If you’re out hiking this time of year, you may have noticed an explosion of bright red berries all along the Santa Monica Mountains and San Gabriel Foothills. It’s a nice burst of color at a time ...

Toyon is a common tree in the hills around the San Gabriel and San Fernando valleys and in the Angeles National Forest to the north. It’s found throughout the California chaparral regions. The leaves ...

Every other week, Patrice Hanlon, garden manager at Walnut Creek’s Gardens at Heather Farm, writes about plants in the garden that grow well in the fertile Bay Area. October’s light intensifies the ...

It is a wonderful thing when plants are able to decorate themselves for the holidays, with bright red berries against deep green foliage. This is one of the appealing features of the Toyon, a ...

This is a great year for toyon berries. Toyon, Heteromeles arbutifolia, is our California native holly. So convincing is its impersonation - at least by the standards of early European immigrants here ...

The holly, with its prickly green leaves and bright red berries, is often used as decoration this time of year. There’s a similar native plant called the California holly, also known as Toyon. That’s ...