Get in the Dirt

Ocean View Farms Community Garden, Photo by Kathy Vilim

~Gardening not only puts food on the table, it also feeds my soul~

Usually I write about things to do in the backyard garden.  However, with the high cost of housing in SoCal, for many having a backyard garden is but a distant dream. After I sold my house, I missed gardening so much and wondered where I could garden. Then I discovered Ocean View Farms, a non-profit community garden in Mar Vista.

Community gardens are a wonderful resource.  They feed the need to see things grow, to nurture new life, to get in the earth and get soil under your fingernails.  When I am at my garden plot, I feel the sun warm my skin and the breezes pick up my hair.  All around me things are growing.  The place is alive with busy insects and butterflies and the splashes of color that flowers add. Here I can make a difference.  I can grow my own food.  Tomatoes simply are not the same in the store, after you’ve tasted hand-picked organic tomatoes.  And, I can give back to pollinators by planting nectar rich flowers and milkweed.

Are you interested in finding a place to garden? LA.Curbed.com has provided a list of the 10 best community gardens in Los Angeles County (compiled by Will Cooley)

Ocean View Farms Community Garden, photo by Kathy Vilim

Ocean View Farms:

I was happy to see that the garden I belong to, OceanViewFarms, is on the 10 Best Community Gardens list. A non-profit community garden in Mar Vista (established in 1977), it earned mention for having the “Most Impressive Compost.”  I would have to agree that their compost set up is extensive and impressive.  The “black gold” that results makes for a rich, organic garden compost that is available for all members to use.  In return, the members all contribute their spent vegetable plants to the compost pile.

For me this is a very important resource.  Your vegetables will only be as good as the soil that goes into growing them.  In Southern California it can be difficult to keep dry, sandy soil rich and fertile enough for a good harvest all by yourself.  Having a garden community to work with is a benefit I certainly appreciate.

Ocean View Farms is a large (500 plots) well-established community garden providing many resources for its members, including: a tool shed where tools are made available, a greenhouse for seed starting, and an orchard with fruit for the enjoyment of all members.

Did I mention that this garden is organic? Everything is grown organically. No pesticides whatsoever are used, and the bees say, “Thank you.”

Santa Monica Main Street Community Garden, photo by Kathy Vilim

Santa Monica Main Street Community Garden:

Located on Main Street between Hollister and Strand, this community garden has (73) plots and is also on the 10 Best Community Gardens list mentioned as “Most Integrated Into the Community.” Available exclusively to Santa Monica residents, this garden has a long waiting list. If you’d like to apply, fill out their application here: https://www.smgov.net/Departments/CCS/form.aspx?ekfrm=42024

When I visited this month, the Main Street Garden was holding a breakfast with featured speaker Christy Wilhelmi of GardenNerd. She spoke on Practical Pest Control for Small Space Gardens. It was a good chance to get to know the folks that garden there and discuss what to be growing this spring. The garden was alive with blooming flowers, planted to attract pollinators.  Recent rains have meant more butterflies, in particular Painted Ladies! It has also been a big help to the winter vegetable crops, such as cauliflower, broccoli, and lettuces.

Wattles Farm Main Path & Greenhouse, photo courtesy of Wattles.com

Wattles Farm:

Mentioned on the 10 Best Community Gardens list as “Most Unlikely Oasis,” Wattles Farm has a very interesting history. Located in the heart of Hollywood, this community garden was built on the grounds of a 40-acre estate named “Jualita,” the winter home of businessman Gurdon Wattles. His mansion is designated as City of Los Angeles Cultural Monument No. 579. The mansion with its lush landscaped gardens was built in 1907.

In 1975, an organic community garden was started on 4 of the acres It was one of the first gardens begun through the initiative of Mayor Tom Bradley’s community gardening program. Volunteers cleaned up the previous garden which had fallen into neglect, clearing brush and putting in plumbing for the first plots. They saved hundreds of original avocado and citrus trees in the orchard.

Today the Wattles community garden has 300 members and 172 plots.

“Someone loves this garden and has lent it to you.  

Please respect this kindness and leave it as beautiful as you find it.” 

The spirit of the members is reflected in this sign posted at the entrance to the grounds. It is this spirit of community that has saved the land from developers in this highly-prized part of Hollywood. 

The only problem with community gardens seems to be there are not enough of them! According to the Los Angeles Community Garden Council (LACGC), there are approximately 125 community gardens in Los Angeles County. You can find one near you by visiting their website: http://lagardencouncil.org/find-a-garden/ To learn the membership requirements of each, the application process, and the waiting list contact the garden manager.

