I wanted to share my guerilla wetland garden in the L.A. River. In 1938 the river was paved into a concrete channel for the sake of flood control. The idea for this type of garden came to me when I saw a shopping cart in the water that was trapping sediment and had plants growing out of it and a heron hunting on it. The basic action here is just moving rocks into the water to create a variety of flow conditions. I also do a little bit of moving slime and plants from the surrounding area into the rocks. I'm not being overly picky about native versus invasive biomass because once it rains the entire thing gets washed out to the ocean. Thanks for checking out my work! These are the natives that have popped up so far:
Floating Primrose Willow
Water Speedwell
Giant Wild Rye
Gooding's Willow
Arroyo Willow
by Tarpit__
31 Comments
I guess it’s tough knowing it will be washed away, but, in the meantime, you’ve created something beautiful and helpful to wildlife.
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The most outside the box guerrilla gardening I have seen! Bravo!
Ok now this is badass
🏆🥇🏅
This is incredible! You rock!
This is a really cool idea and I think the result of your effort is quite beautiful. The people of r/ceanothus would love to see this.
Hi little frog 🐸 😍
DOPE
this is incredible youre so cool
cool af
Hey im crying that’s for putting some life back in there
Wow! This is cool, bad-ass, subversive, productive, and progressive. You’re awesome! I like your attitude of getting it started rather than waiting for it to be perfect, vis-à-vis natives. You rock!
I know that it was paved for flood control but sheer damage this type of activity and other development along the coast line like sea walls has done is insane.
this is the only rock stacking in waterbodies i support (outside of Indigenous people making fishing weirs etc)
Geez, this guy is out in the LA sun, gardening in the middle of the otherwise inhospitable concrete urban river while I’ve been completely neglecting my green, lush & comfortable backyard.
Good job stranger, seriously. Amazing work.
Love this thank you
Serious question, is this where Grease filmed the racing scene?
That aside I love what you’re doing and that little frog seems to like it too! Nice work!
That toad is so cool. Dude is in the middle of the second biggest city in America and has no idea
I love it! This is fantastic! It’s beautiful and good for the environment. It’s precisely the kind of work I want to see more of.
This is really cool and very inspiring. Both for your creativity and for your willingness to put progress over perfection. Thank you for doing it, and thank you for sharing.
This is tough 💪🏻 I appreciate your efforts 🔥
this is really lovely and brilliant
That’s awesome. The river wants to come back! Years ago when I lived in the Los Angeles there were places that had naturally started growing plants (even trees!) in the riverbed. I know there are people and groups that want to renaturalize the river as much as possible.
This is genius, except that floating primrose is extremely invasive. https://www.cal-ipc.org/plants/profile/ludwigia-peploides-profile/
But seriously, overall, amazing work!
🪿 please take this goose as an award
They should rip out all that concrete and let the creek be natural
Fantastic, love it! Beautiful, quixotic, sisyphean, life giving and sustaining. It reminds me of little islands I would create in the stream behind my house growing up, onto which I would transplant moss.
Incredible! I’ve always been freaked out by how toxic I imagine the LA River to be, especially after our January fires, so seeing life flourish is heartening. Do you wear any PPE or have a protocol for washing up after wading around?
Wow this is so awesome, good on you! Do you plan to do any more?
Love the inspiration story. “Life, uh. Finds a way.”
This is Awesome and immediately made me think of Terminator 2.