Blog

It’s officially planting season. I hope you’re enjoying the cooler weather, and getting excited about the chance of rain later this week. And finding time to appreciate late blooms and rusty seed heads swaying in the uniquely angled November light. I know I am! As...

It’s Oaktober! And yes, Seedtember just finished - we’re very fond of calendar puns here at Theodore Payne Foundation. For me, of all the CA native plants out there, oaks are probably most deserving of their own pun of the month. They are the workhorses of Southern...

Happy September, or should I say Seedtember! This month, we are celebrating all things seed at TPF. To say that 2023 has been a special weather year is an understatement. With rainfall way above average across Southern California, wildflowers proliferated throughout...

As we head into the long, hot stretch of Southern California summer, things typically start to slow down in the native plant world. Leaves fall, flowers turn to seed, and the soil dries, changing the landscape dramatically. One of my favorite things to do during this...

The first Clarkias are coming into bloom around LA and—as their common name ”Farewell to Spring” implies—this represents the beginning of the end of an incredible spring for California native plants. I say that with one major caveat: Spring hasn’t even started in the...

Spring of Life We are just a few days away from our twentieth annual Native Plant Garden Tour! When we came up with the title of this year’s tour, Spring of Life, it was the middle of a severe drought. Outdoor water restrictions were the new law of the land, and...

As we gazed upon thousands of poached plants that had recently been repatriated into a remote botanical garden just south of the Namibian border in South Africa, the complexity of our current environmental moment really struck me. In one of the most undeveloped and...

A few weeks ago, I shared some info and opinion on the drought in Southern California (available to watch on our YouTube channel if you missed it.) In preparation for that talk, I was more attuned than normal to the state of our landscape here in Los Angeles. As I...

As we head into the hottest and driest part of the year, drought is at the forefront of many conversations at TPF. In my last blog post, I described the very existential reality of our current water situation, and how this could play out in terms of Southern...

This winter started with a deluge in much of Southern California. Over nine inches of rain fell in downtown Los Angeles in December 2021, more than three times the monthly average. We were ecstatic here at Theodore Payne Foundation, looking forward to super blooms at...