Tree of Life Nursery is pleased to announce that we will remain open Saturday mornings this July.  Saturdays from July 3 through July 31st, we will be open to the public from 9 AM – 12 noon.

We will also be running another session of our ever-popular Replace Your Lawn with Native Plants series.  Instead of our customary 10 o'clock start time, we will be holding these workshops at the bright early hour of 9 AM (to beat that summer heat!).

The Replace Your Lawn: Kill the Grass! session will be held twice this July, because summer is actually the best time of year to kill warm-season grasses, which are the most common lawns in Southern California.

Details about our Replace Your Lawn Workshop Series this July

Tree of Life Nursery will be closed Monday, July 5th in observance of July 4th, Independence Day.

Join us this Saturday June 19th at 10 AM for a special lecture by renowned landscape architect, professor, and water-conserving garden design expert, Bob Perry.  Author of the famous Tree and Shrubs for Dry California Landscapes (1981) and Landscape Plants for Western Regions (1992), (both are out of print), Perry’s newest book Landscape Plants for California Gardens (2010) is the long-awaited reference for those seeking comprehensive landscaping information for Southern California.

Landscape Plants for California Gardens will be available this Saturday for sale through our retail store, and Bob will be available to sign your copy of the book.  The beautiful 11” x 11” inch volume boasts 650 pages filled with over 3,100 color images and information on 2,100 plants.  With that much information, this book is sure to become every southern Californian gardener’s go-to reference for years to come. 

See more details for this weekends' lecture here.

Grasses, mostly perennial clumping varieties, have made an impressive debut onto the modern landscape scene.   We have recently seen garden grasses featured in books and articles, planted in "meadows," "grasslands," and as "accents," bringing "movement" and "drama" to the landscape.  In fact, the current hot trend for using ornamental grasses has sought to bring back to our gardens a refreshing "natural" look.  But for a truly natural look (true to nature), only native grasses will suffice.  Exotic species, that is, grasses from foreign lands, simply appear too "exotic" often too gaudy, to fit into the subtle California landscape.

We have many beautiful native grass species here in California, so there is no need to search Asia, Australia, Africa, Europe, South America, nor far a-field on our own continent to find nice varieties for our gardens.

As you will see in this special feature, Masses of Grasses there is a native grass type for every situation you could imagine in the garden, now, you can finally see all of the native grasses we grow at Tree of Life along with pictures and descriptions. 

Use these plants with confidence.  Since grasses are often prolific seeders, and their seeds usually germinate readily, careless use of exotic grasses may actually create new weed problems both in the garden and in the surrounding country.  If native grasses reseed in your garden in is called recruitment.  If exotic (foreign) species successfully reproduce, it would be called an invasion.

Check this information and try a few native grasses in your garden.  They are the perfect compliment for just about every native design theme, and they are super easy to grow.  We have a lovely grass section at Tree of Life Nursery, so come on over to compare them and see them in action… planted near rocks, flowering plants, in meadows, dry streams, alongside paths and in pots.  They grow fast, they change with the seasons, and they add a truly natural look to the native plant garden.

See the new Grasses Guide in the Featured Plant Article: Masses of Grasses