Text and Photos by Lee Gordon Native Garden Committee
This is fourth of a short series on some of our local native plants that are superb for our gardens, but that are largely overlooked.
Snowdrops caught me by surprise on a spring hike up the Iron Mountain trail, where they graced both sides of the trail. When I saw their showy blooms, their graceful stems, and their shiny round leaves, I immediately fell in love with them. You can read more about them in an article from the Redding CNPS:
and, also, in an article from Pacific Horticulture:
https://www.pacifichorticulture.org/articles/styrax/
Snowdrops are more common north of Sacramento, particularly near Redding, than they are in southern California. However, their bright flowers make them easy to find on Iron Mountain.
My first two plants received monthly irrigation, but both turned crispy and died in the summer. I started a larger planting in spring 2020 and I water it twice a month (each time about 1 inch). This keeps their leaves green and the plants growing through the summer and into October and even November. Some are starting to go deciduous now (mid Sept.), but most are still green and growing. All of them lost their leaves last November and new leaves began to appear this year in February. In time, I will stretch out the water intervals until they get only monthly water.
Snowdrops grow to about 5-feet high on Iron Mountain, but they can grow beyond 10 feet, particularly with periodic irrigation. They tend to be columnar, growing perhaps half as wide as their height. I expect their growth to diminish as I reduce watering, and that will make it easier to keep them trimmed to the size and shape I want.
I tried growing them from seed and decided it was impossible until I saw the lovely plants grown by a native plant nursery. Expect them to become available by spring.
Above: Snowdrops are common along the Iron Mountain trail, both near the trail and up and down the hillsides, where they grow in full sun. They crowd into dense chaparral of mission manzanita (Xylococcus bicolor) and true manzanita (Arctostaphylos sp.), scrub oak (Quercus sp.), sugar bush (Rhus ovata), cherry (Prunus ilicifolia), and bush poppy (Dendromecon rigida).
Below: Snowdrop blooms, about an inch in diameter, in late April, 2019. The flowers hang mostly from horizontal stems.
Below: This snowdrop was planted in spring 2020 from a 1-gallon pot, and it has grown to about 5 feet tall. Today is it a bean pole, but it will spread some as it grows larger. The chicken wire keeps woodrats away; woodrats are a problem on this hill. This snowdrop is surrounded by monkeyflowers (Mimulus aurantiacus).
Below: This new planting includes about a dozen snowdrops, with about half in the photo. The plants are all inside rings of chicken wire. The plants that go seasonally deciduous. Bush poppies (Dendromecon rigida) form an ever-blooming backdrop in the photo and the ground cover is California fuchsia (Epilobium canum). Given their ultimate size, the snowdrops are too close together. This is partly because I didn’t exactly know what I was doing when I planted them. But also, I don’t mind overplanting and thinning groups like this as they grow, I’ll keep the ones that make for the best overall look. Another possibility is to allow plants to merge together into a mass of plants. (Photo taken in October, 2021) Next month: Bush rue (Cneoridium dumosum)