Alameda Native History Project

Tag: decolonize

  • Landback Wildflower Mix

    What’s InsidePlanting InstructionsHow To Get the Landback Wildflower Mix

    A mix of hand-collected Native California Plants chosen for the semi-arid climate of Alameda, and places like it, below 1,000 feet.

    All of them are full sun; except for the Tomcat Clover, which is happiest with a little soil moisture.

    Tomcat Clover
    Trifolium willdenovii

    Credit: Jennifer McNew, BLM

    Most of the plants in the Landback Wildflower Seed mix were selected because they are easy to grow, and help to provide food and pollen for a variety of life-forms, the most popular of which would be butterflies, and native honey bee and bumble bees. But these plants also sustain Birds, and Moths.

    Gilia Capitata is beautiful, blue, self-sewing and easy to grow. Blooms throughout spring, well into summer.

    Blue Thimble Flower
    (aka “Globe Gilia”)
    Gilia capitata

    Credit: Amada44

    Many of these plants should look familiar, if you’ve ever been hiking around the East Bay. We live in a place where there are many places where you can observe wildflowers as they exist in nature.

    Goldfields are numerous, and can be found all over the shoreline of the Bay Area, for instance: on Doolittle Drive, along the Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline.

    Goldfields
    Lasthenia glabrata

    Credit: Cliff Hutson

    The California Coastal Poppy is a native cultivar developed for its drought tolerance, deer resistance, and self-sowing attributes. The orange dot in the center make the perfect landing pad for all kinds of pollinators.

    Coastal Poppy
    Eschscholzia californica var. maritima

    Credit: Paul Hermans

    Each seed pack has a unique ratio of seeds.

    Chinese Houses set themselves apart with their long stalks, which reach up to 2 feet high, and their distinctive purple petals. These wildflowers are especially attractive to pollinators, including the Variable Checkerspot, Edith’s Checkspot Butterflies; and the Bilobed Looper Moth (among others.)

    Chinese Houses
    (aka “Innocence”)
    Collinsia heterophylla

    Credit: Stickpen

    Some packets have a small amount of these beautiful and super drought tolerant California native plants:

    Elegant Tarweed
    Madia elegans

    Credit: Calibas

    Smells like pineapple. Drought & Deer tolerant. Reliably self-sows. Late-season bloom from Mid-Summer to Fall.

    Serpentine Sunflower
    Helianthus bolanderi

    Credit: Richard Spellenberg

    Grows up to 5′ tall. Doesn’t care what soil you plant it in. Goes crazy in compost-enhanced soil. Great cut flower. Self-Sows.

    About the Seed Packets

    The Landback Wildflower Mix has been specifically chosen to be easy to grow and drought-tolerant; requiring only a couple of waterings a month once they are established.

    These seeds require no pretreatment and can be sown directly into the ground where they will be grown. Coastal Poppy roots are fragile, and should not be transplanted or moved from their original plot, once established.

    Planting Instructions:

    Prepare seedbed by removing existing weeds. Mix seeds with compost, broadcast where it is to grow, rake in lightly, and tamp. If fall rains don’t begin, irrigate 1-2 times weekly until seedling have made good growth.

    Watering:

    Water 1-2 times weekly until the plants are established. Once these plants are established, they can be water 1-2 a month. [With the exception of the Tomcat Clover, which enjoys a little moisture in its soil.]

    Planting Time:

    Fall and winter are optimal for annual flowers. The sweet spot is mid-fall.

    Sowing Rate:

    The Landback Wildflower Mix seed packet can seed approximately 5 square feet.

    Source of the Seeds in the Landback Wildflower Mix:

    These seeds were purchased, mixed, and repackaged by Alameda Native History Project from Larner Seeds, and Klamath-Siskiyou Native Seeds, for give-away purposes only.

    Neither Larner Seeds, nor Siskiyou Native Seeds are affiliated with the Alameda Native History Project.

    A Note On Larner Seeds:

    Larner Seeds was founded by Judith Larner Lowry. She is an expert on local native plants, seed gathering, and propagation, and has written a number of books on this subject.

