Benicia & Vallejo Food Forest Garden Tour Celebrates Its 10th Year!
By Nicole Newell, Sustainable Landscaping Program Manager
Every community has their magical spots and events that only locals know about. I consider our annual garden tour, this year on April 25, one of those special events. It is the sweetest part of our world — kind people that want to open their yards to inspire, to talk about plants, and to see what grows well in USDA garden zone 9b. This will celebrate our 10th year touring the food forest gardens!
The tour has evolved over the years to include other types of gardens for a variety of inspiration. This year’s garden tour showcases a mix of new garden sites, established permaculture food forests, native landscapes, community gardens and more. In partnership with the Willis L Jepson chapter of the California Native Plant Society, we are featuring four dedicated native plant gardens. Join us to meet passionate local gardeners, explore real-life examples of flourishing food forests, and get inspired to grow your own edible paradise.
The day opens at 9 am with Lori Caldwell, a.k.a. “Compost Gal,” presenting on healthy soil at Avant Garden in Benicia. Attendees can pick up the itinerary of participating gardens at Avant in the morning and visit Benicia gardens from 10 am-1 pm and Vallejo gardens from 1-4 pm. For those just able to join for the afternoon, there will be an opportunity to pick up the Vallejo itinerary at Pollinator Pathway on Mare Island from 12-1 pm. You can visit gardens at your own pace on this self-guided tour.
How It Will Work
You can choose to tour for the whole day or for half a day.
Benicia Demonstration Food Forest Gardens will be open 10 am-1 pm
Vallejo Demonstration Food Forest Gardens will be open 1-4 pm
Itinerary pickup:
9-11 am: Itineraries will be available at Avant Garden in Benicia (400 First St., Benicia). This itinerary will include all of the demonstration food forest gardens in Benicia (open in the morning) and Vallejo (open in the afternoon).
12-1 pm: Itineraries for the Vallejo garden sites (open in the afternoon) will be available at the Pollinator Pathway garden at the Global Center for Success (1055 Azuar Dr/BLDG 733, Vallejo).
Highlights and What’s New
Every garden is an opportunity to learn about permaculture, native planting, water conservation, and much more. By attending the tour, you will leave with practical knowledge that can transform not just your own garden but also the way you interact with the environment. Here are a few new projects and educational talks that will be highlighted during the garden tour:
Healthy Soil
Compost Gal, Lori Caldwell will open the garden tour at Avant Garden in Benicia with a talk on healthy soil. After the talk she will be available to answer any questions about compost, soil and so much more!
Native Plants
While all the food forest gardens feature native plants, this year we are thrilled to showcase five specialized gardens dedicated to highlighting native species. 3 in Benicia and 1 in Vallejo, each will have a CNPS Docent to answer your native plant questions!
Free Seeds, Plants & DIY Garden Design Templates
Pick up free seeds at Avant Garden & Pollinator Pathway during registration, and grab free veggie starts at our partner location, Vallejo Unity Garden. We will also have DIY Landscape Design templates for both edible and water-efficient gardens. Available while supplies last!
Plants & Garden Goodies
Plants and garden goodies will be for sale at some of the gardens so bring cash. At Terraza Dominica at St. Patrick-St. Vincent Catholic High School, tomato plants will be for sale for $5. (exact change or credit card/Apple Pay only)
Pollinator Activities & Guides
Join the Vallejo Environmental Leadership Fellowship interns for a fun community day at the Pollinator Pathway Garden! Make seed balls to support local pollinators. Come make a positive impact on our environment alongside passionate local youth. Vallejo People’s Garden will offer guided tours at 1 pm and 2:30 pm.
HOA
Visit this lawn conversion project designed by Michael Wedgley from Soilogical and installed by the Bay Vista Homeowners Association. This project not only serves as an example of environmental stewardship, but also as an inspiring model for HOA communities everywhere. This project will show resilient plants that are adapted to our local climate and require far less water than traditional lawns.
We are still planning so there is more to come …
The spring garden tour will begin at 9 am at Avant Community Garden in Benicia with a talk on healthy soil from “CompostGal” Lori Caldwell. Itinerary pick up will be from 9-11 am.
An evolving food forest garden and greywater system installed as part of Sustainable Solano’s 2022-23 Permaculture Design Certificate course. Students transformed the front yard with a rain-capturing swale and planted berms with native and pollinator-supporting plants. The west side yard’s passionfruit vines and fruit tree guilds are watered by a laundry-to-landscape greywater system. The monarch butterfly-hosting back gardens were designed by Soilogical, nurtured with specially prepared compost, and supported by a Water Service Irrigation design created as part of a Sustainable Solano irrigation class. The site’s current steward, Heath Griffith of Grow with the Flow, cultivates edible landscapes with flowers and medicinal herbs, with an eye towards community engagement and ecological justice. An herb spiral was created with bricks repurposed from the chimney of the circa 1850s historic home, retaining walls were built from pieces of historic on-site stables, and patios were made from slate and brick on-site. The east side yard (in development) is watered with both a rain-capturing swale and a laundry-to-landscape system. Displays feature the historic aspects of the home; its background and ongoing tradition of art, design, and healing; information about the Ohlone Sogorea Te Indigenous Land Trust and rematriation of Carquin land; and various permaculture systems and landscape elements.
Visit this native plant garden and see what 30+ years of gardening dedication to native plants can create. Welcoming shade plants and green grasses abound under thriving and tall buckeye and big leaf maple trees that gain water from harvested roof rain flowing to a dry creek bed. A mature manzanita row lines the side yard walkway. Feel the intimate wildlife habitat backyard space as you find small birds flying between the branches of tall native shrubs such as the fragrant mock orange, red-blooming spice bush and the heart-shaped leaves of the western redbud. Sun-loving native perennials border a native grass lawn, and alum root hugs the shade of the understory. The owners are grateful for the relaxed and comfortable habitat that native plants provide for them.
The view of this welcoming tiered front garden begins right at street level with sidewalk appeal of a chaparral-inspired garden including evergreen manzanita, easy-to-grow buckwheat, and native grasses. Step down to the next tier to find a cozy deck space to sit within the garden and share the space with emerging caterpillars, hummingbirds and native pollinators as the seasons unfold. Tiered terraces and integrated drainage allow for meadow and sage, milkweed, and strawberry groundcover plantings to absorb stormwater while supporting plant health. View coffeeberry, monkeyflower, penstemon, and salvia which attract and support additional wildlife in this habitat-rich garden. Mature fruit trees, perennial edibles and vegetable beds combine with the abundance of native plantings for a harmonious full habitat that supports biodiversity and spills into the back yard as well. This garden family truly feels a calm connection with nature when they are in their garden space.
Come and visit this wild-like garden to gaze upon the beautiful annual flowering natives such as the yellow and white tidy tips and the purples of lupine in the front garden patch. Travel through the side yard of orange California poppies, stepping rounds and a dry creek bed that collects rainwater, to the large backyard garden that flourishes with a thriving tapestry of wildlife-supporting native plants. Verdant grasses and spring ephemerals surround a bird bath that California Towhees are happy to visit. Tall shrubs such as rosa californica or the keystone tree coast live oak have become safe places for nests of breeding small birds. Flowering colorful annuals are servicing the many pollinators such as hover flies and bumblebees that visit the flowers for pollen. This habitat refuge is where the family connects with the wonders of nature. The owner collects seeds of many native plant species to continue the annual flowering habitat year after year.
Loma Vista Farm is a program of the Vallejo City Unified School District in partnership with the Friends of Loma Vista Farm, a community-based nonprofit organization.