If you want to get your hands dirty right away, you should consider volunteering at a local community garden hosted by Los Angeles Community Garden Council.  LACGC has a list of gardens that are looking for volunteers.  You don’t need experience to get started learning to garden. Check them out here: http://lagardencouncil.org/get-involved/volunteer/

Desert Rains Bring Eruption of Painted Ladies to Southern California

            Vanessa cardui, Painted Ladies Butterfly,
                  photo credit: www.laspilitas.com

The other day while I was sitting at a bus stop, I observed a number of tiny shadows flying toward me. I looked up to see butterflies, a whole flock of them!  They were small, almost moth-like.  Later walking to a friend's house, I observed more of these little butterflies, flying up her driveway and then up over the house, heading north.  What the heck was going on?

All over the Southland people have been observing these small orange creatures flying hard in gusty winds. Where did they come from, and where are they headed?  Some people thought they are monarchs migrating north from Mexico.  But, no, monarchs are much bigger. Then I read about the explosion of Painted Lady butterflies! 

Researchers have advised that the Painted Lady butterflies (Vanessa cardui) overwinter in deserts, such as the Mojave and Colorado deserts, before embarking on their annual migration to the Pacific Northwest. The profusion of butterflies happening right now coincides with the super blooms in the desert following all the rainfall we just had. In a normal year, for example, Anza Borego desert gets 3 inches of rain per year. but this year they got 3 inches just over Valentine's Day!  

In the past six drought years California has seen a huge decline in butterflies in general. Probably the most watched are the western Monarchs. Painted Ladies are not in such dire straights as the Monarchs. One of the advantages they have over the Monarchs is that they can eat the nectar of a wide number of plants, so they do not have to search for Milkweed. The usual nectar sources visited by Painted Ladies are nettles, mallows and borages, but they can also enjoy lupine, sunflowers and poppies if rains make them available. They can also ingest a large number of plant toxins. 

Painted Ladies can fly at speeds of up to 25mph. They can travel a distance of 2500 miles. They use the abdominal fat they stored as caterpillars to fuel their flight. Their small 2-3 inch size leaves them largely unnoticed during normal years. It is this year's eruption that have brought them front and center to the attention of Angelenos. 

There is something magical about the flight of the Painted Ladies, en masse during this year's migration. In the urban environment we are thirsty for nature. And these orange winged beauties remind us that all around us, no matter where we are, we can find nature.  And nature never fails to be amazing. 

https://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-butterflies-desert-explosion-20190312-story.html

#rainfall #pollinators #butterflies #SoCal

Gimme Shelter

Butterfly Grove, Pismo Beach, CA, Photo by Kathy Vilim

Gimme Shelter

A shadow passes overhead.  I look up to see orange wings.  A monarch butterfly is passing overhead, slowly, playfully with another monarch butterfly.  I am working in the OVF gardens, and I stop to watch them. They fly so free that it lightens my heart.  They are flying over a plot that contains one milkweed plant and one sage plant, the perfect combination for the monarch butterflies.

The milkweed plant (Asclepias) is not so much a nectar source for the monarchs as is the sage, but the milkweed attracts them because it is a host plant, a larval source. The female monarch will lay her eggs on the milkweed knowing the young caterpillars will have food when they emerge.  She can lay hundreds of eggs on a single plant, and they will take in milkweed toxin that will protect them from being eaten by birds.

When autumn is in the air, the great monarch migration begins.  Unlike their east coast cousins, our California monarchs do not migrate to Mexico.  Instead, they migrate to overwintering groves on the California coast. Along the coast there are no freezing overnight temperatures.  The monarchs cluster together high up in Eucalyptus trees, wings closed, to keep warm when the sun is not out. One of the largest of these overwintering groves is close by in Pismo Beach. Now, in  January, there will be a mating frenzy at the overwintering groves, and the females will depart with eggs to lay. They will fly low looking for milkweed host plants.

While the monarch butterflies are traveling to and from their California overwintering grounds, they need waystations where they can rest.  On their way out to the grove, they will continue to fatten up on nectar, and on their departure from the grove they will be looking for milkweed.

I have had the great pleasure of camping next to Pismo Beach’s Monarch Grove.  For several weeks I lived among the orange ballerinas of the sky, observing their daily routine of resting all together at night and then dancing in the mid-day sun.  I felt so free then, as they were free. And I left there committed to caring about what happens to them. How can a female butterfly find milkweed in the city?

The answer is private and community gardens. Places like the community gardens at Ocean View Farms are wonderful resources for the monarch butterflies.  The organic garden is full of life. What a great California waystation we could have by planting for the monarchs at our community gardens. I can envision monarchs flitting about the vegetable plots.  All they need is milkweed and a nectar source like sage. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if each of us planted just one of those plants and gave our traveling monarchs a rest stop?

Remember: If you want to help the monarchs, it's best to grow native milkweed plants that die back and encourage the monarchs to migrate rather than tropical milkweed that can interrupt their breeding cycles.