    Larner Seeds is based in Bolinas, California, and is definitely worth the visit, if you can make it over to their Seed Shop & Demonstration Garden.

    How To Get the Landback Wildflower Mix

    You can pick up a Landback Wildflower Mix seed packet from our booth at the:

    Blues, Brews & BBQ Festival
    September 17, 2023
    Noon to 6pm

    Call or Email Us ahead of time to reserve your packet!

  • Save Shellmounds Not Parking Lots

    Collage art of a shellmound with historic Alameda newspaper articles in the background, with the title words “Save Shellmounds Not Parking Lots”. Artwork by Gabriel Duncan.

    While these places may be on our traditional homelands, and within our tribal territories: Brownfields properties and Supferfund sites are neither appropriate, nor respectful gifts of atonement to the Indigenous People the entire Western Hemisphere was stolen from.

    It is a waste of resources for indigenous non-profiteers, like Corrina Gould, to focus primarily on post-industrial sites, like the place she alleges is the “West Berkeley Shellmound“.

    It is an improper use of our allies’ time, energy–and money–to have them marching around an empty parking lot, and futilely protesting an established and thriving shopping mall (Bay Street Emeryville).

    All of this takes away from the reality: Ohlone cultural resources in the San Francisco Bay Area are being destroyed by development at an alarming rate.

    Without intervention, Native American cultural resources, like shellmounds, and the fragile ecosystems they inhabit and have supported for over 10,000 years, will be destroyed. Paved over, without a second thought for anything other than their “fair market value”.

    Parking Lots and Abandoned Post-Industrial Spaces are not a priority; compared to Federal Recognition, Federal Land Grants, and the establishment of a Tribal Land-base and an official, recognized, Ohlone tribal reservation, and sovereign tribal territory.

    Urban Gardens do not address the Land Back movement in a relevant way.

    Cultural Easements—like the one proposed at Joaquin Miller Park, in Oakland, California—are not actually land back, and do not benefit the cause Corrina Gould (under the auspices of Sogorea Te Land Trust) purports to advocate for (all the while pretending to be the “tribal chairwoman” of a non-profit corporation posing as a bona fide tribal government.)

    In fact, PR events like the dedication of part of Joaquin Miller Park, in Oakland, and the renaming of a park in Alameda, are completely irrelevant to the actual cause of land back, rematriating the land, and the real priorities of bona fide tribal governments, like the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area–a tribe Corrina Gould would be a member of, if she weren’t so focused on personal gain, instead of advocating for her own tribe, and all Ohlone people.

    All of this only confuses the well-meaning public; and takes attention and purpose away from the legitimate means of land back, and the mechanisms which exist to attain justice, land, and equity for Ohlone people in the San Francisco Bay Area.

    As long as people realize their time and energy is better spent on an achievable goal, like Federal Re-Recognition & The Establishment of a Muwekma Land-base: Land Back is something we can see happen within our lifetimes.

    For more information on how you can help Ohlone people regain Federal Recognition, and get their Land Back, visit the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area’s website at: http://muwekma.org

  • Indigenous-Led Research Project Creates Restoration of Historical Landmarks (Shellmounds) in the San Francisco Bay Area

    The Alameda Native History Project project presents a map of the three Alameda Shellmounds, as seen by N.C. Nelson in 1907, restored and presented in the present-day landscape.

    For the first time ever, the Shellmounds of Alameda are being visualized, and presented as a physical, tangible land feature.

    The purpose of this map is to:

    1. Acknowledge that Alameda was a place were local Ohlone communities came to bury their loved ones;
    2. Illustrate the large size and scale of shellmounds, in general;
    3. Visualize a theoretical landscape where the Alameda Shellmounds were preserved;
    4. Fill the gaps made by Alameda Museum’s lack of accurate or meaningful information about the First Alamedans: Ohlone People.
    Alameda Shellmounds Webmodel

    https://nativehistoryproject.org/geo/alameda-shellmounds-webmodel/

    These restored historical land features, and this 3D map represent a milestone in the Alameda Native History Project’s research.

    But this is just a small piece of a larger story developing at the Alameda Native History Project. There’s more.

    Stay tuned.