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The joy of native plants used in personal gardens will be celebrated May 6 in the annual Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour.
Gardens will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. for Alameda and Contra Costa county homeowners to share how they have developed beautiful, pesticide-free, water-conserving native plant gardens that provide habitat for native birds, bees and butterflies.
The tour is free but people must register at www.BringingBacktheNatives.net to receive a garden guide for $10, which lists the homes for a self-guided tour. Fifty talks, also listed in the guide, will be offered during the weekend.
The guide, which was mailed mid-April, contains 20 tickets for admission to gardens. Although this year’s tour has 35 homes, people generally see four to five gardens so a guidebook has enough tickets for four people. No registration fee is required, but the suggested contribution is $15 per person.
This year the theme is “Art and Music in the Gardens.” Artwork will be for sale at 11 gardens; and bluegrass, baroque and renaissance music will be performed at seven of the venues. Children’s activities will also be offered.
Volunteers are needed to spend a morning or an afternoon greeting tour participants and answering questions about native plants. Volunteers receive invitations to two garden soirees and private tours of the gardens they will be staffing, plus T-shirts. The online registration form has a section on volunteering.
A free Garden Art and Native Plant Extravaganza fundraiser will take place from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. April 28 at East Bay Wilds Native Plant Nursery in Oakland, which is not normally open to the public.
There will also be sustainable gardening workshops in a Walnut Creek garden, but reservations should be made early.
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