Native Plants: Fall blooming Coyote Brush covering Sonoma County landscapes

Bushy and leathery-leaved, ubiquitous to sunny spaces from coastal scrub to chaparral and foothill woodlands, coyote brush is so common it may disappear from our focus.

It is shaped by its habitat, from a low undulating form on the windblown coast to an upright 8-foot-tall shrub inland.

Its wavy evergreen leaves have a waxy coating that protects them from moisture loss and renders the plant fire resistant.

Coyote brush is one of the most important fall-blooming native plants for supporting insects and birds. This is a good time to scrutinize it closely.

It’s dioecious, with male and female flowers held on separate plants. White fuzzy-flowered female plants vastly outnumber the yellow-flowered males.

The plants’ abundant blooms contain copious amounts of pollen or nectar and are heavily visited by honeybees, parasitic wasps and predatory and parasitic flies such as Syrphid and Tachinids. Syrphid flies have yellow and black markings and are bee mimics. Their grub-like larvae are predatory.

Tachinid flies are parasitoids, gray or brown and often hideously bristly. The eggs are laid on or in a host, frequently a caterpillar.

The larvae develops inside the host, ultimately killing it. Adult parasitic wasps feed on nectar, and honeybees collect nectar from female plants and pollen from male plants. Fall is an important time for honeybees to stock up on pollen and nectar before winter really sets in.

Coyote brush is also an important shrub for birds to perch and nest in, and to feed on the seeds.

Wrentits and white-crowned sparrows are common residents.

Kate Frey’s Native Plants column appears once a month in Sonoma Outdoors. Contact her at katebfrey@gmail.com.