Two more of the 10 annual species planted by students in November have begun to flower! These are Baby Blue Eyes (Nemophila menziesii) and Lacy Phacelia (Phacelia tanacetifolia). That's half of the species now in bloom. We invite you to walk over to Baker 1805 to see the flowers in person.

​The warm weather this week should be waking up our native bees soon, so we'll hope to start seeing some pollinators out there in the next week or two!

During our second campus stewardship workday in November 2025, volunteers participated in an act of hope for the future, the sowing of seeds. On an overcast and chilly morning, we planted seeds of 12 California native annuals in the native garden by Baker Hall. 

The first of those have just begun to flower! The early bloomers are:

• California Goldfields, Lasthenia californica, shown below, top row
• Tidy Tips, Layia platyglossa, bottom row
• Yellow Rayed Lasthenia, Lasthenia glabrata, not pictured

Come on over to Baker Hall from time-to-time this spring to check in on these and the other 9 species that are yet to bloom this spring.

Students in SRJC's botany courses will be collecting seed from these flowers to sow next winter. The 2024/25 SRJC Bee Team will monitor the native bees that visit these flowers over the course of the spring to better understand the plant-pollinator network on our campus in hopes of informing effective landscaping for pollinators in the future. 

Most of these species do not occur elsewhere on campus and would not occur here without the help of our community of campus stewardship volunteers. Thank you!