make a return trip for. The pickup process was smooth. We pulled into the parking lot, and they had the plants organized by the buyer’s last name. Helpful volunteers loaded the order into my car along with an edition of the Flora magazine that CNPS puts out and a planting guide.
This was the first time I actually got to see the plants I had bought, and this brings me to what I feel is the drawback of any online plant ordering. I like going to nurseries to pick out the plant I want. Here, the buyer does not really get much of a say in the selection process. Now, I fully believe that it’s the luck of the draw as to how the plants will do no matter what even if I got to select them myself, but it’s the illusion of control that counts.
As for my order itself, I got three California sagebrushes (Artemisia californica), two purple sages (Salvia leucophylla), two black sages (Salvia mellifera), one toyon (Heteromeles arbutifolia), one lemonade berry (Rhus integrifolia), one California buckwheat (Eriogonum fasciculatum), and one coyote brush (Baccharis pilularis). All except for the toyon, which was in a 1 gallon pot, were in 4” pots. I’ve been told that buying these young 4” pot plants is ideal, as it’ll lead to healthier plants in the long run and they end up growing to the same size as a 1 gallon pot specimen in no time.
I did my usual thing of putting them into the ground the day after. It turned out to be a rather fortuitous time to do so, as we’ve seen some rare October rain since, and temperatures have stayed away from 90 degrees. The feeling of seeing a new happy little plant in the ground is one that’ll never feel old. That all being said, it is rather early still so I do not have much to say about how they are faring. The two purple sages looked a little unhealthy to start, but this is also my first time growing them, so I will keep an eye on them and hope for the best. The other thing to note is that one of the black sages is tall, like really tall, and practically has no width. I don’t really know what to make of it, and if any of you have any idea how it could have ended up this way, let me know.
This sale was made possible by the Palos Verdes Land Conservancy (PVLC), which does some fantastic work out on the peninsula. All the plants sold were grown by them. You can purchase smaller orders of plants from them year round on their website, but I have not done so personally. They’re doing great things to protect the ecosystem out there, and if you’re in the area, they are a good resource to use to kickstart your garden or your involvement in the world of native plants in general.
With any new plantings, I find myself holding my breath a little bit to see how they’ll all do. I don’t have a lot to say right now, and maybe I will have updates later on. For now, however, I am still looking to hopefully go to more sales this fall and continue to build up the garden. This is definitely the time of year for action when it comes to native plants, and I hope that if you are on the fence about getting started, you will come out to one of the many plant sales going on and just see if there’s anything you like.
Much like the plants themselves, California’s native plant gardeners come out of dormancy in the fall, and hopefully we’ll all get to enjoy the fruits of our labor come spring.
If you are able to and interested, consider joining CNPS! It’s definitely a point of first contact for many people with native plant gardening in our Golden State. Additionally, consider becoming a member at one of our local arboretums or gardens that support native plants. They do some fantastic work, and are a great resource for the communities they serve.
