I recently went on a special garden tour with my mom. The tour was hosted by the Theodore Payne Foundation, which is a group that tries to teach people about California Native Plants. So the tour was all focused on California native plants. We went to see many gardens, both professional and DIY, located in the San Gabriel Valley. All the gardens and houses were very nice. They were full of many different colorful flowers from California native plants. I loved it!

Above are a bunch of pictures that we took. One house had a huge coastal live oak. Coastal live oaks are a very well loved California native tree because they provide shelter and food for local animals. At another house, we saw a very big, black, slimy heap of BEAR POOP! They even labeled the poop, as if it were a plant. It was so disgusting I wanted to throw up. That house was in the middle of a bear trail at the base of the San Gabriel mountains. I also took a bunch of random pictures of plants that I liked. The tour gave me lots of ideas for the empty spots on our hillside at home. I have heard that California Native plants have extra long taproots and are great for erosion control. That is exactly what we need.