Water District Demonstration Garden Dedicated at Sierra Madre Elementary

Gov. Jerry Brown may have declared an official end to the California drought recently, but low-water use landscaping and better methods of storm water management that allow rainwater to percolate back into the aquifer will always be necessary.

Tom Love--San Gabriel Valley Municipal Water District board member, Sierra Madre resident and General Manager/CEO of the Inland Empire Utilities Agency (IEUA)--addressed those assembled Tuesday at the dedication of the new "water wise" landscaping at .

He adjusted a familiar analogy, quipping that here in Southern California, "We need to save [water], not for a rainy day, but for a sunny one."

In a fall 2010 interview, Love pointed out that the land occupied by Sierra Madre School is one of the largest undivided parcels in the city. Due to its size and visibility to the community, the as well as their potential aesthetics.

Through a $75,000 grant from the water district, several key donations like the Skanska and Marina Landscape gift of $50,000 of decomposed granite for the winding walkways/rainwater percolation system, and support from the Theodore Payne Foundation, several governmental and public agencies worked together to put together the project over the past year.

Pasadena Unified School District allocated personnel to oversee the work, including project manager Shirley Barrett, while the City of Sierra Madre helped with moving utility connections.

All the state offices that represent Sierra Madre sent delegates to congratulate the school and all parties involved on a job well done, and provided official congratulatory proclamations.

In her address to the crowd, Principal Gayle Bluemel tied the project to the tenets by which the school operates, and was pleased with another opportunity to incorporate the hands on student involvement in mulching and planting and placing rocks, into the school’s curriculum.

When a tour was given of the completed project by Amy Whist, examples of the slow establishment of native landscape were featured. Placards with the words, “Sleep, Creep then Leap” were set among the landscape to inform the public and the school’s students that these plants take three years to become well established, and must be watered during this period. 

In their first year, native plants spend their energy developing an extensive root system, with little evidence of growth vigor above ground. This often results in disappointment by a homeowner, who may think the plant is dying.

The second year, the plants exhibit a bit of top growth, or “creep.” By the end of the third year, with once a week watering, the natives should be vigorous enough to “leap."

Native landscape is not only water-thrifty, requiring only one seventh of the water required for a non-native landscape, but it's critical for the ecosystem as well, the tour guide explained.

Ninety percent of caterpillars and butterflies can feed only on plants native to the area. Without sufficient caterpillars, baby birds go hungry. As evidence, the startling statistic was offered that while there were 500 million birds in America during the 1960s, only 10% of those birds can still be found across the United States due to a loss of this type of native habitat.

Whist expressed particular gratitude that the groups and agencies “got it” by waiting to plant the native palette until the rainy season, which ensured a better establishment and survival rate of the landscape.

Several key features of the project’s goal to “conserve, preserve and restore” water were utilized at the site, including water efficient irrigation, water thrifty turf for gatherings on the school’s front lawn, California native plantings, decomposed granite pathways for walking and rainwater percolation, plus an education curriculum for the school and designated space for a future “edible garden”.

Now, the Sierra Madre community has a permanent site to observe and learn about these water conservation methods, and it's right there in the front yard of Sierra Madre Elementary School.

Editor' Note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly referred to the heodore Payne Foundation as the Thomas Payne Foundation.