{"id":221791,"date":"2026-03-16T08:15:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T08:15:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/221791\/"},"modified":"2026-03-16T08:15:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T08:15:08","slug":"the-native-seed-farm-safeguarding-californias-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/221791\/","title":{"rendered":"The Native Seed Farm Safeguarding California’s Future"},"content":{"rendered":"

Only then do the specialists carefully propagate the seeds under controlled conditions to maintain genetic diversity, and finally, as Reynolds explains, it\u2019s an art to harvest the new seeds at precisely the right moment \u2014 sometimes within a 24-hour window \u2014 to ensure viability. Harvest too early and germination rates plummet. Too late, and the seed falls to the ground.<\/p>\n

Some species require hand harvesting. Others, including some varieties of milkweed critical to pollinators like monarch butterflies, can cost more than $1,000 per pound to produce. \u201cMilkweed actually is very expensive to amplify,\u201d Reynolds explains. \u201cBut we need it because if there is no milkweed, there are no monarch butterflies.\u201d<\/p>\n

Heritage Growers was created five years ago to address this systemic shortage. As a venture of River Partners, a nonprofit that has restored tens of thousands of acres of riparian habitat throughout California, the farm operates under a fundamentally different model than commercial seed producers and the network of small nonprofit growers. \u201cOur mission is to restore habitat for the benefit of people and the environment,\u201d Reynolds says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"A\"AAt first glance, Heritage Growers resembles any other working farm. Courtesy of Heritage Growers<\/p>\n

Growing its own supply allows the organization to plan ahead \u2014 cultivating native grasses, shrubs and wildflowers years in advance of when they\u2019ll be needed in the field. \u201cIn the past, River Partners was really at the mercy of the only other real supplier in California,\u201d Reynolds says. When a grant took three years to be awarded, he notes, \u201cthe cost of that seed has gone up substantially \u2026 and there\u2019s not the money available anymore.\u201d Heritage Growers changes that calculus. The farm currently produces more than 30,000 to 40,000 pounds across up to 200 different seed varieties every year. That makes it one of only three large-scale native seed growers in the state, and the only nonprofit. And yet, the output is still far from enough.<\/p>\n

California is widely recognized as one of the world\u2019s most important biodiversity hotspots, supporting thousands of endemic plant and animal species, more than any other US state. However, California\u2019s Biodiversity Initiative<\/a> notes that its wetlands, riparian woodlands and forests have \u201csuffered extensive losses,\u201d with \u201can estimated 80\u201390 percent\u201d of its biologically diverse landscapes altered or lost in the past 150 years. Development, agriculture, invasive species, climate change and increasingly intense wildfires are among the culprits. Reestablishing native vegetation is crucial to reversing those trends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Only then do the specialists carefully propagate the seeds under controlled conditions to maintain genetic diversity, and finally,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":221792,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,1959,26553],"class_list":["post-221791","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-conservation","tag-native-plants"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221791","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=221791"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221791\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/221792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=221791"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=221791"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=221791"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}