Buckwheat and the El Segundo Blue Butterfly

Buckwheat and the El Segundo Blue Butterfly

BY KATHY VILIM

Male-and-Female-El-Segundo-Blue-Sterba (Euphilotes battoides allyni) 

Photo ©Don Sterda and Friends of Ballona Wetlands

Nothing warms my heart quite like hearing the happy news that butterflies are flourishing~ somewhere.  Rarely do we get good news about our winged friends lately.  But this story is one of hope and promise!

The El Segundo Blue (Euphilotes battoides allyni) is a pretty light blue butterfly that is found nowhere but in So California and is federally designated as Endangered.  This butterfly is named for the dune system where it makes its home.  There are only three known colonies still existing, and the largest is located on a small area of land owned by Los Angeles International Airport and maintained as the El Segundo Blue Butterfly Habitat Preserve, which was created in an effort to protect this rare species. (The land was formerly known as Palisades del Rey.)

El-Segundo-Blue (Euphilotes battoides allyni) 

Photo © Patrick Tyrrell, Program Director at Friends of Ballona Wetlands

The Good News: Recently it was reported that the El Segundo Blue Butterfly re-established itself in a small area of the wetlands about half-mile away from the LAX site.  More than (100) butterflies have been seen near the Ballona Wetlands. The El Segundo Blue’s population in the Ballona Wetlands has increased steadily over the past seven years. Ecologists believe that the El Segundo Blues found in the Ballona Wetlands moved there from the LAX (Los Angeles International Airport) preserve, as the El Segundo Blue is not a highly migratory species. It will not travel outside of 400 feet from home to find food. This bodes well for the return of other endangered species to the wetlands and tells that restoration efforts are working.

Eriogonum parvifolium (Dune Buckwheat Detail) 

Photo © 2006 Steve Matson

Naturalists are delighted to find that the small blue butterflies are making use of the Coastal (Dune) Buckwheat (Eriogonum parviflorum). After an intensive effort by volunteers to remove invasive iceplant (native to China), the native Buckwheat had more room to grow. Corridors opened up making room to plant more Buckwheat, as well. The volunteers are part of the nonprofit Friends of Ballona Wetlands.  Coastal Dune Buckwheat (Eriogonum parviflorum) is the sole food source of the Blues, and they will also use the Buckwheat to lay eggs, as it is their host plant.

About the Blues: The El Segundo Blue Butterfly, in the family Lycaenidae, emerges during summer when the flowers of its host plant, Coastal Dune Buckwheat (Eriogonum parviflorum) open. The adults live only a few days, during which time they will mate and lay eggs. Within a week, the eggs will hatch, and the larvae will feed entirely on the flower heads of their host plant. El Segundo Blue spends virtually its entire life cycle in intimate association with the flower heads of just this one species of buckwheat.

The El Segundo Blue’s dorsal wing color is blue, with the males being brighter blue than the females. The ventral side is gray, with square-shaped spots and a series of orange spots on the hindwing that appear merged into a single band of color.

El-Segundo-Blue Butterfly on Dune Buckwheat, 

Photo © Patrick Tyrrell, Program Director Friends of Ballona Wetlands

The El Segundo Blue has found its home increasingly coveted by humans. One of the last remaining populations lives by the Los Angeles International Airport. The airport’s construction, oil refining, sand mining and urban development have all claimed large portions of its dune habitat, which used to be more extensive. Though the threat of development has  been largely halted, there are other threats, as well. Their host plant is competing with several introduced plants, including other Buckwheat Eriogonum species on which the El Segundo Blues cannot feed.

In order to ensure the future of the El Segundo Blue Butterfly, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) has started dune management programs which focus on restoring the sites’ native vegetation. The Urban Wildlands Group has applied to the USFWS for an enhancement of survival permit and safe harbor agreement for approximately two acres of bluff habitat on private property in Los Angeles County, California. I have written previously about the Ballona Wetlands, and the how important this preserve is to so much wildlife, as one of the last remaining wetlands in California.  As time goes on, I hope that this place will remain safe for many generations of wetland wildlife to continue to prosper.

As you might expect, the folks at Friends of Ballona are excited! Their message to volunteers, “Stay tuned – this is one of our most exciting developments in years – a DIRECT result of our restoration efforts!”

Dune Buckwheat (Eriogonum parvifolium) 

Photo ©Charles Webber California Academy of Sciences

 FILED UNDER: INSECTS: BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHSTAGGED WITH: (ERIOGONUM PARVIFLORUM), BALLONA WETLANDS, BUCKWHEAT, BUTTERFLY,COASTAL DUNE BUCKWHEAT, DUNE ECOSYSTEM, DUNE HABITAT, EL SEGUNDO BLUE BUTTERFLY, EL SEGUNDO BLUE BUTTERFLY HABITAT PRESERVE, EL SEGUNDO BLUES,EUPHILOTES BATTOIDES ALLYNI, FRIENDS OF BALLONA WETLANDS, HOST PLANT, PALISADES DEL REY, RESTORATION, RESTORATION EFFORTS, WETLANDS