It’s easy to create a California native wildflower garden. Here’s how
Creating habitats for pollinators is “easier than falling off of a log.”
Anyone in Los Angeles can create a beautiful wildflower meadow and you can start just in time for a spring bloom.
That’s the mission of Altadena Maid, a one-person crusade for restoring pollinators and wildflowers, one seed mixture at a time.
“I like to talk about the plant anxiety,” says Altadena Maid founder Rene Amy. “The idea that somehow or another you’ve got to do all this work. No, it isn’t anything like that. Native plants are nature’s, if you will, ‘weeds.’”
Altadena Maid makes it easy for anyone to grow low-maintenance wildflower gardens. You simply crumble the seed bark sold by Amy, toss it and water.
Rene creates a variety of seed barks, including native wildflower, coastal and pollinator-focused blends, each for a different region of California. He takes into account factors such as elevation, heat, sunlight and exposure. Most importantly, each bark aims help provide habitat for pollinators and to support native pollinator populations.
“I tell people it’s easier than falling off a log,” Amy says.
He adds that though L.A. develops its land for housing and commerce, there’s still a way to restore native plant habitats.
“The biggest challenge, as we look at what’s going on around L.A., for example, we’re losing more and more of the native open spaces and developing more and more housing and commercial developments and all the rest,” he says. “We need to try to buck that trend as much as possible and make it possible to sustain those pollinators that keep us alive.”
That’s the mission of Altadena Maid, a one-person crusade for restoring pollinators and wildflowers, one seed mixture at a time.
“I like to talk about the plant anxiety,” says Altadena Maid founder Rene Amy. “The idea that somehow or another you’ve got to do all this work. No, it isn’t anything like that. Native plants are nature’s, if you will, ‘weeds.’”
Altadena Maid makes it easy for anyone to grow low-maintenance wildflower gardens. You simply crumble the seed bark sold by Amy, toss it and water.
Rene creates a variety of seed barks, including native wildflower, coastal and pollinator-focused blends, each for a different region of California. He takes into account factors such as elevation, heat, sunlight and exposure. Most importantly, each bark aims help provide habitat for pollinators and to support native pollinator populations.
“I tell people it’s easier than falling off a log,” Amy says.
He adds that though L.A. develops its land for housing and commerce, there’s still a way to restore native plant habitats.
“The biggest challenge, as we look at what’s going on around L.A., for example, we’re losing more and more of the native open spaces and developing more and more housing and commercial developments and all the rest,” he says. “We need to try to buck that trend as much as possible and make it possible to sustain those pollinators that keep us alive.”
