Natives | Curbstone Valley

Spring Garden Update: The Native Gardens

by Clare | May 29, 2012 | Farm Blog, Flora and Fauna, Native Plants, Natives

There’s no question that this is my favorite time of year. The native gardens are at their absolute best between May and June, when so many of the plants are in peak bloom. This proved to be a very busy weekend for us, as we tried to catch up on a rather long...

April Garden Update: Native Garden

by Clare | Apr 20, 2012 | Farm Blog, Flora and Fauna, Native Plants, Natives

Walking through the garden, it’s clear that April is when Spring really arrives here. I can’t allow California Native Plant Week to slip by without a brief look at the native plants in our gardens this week. There are of course the usual suspects, like...

Goldback Fern (Pentagramma triangularis ssp. triangularis)

by Clare | Mar 16, 2012 | Farm Blog, Flora and Fauna, Native Plants, Natives

We are significantly behind in our rainfall totals for this year, but during the last week the rains have made a valiant effort to catch up before Spring arrives. This winter’s paucity of rainfall has impacted a number of our native plants, especially our...

Interior Live Oak, or Shreve Oak?

by Clare | Sep 28, 2011 | Farm Blog, Flora and Fauna, Native Plants, Natives

The woodland on the property is mixed evergreen forest, composed of a variety of native California tree species, including Coast Redwood (Sequoia sempervirens), California Bay Laurel (Umbellularia californica), Pacific Madrone (Arbutus menziesii), Douglas Fir...

Woodland Skipper

by Clare | Sep 9, 2011 | Beneficial Insects, Farm Blog, Garden, Native Wildlife, Natives

This year, as the gardens are starting to come together, it’s been tremendously rewarding to see more species of animal life showing up among the flowers. Some of the most notable additions to the gardens this year have been butterflies, including the Lorquin’s...

Pacific-slope Flycatcher – The Third Time’s a Charm!

by Clare | Jul 18, 2011 | Farm Blog, Flora and Fauna, Native Wildlife, Natives

For the last two years we’ve had a pair of Pacific-slope Flycatchers (Empidonax difficilis) that, for reasons known only to them, insist on building nests on the house that seem doomed to failure. Last spring, the pair nested on top of our porch light. The female...