Resources & References

CALFLORA, with its own native plant database, has a Plant Finder feature that, like CalScape, shows the native plants that grow naturally in the vicinity of a particular location. For horticultural information, CalFlora links to CalScape, and for plant nursery information, it links to the California Native Plant Link Exchange.

CNPLX uses the CalFlora database but presents the information in a different way from CalFlora. Native plants can be searched by county (rather than by specific address) and by several other criteria such as type (tree, annual, etc.) and family. For each plant that grows wild in California, there is a plant information page that shows nurseries and seed vendors that sell the plant and information about growing the plant. This site is less useful for selecting appropriate plants for a particular site than CalScape or CalFlora, but its online inventory of nurseries that sell particular plants is well laid-out. And it’s good for identifying what particular plants are native to Marin County.

CALSCAPE, developed by the California Native Plant Society, is designed to enable homeowners and landscapers select and find the native plants that are the best fit for any particular location in the state. It is truly a one-stop site for growing California native plants. A powerful search feature shows which plants are really native to any location in the state, and helps homeowners and landscapers figure out which ones they want, where to buy them, and how to grow them. With this website, you can drill down to the most appropriate native plant by type (tree, shrub, etc.) for a given location: for example, a low-water shrub for part-shade. Each plant entry includes photos that show the plant in many forms, a narrative and summary description, the wildlife it supports including butterfly and moth caterpillars for which it is a host plant, and plant care information.  Finally, it lists nurseries that carry the plant.

The website maintained by the state offices of the California Native Plant Society offers extensive resources under the tab: Our Work/Gardening. In addition to the great plant database, Calscape, they have virtual garden tours for inspiration, information on nurseries that carry native plants, design basics, details on how to plant, water and mulch, how to deal with pests, plus a very useful set of articles on pruning native plants. Definitely worth exploring.

Regional Parks Botanic Garden at Tilden Park in Berkeley, CA. Established in 1940, the garden’s primary role is to create beautiful landscapes displaying California’s diverse plant life. Its mission embraces not only aesthetics, but also native plant conservation, public education, and horticultural experimentation designed to bring new native plants into the nursery trade. In the garden’s many habitats are species from the high Sierra to the serpentine barrens of the coast ranges, and from the northern rain forests to the southern deserts. They offer a schedule of fun and informative classes, field trips, and workshops, as well as plant sales and seed sales.

The Marin Chapter is a part of the statewide organization, and the website has lots of native plant gardening information, including gardening photos and advice. They offer numerous handouts and plant lists for specific habitats, as well as slideshows of native gardens in the county. This last includes the native plant pollinator garden at the Bay Model in Sausalito, which the chapter planned, planted and maintains with Charlotte’s generous help.

Contribute to science: become a citizen scientist! The iNaturalist app, created by the CA Academy of Sciences, enables you to record observations out in the field, upload them into a worldwide database and share with fellow naturalists. If you don’t know what it is, the app will make suggestions, as will a crowd of user experts.

Developed by Bruce Homer-Smith and the California Native Plant Society, PlantID.net is a non-commercial website designed to help you identify California plants found in the wild. Enter what you observe about the plant and your location, and it will produce a short annotated list of possibilities.

Found a mushroom, flower, or bug, and not sure what it is? Open up the Seek camera to see if it knows. It will show you lists of commonly recorded insects, birds, plants, amphibians, and more in your area. Based on the extensive database of observations submitted around the world through iNaturalist.

FOR: complete details on how to determine which birds may be nesting in your area and what type of nest they build, downloadable plans for many types of nest boxes, how to troubleshoot problems.

FOR: Cal Flora is a small, unconventional nursery devoted to natives and habitat gardening with a diversity of offerings. They are knowledgeable and experienced. Most plants are propagated on site.

FOR: Marin’s mostly native nursery, CNL grows and sells organic California native plants & veggies and offers lots of great garden art. CNL’s store is one of the retail outlets for Home Ground’s line of locally packaged native wildflower seeds.

FOR: Neem seed meal to treat orange aphids, bulk organic fertilizers and soil additives, egg meal (to make a deer deterrent), lots of plants for pollinators, good advice.

FOR: bulk sales only of native grasses, wildflowers, lawn and pasture grasses, cover crops, rock dust and fertilizers.

FOR: The Marin chapter of the California Native Plant Society offers an extensive array of native bulbs, annuals, perennials, shrubs and even sometimes trees at their April and October plant sales, held on the grounds of Falkirk Cultural Center in San Rafael. Home Ground supplies about a third of the plants each sale through their propagation activities. Check www.cnpsmarin.org for dates. Flowering plants for pollinators are the emphasis in spring; shrubs are the emphasis at the fall sale. Also available: Home Ground’s line of locally packaged native wildflower seeds.

FOR: Narrow-leaf and showy milkweed (seasonal availability); also many native nectar plants, both annual and perennial. Open Mar–Nov.

FOR: regional wildflower mixes, wildflower seed and native grass seed.

FOR: bagged or bulk soil products and composts; organic nursery planter mix; All-green compost; cardboard in rolls for sheet mulching.

FOR: bulk soils suitable for vegetable gardening; bagged Pt. Reyes compost; gravel, pavers, stones and boulders.

FOR: organic soils and composts, especially good are super-harvest and mushroom composts for ornamentals and veggies.

FOR: A huge selection of stones, from pavers to boulders, at good prices. Here you can personally select individual boulders. Delivery and placement services are also reasonably priced.

FOR: Quality drip irrigation supplies; predesigned plans for irrigation systems, big library of how-to videos.

FOR: all kinds of irrigation equipment and supplies, lines and sprinkler heads; also irrigation timers and good advice.

FOR: the very best gardening tools and great service, too!

FOR: great place to get your tools sharpened, plus they offer a huge selection of tools to cut and chop with.