Lot size: 3,000 sq. ft. garden, 100% native
Garden Age: Garden was installed in stages, beginning in 2022
Years on the Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour: New this year!
Showcase Feature
Do you live in a hot, dry area? Or, are you considering relandscaping your lot? If either of these questions resonates with you, come see the DeBoer’s garden to see what plants flourish in Walnut Creek, and how your garden might look one year after planting.
Starting at the beginning: when Beth and Bill bought this flat, one-acre lot in 2014 everything within ten feet of the property line had been scraped to bare dirt. Over the y¬ears hardworking Bill installed all of the hardscaping, built boardwalks, decks, patios, shade structures, wooden fences, the chicken coop, and a sheep pen.
During the pandemic Beth watched the virtual Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour, heard Doug Tallamy’s talk, which “changed my life,” and, on the “Find a Designer” section of the Tour’s website, and worked with Plantkind to create the landscape design. Beth and Bill did the planting.
The garden beds adjacent to the house contain a potpourri of lavender aster, red fuchsia, creamy yarrow, blue-eyed grass, and pink mallow, which bloom in riotous profusion from spring through fall.
Behind the house is a field of Hooker’s evening primrose; it’s showy yellow flowers, with their four heart-shaped petals, create a cheery entrance to Beth’s office—a vintage 1953 Spartanette trailer. (Note of caution; this primrose reproduces profusely.)
Around the far side of the house are two large buckeyes and an oak; the dappled shade they provide is punctuated with widely spaced toyon, elderberry, coffeeberry, buckwheat, lemonade berry, cream bush, bunchgrasses, and more. The open areas around these plants creates a calming, peaceful feeling in this secluded section of the garden.
Other Garden Attractions
• Moss rocks border the garden beds; larger boulders in the back of the garden provide a sense of stability and a natural, woodsy feel.
• Beth is learning to makes dyes from the plants in her garden for sewing and knitting projects.
• The orchard contains plum pear, cherry, and pomegranate trees.
Gardening for Wildlife
In July, hummingbird-sized sphinx moths visit the large yellow blossoms of the evening primrose—each flower opens at sunset, and lasts just one night. (Check out the real-time video of the flowers opening, and read about how the primrose bloomed in the thousands and were a major attraction in Yosemite here.)
Coopers hawks build nests of twigs and sticks high in nearby tall trees. In June and July, Beth, Bill, and their children love watching the chicks’ early flights.
Our local native narrow leaf milkweed has been planted to provide places on which the monarch butterfly, whose survival is a cause for worry, can lay its eggs. Milkweed is the only plant on which the monarch can lay its eggs. Dutchman’s pipevine has been included in the garden for the large, iridescent black and blue pipevine swallowtail butterfly, as this is the only plant on which the pipevine swallowtail butterfly can lay its eggs.
Lizards skitter through the garden, bask on the boulders, and search hopefully about for insects.
Keystone species in this garden (watch this talk by Doug Tallamy!)
Keystone species—our own, local ecological powerhouse plants— in this garden include oak, holly leaf cherry, elderberry, currant, sage, manzanita, buckwheat, goldenrod, cream bush, lupine, and strawberry.
At least partially wheelchair accessible? No