What native plants should I grow?
What native plants should I grow? We get more requests looking for advice about recommended native species than we have time to answer, unfortunately, so we have created a simple guide to online tools in California and Oregon to help you figure out the best native species for your home, property, or land that you manage, and come up with your own native species list for your area!
Click on the blue link below to view the document, or the download button to download the document.
It is the same document as you see in the featured image above, but with live hyperlinks that take you directly to the linked web pages.
Or you can follow the instructions below:
CALIFORNIA
Use the “What Grows Here” function on the Calflora website to create a species list for your area. You can access that webpage here.
Use the +/- on the map to zoom in as close as you can to your house or property. Then click the SEARCH button at the top. It will populate a list of plants organized by plant type. Click on the + button next to each plant type to see the full list of the species that have been documented to grow in your area. You will see if it is native or non-native, and you can click on each species to learn more about it or view more photos.
This populates species that have been documented to grow in that area. There may be more plants native to the area that have not been documented.
For help with this tool from Calflora click here.
For a video tutorial click here.
Oregon
Use the “MAPPING” tool on the OregonFlora website to create a species list here.
Zoom in on the map close to your target area. From there, click on either the polygon, circle or rectangle icons on the upper, right-hand side of the map. Click and drag the shape until it captures the general area. Hit the green SEARCH button on the upper left-hand side of the map. A notice may pop up that you don’t have permission to see exact locations of rare species that may be in that area. Click OK if you see that pop-up (rare plants are not included on the map).
All “Records” will then be populated. Click on the TAXA tab to view a simple species list that includes all vascular species that have been documented to occur in that area. There may be more plants native to the area that have not been documented.
For a video tutorial click here.