What began as a project to attract wildlife has evolved into a magnet for community participation.
The native garden at Lake Cunningham began “because we were interested in native plants and wanted to create habitat for birds and insects already in the park,” said Ashok Jethanandani. Having recently landscaped his Evergreen home with native plants, he “had no more work to do” on it and wanted to create a native garden that many other people could enjoy.
After three years, the project is thriving because the focus has shifted to connecting with people in the neighborhood to achieve the same goals. “We want to find more people like us in the neighborhood, who value nature and would enjoy working on [the native garden],” said Arvind Kumar, Jethanandani's partner.
San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales commended the Lake Cunningham volunteers for their efforts in a ceremony on Nov. 15, stating that the group “is a highly inclusive and hard-working community-based group aimed at beautification of park lands, maintenance and supplementation of a native plants garden, creation of a habitat for birds and other wildlife, and promulgation of knowledge of native plants to park visitors, all while encouraging community participation and ownership of the project.”
Named in the commendation were the core volunteers who have been the steadiest contributors to the project: Susan Sundberg, Bracey Tiede, Richard Tiede, Kay Gutknecht, Sue Welch, and Barbara and Scott Springer, as well as Kumar and Jethanandani.
They started the garden in fall 2002 by scattering wildflower seeds, most of which got eaten by birds. By winter, it was clear that weed control would be the major challenge, and the size of the garden was scaled back to about 1,000 square feet.
The following year, the focus shifted to perennials and shrubs. Volunteers donated seedlings grown locally in their gardens. Also, some small coyote brush that had been overwhelmed by annual weeds at the park started growing into robust shrubs once the weeds were removed.
It wasn't only the coyote brush that was overwhelmed, however. By the end of last year, Kumar said, he was feeling stressed out and felt the task was too big for the core group of volunteers who maintained the garden.
Help came from San Jose's Neighborhood Development Center, which offers free classes to city residents. Kumar and Jethanandani took classes on how to apply for grants, how to find neighborhood resources (asset mapping), and how to work with youth volunteers. Fortuitously, they also met the San Jose Conservation Corps, which was looking for community projects to work on.
As a result of learning how to find and use community resources, Kumar said, he has been far less stressed this year. Now the regular, predictable help comes from the core group and SJCC crews as well as volunteers from area high schools, including Independence, Andrew Hill, Silver Creek, and Evergreen Valley.
The high school students get credit for community hours, and they are some of the most enthusiastic workers. “I tell [the teenagers] to come back [with] their families and tell the family, 'I mulched this bed,'” Kumar said. Because the students live in the area, they are ethnically representative of the neighborhood; the SJCC crews, drawing from a wider area, are more diverse.
Typically, a crew of 15 volunteers is optimal, although the largest group was a busload of 30 teenagers from a Jain convention. Other groups have come from San Jose State University, One Brick, and California Native Plant Society, aided by a posting on the www.volunteermatch.com Web site.
The only requirements are that volunteers enjoy being outside and don't mind getting their hands dirty. “It's an easy two hours on a Saturday morning, not a big commitment,” Bracey said, as well as being local, convenient, and fun to do.
“The people are nice, and it's interesting to talk to the public, introducing them to the world of native plants,” she said. “It's a wonderful thing to do for the community” and an opportunity for healthy activity.
Volunteer duties include weeding, mulching, planting, watering and propagating. Core volunteers are always on hand to train new volunteers. Planting takes place in the late winter and fall; in the summer, the focus is on watering, weeding, and mulching.
The results of all the extra hands contributing to the garden this year are evident, as volunteer hours have mushroomed from 320 in 2004 to at least 700 in 2005. Not only have the areas prepared for planting expanded to half an acre, but the areas already planted have far fewer weeds. Adding a layer of cardboard under the mulch this year has also suppressed weeds more effectively.
Furthermore, the park staff at Lake Cunningham has been cooperative from day one, Kumar said. The park administration has offered logistical help as well as tools and wheelbarrows, and this year, the park supervisor, Bill Guraro, authorized two new water lines so that the volunteers no longer have to drag 300-foot hoses to the site. Joe Corrales, a gardener at the park, has helped identify weeds and advise on weed control. One of the park rangers, Mark Rayner, built a lovely sign for the garden last year.
With help from park staff, Kumar applied for, and was awarded, two grants. The San Jose Beautiful grant funded the purchase of shrubs and trees for the garden, which will be planted from now until March 2006.
Late fall and winter is the optimum planting time for native plants because the winter rains help the plants grow strong roots. Careful nurturing the first couple years, including supplemental watering through the first summer, is essential to sustain the plants. Once they have developed a root system capable of tolerating drought, many native plants will flourish with little care.
The second grant, from Community Action and Pride, funded a native nursery so that the volunteers do not have to get grants to buy plants every year. Bracey helped design the nursery's irrigation system, and Richard assembled it. The nursery enables volunteers to grow plants from locally gathered seeds and cuttings, which are more likely to succeed here and support local wildlife.
Botanist Sally Casey accompanied several volunteers on a fall field trip to gather seeds and cuttings at Alum Rock Park, where Kumar had obtained a collecting permit.
If you visit the garden this time of year, you will see a neatly mulched area with small plants, the paths defined by donated logs. The dormant season in the native garden is late fall, the driest time of the year.
Awakened by the winter rains, plants burst into bloom in spring and early summer. When the plants have become large enough to be showy in a couple of years, plans call for monthly tours of the garden.
Community members or groups who want to get involved in the garden are invited to visit the website for details or call Kumar at (408) 274-6965.
Here is a small selection of the plants featured at the native garden. All of these plants like full sun and are drought tolerant once they are established, which takes about two to three years.
Originally published in the Evergreen Times, November 24, 2005.
© 2005 Tanya Kucak