# Coyote Brush: an Easy Native

Coyote brush (Baccharis pilularis), is a very common native
plant in San Diego County, and much of California. It grows
as a bush with small medium-to-dark green leaves. Some
varieties grow over six feet tall, and some remain
relatively short.

As you might expect from a common native plant, Coyote Brush
is a real survivor in San Diego gardens, where the long dry
summers can kill a lot of traditional garden plants.

Coyote brush looks a little like boxwood, and I've had
success trimming it into a formal hedge. So if you want that
formal look without shelling out big bucks for constant
watering, then maybe give boxwood the boot and try Coyote
brush.

## Variation among varieties

The wild-growing plants that I've seen tend to get tall and
lose the leaves on the bottom half of the plant, so they
don't make a great hedge, but there are horticultural
varieties that do.

My favorite, for a low hedge is the *Pozo Surf* variety. It
gets to be about 3 feet tall and retains its leaves all
over. It's a tough, drought-tolerant plant that's easy to
care for, tolerates heavier watering (if near non-native
plants, for example), and seems to handle pruning and
trimming pretty well.

## A formal hedge from a native plant!?

Coyote brush is fairly easy to grow from cuttings, and I've
got a very long formal(ish) hedge of it in my backyard. The
hedge separates the gravel walking path from the planting
areas (mostly populated with other natives such as sage). I
don't keep the hedge meticulously trimmed or anything, so I
don't know if it holds up to that as well as boxwood does,
but I'm pretty happy with it.

I'd say, err on the wide side with this if you want to use a
hedge. The plant will naturally want to get to about three
feet tall and at least that wide, so instead of fighting it
all the time, I think a two or 2.5-foot wide hedge is 
probably the way to go. You'll have to trim it a lot less
often.

Most native-plant gardeners seem to be squarely in the
'natural-looking' camp, so you'll probably never see anyone
else using Coyote brush as a formal hedge. Such a thing is
practically anathema to them. But I like the look. I'm the
only person I know of who's tried this.

## Learn More

The greatest native-plant resource I know of is the
spectacular Las Pilitas Nursery site [1]. Las Pilitas used
to have an Escondido location, but that closed down a few
years ago. Now, I think they only have their Santa Margarita
location, but in San Diego, you can buy most of the
varieties that Las Pilitas offers from Moosa Creek Nursery
[2].

[1] https://www.laspilitas.com
[2] https://www.moosacreeknursery.com

The Las Pilitas website is especially informative and was a
great help in planning my garden.