A garden of California popies, Orange Monkeyflowers, California Lilacs, native Irises, bunch grasses, Manzanita, Holly-leafed Cherries and many more native California plants will be planted along the bikepath if the BPA gets its wish for 1996. A group of BPA members acting as a subcommittee of the Parks Committee is readying specific proposals for BPA Board approval. The Board will submit our desires to the Water District and ask for a change order to require the contractor to use only native plants in the revegetation phase of the project. We will be making precise requests as to species and locations. This will not affect the trees already included in the approved plan.
Readers might recall that the contractor is under obligation to transplant certain trees, and to replant three trees for every one removed. The period of contracted vegetation maintenance is three years and performance (vegetation survival and growth) is guaranteed. In other words, if a tree dies it will be replaced again until it lives and grows. Revegetation will begin next Spring, prior to the planned re-opening of the path in July, 1996.
Unfortunately, when the detailed plans were drawn up between six and three years ago, the focus was entirely on trees. There was no discussion of shrubs or herbaceous vegetation (flowers), and nothing about grass except for a general requirement for hydroseeding. The proposed change order we are requesting will require native grasses exclusively in the hydroseeding. In addition, we will request extensive shrub plantings and areas of perennial and annual flowers. The plan will include a mix of plants such that we will have something blooming each month of the year. Also planned will be fall color and evergreens to provide summer freshness.
One of the reasons this is important is to reestablish and improve the habitat of the birds, small mammals, reptiles and important insects such as butterflies and bees that has been lost during the project. We also see this as an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to rectify the lack of native plant revegation and wildlife habitat at the time of the original bikepath construction in 1977 and 1978. We have a unique chance to do it again and get it right this time!
The final result should be a demonstration of what our land could have looked like before the padres of Mission Santa Clara moved their cattle herds here in the 1820s and began the near-total conversion of Palo Alto to introduced species and the near-extinction of our beautiful California natives. If you are interested in this effort, please contact the Parks Chair, Doug Graham, at 493-0689.