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Ericaceae family

Alameda Manzanita Arctostaphylos pallida

Native Specialist-bee host
Early-season nectar — Flowers in a late-winter / early-spring window when few other plants in our catalog bloom — valuable early forage for pollinators (relative to our catalog's bloom coverage).

Alameda Manzanita is a perennial shrub native to the lower 48 states. It blooms Jan – Mar. A host for pollen-specialist native bees.

More about this plant

Arctostaphylos pallida, commonly known as pallid manzanita, Oakland Hills manzanita, and Alameda manzanita, is an upright manzanita shrub from the Ericaceae, or heath family. It is endemic to the eastern San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. Wikipedia →

Growing & care

USDA PLANTS · TRY
Conditions
Sources · Conditions
Cold hardiness (derived) — Hardiness
Hardiness
≥ zone 11 derived from its U.S. range
Size & form
Sources · Size & form
USDA PLANTS — Lifespan
TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0) — Foliage
Lifespan
Perennial
Foliage
Evergreen broadleaf
In the garden
Shrub layer — Sits in the shrub of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →
derived roles
The garden year bloom → fruit → fall colour
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Bloom
Bloom (the flower's colour)
Bloom · Jan – Mar — 26 obs · Herbarium specimens — Park et al. 2023 (CC BY 4.0)
Species characteristics from USDA PLANTS (public domain) + TRY (CC BY) — general guidance, not a guarantee for your exact site. Deer "browsing" is documented palatability, not a deer-proof claim.

Wildlife & pollinators

How pollinator value is scored →
❧ Caterpillar hosts ~17 caterpillar species

Arctostaphylos supports ~17 caterpillar species.

Native butterfly & moth caterpillars are the base of the terrestrial food web — most songbirds rear their young almost entirely on them. As a host for native Lepidoptera this is a moderate genus.

Recorded feeding on Arctostaphylos in North America, including:

Acronicta perdita · owlet moth Aethaloida packardaria · geometer (inchworm) moth Amorbia cuneanum · leafroller moth Amphipyra pyramidoides · Copper Underwing Anacamptodes clivinaria · Mountain Mahogany Looper Anarta cordigera · owlet moth
+ 8 more species →
Ancylis comptana · leafroller moth Antaeotricha manzanitae · concealer moth Apharetra californiae · owlet moth Argyrotaenia franciscana · Orange Tortrix Aseptis ethnica · owlet moth Aseptis fumeola · owlet moth Aseptis perfumosa · owlet moth Automeris cecrops · Cecrops Eyed Silkmoth
Keystone count (genus-level) from Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use records. Named species (a documented Nearctic sample, not exhaustive) from NHM HOSTS (CC0).
✦ Bees specialist-bee host · 1 bee visitor

Specialist native bees depend on it.

Some native bees are pollen specialists (oligolectic) — they raise young only on pollen from particular plant genera. Arctostaphylos is a recorded specialist-bee host, so losing it can mean losing the bee that relies on it.

Xerces pollinator conservation →

1 native & managed bee species is documented visiting Alameda Manzanita :

Bombus melanopygus · Black Tail Bumble Bee
Specialist hosts from Smith et al. 2024. Visitor records (observations, not exhaustive) from Noori et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0) · GloBI →
Wildlife & visitors 1 bird · 1 nectaring

Open records of who else uses Alameda Manzanita — a generalist food-web signal, kept separate from the keystone Ecological Value.

Recorded eaten by 1 bird species (fruit, seed, browse):

Calypte anna · Anna's Hummingbird

1 adult butterfly & moth species is recorded nectaring at its flowers:

Vanessa atalanta · Red Admiral
Interaction records (observations, not exhaustive) from GloBI → (CC0). Counts are distinct species; names are the most-recorded. Common names from Wikidata (CC0).
Species thumbnails re-hosted from iNaturalist — Creative Commons, credited per image (hover for credit). Click any species to see it on iNaturalist. Not exhaustive; many taxa have no openly-licensed photo yet.
How we know this (1) Methods & honest limits
Photosynthesis Direct fact

A recorded categorical fact: each species is tagged C3 (standard), C4 (heat/water-efficient) or CAM (succulent, night-time CO₂ uptake) — or a facultative combination. We only show a trait card for the noteworthy C4/CAM cases; C3 is the unremarkable majority, kept in the data but not surfaced as a card.

Kattge, J. et al. TRY plant trait database — Categorical Traits Dataset (2012).
Derived values are computed from open data by a published method — labelled, cited, and never shown as a direct observation. Full methodology →
Sources for this entry (21) Open & cited
[01] Scientific name & family — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[02] Growth habit & duration — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[03] Native status & distribution — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[04] Common name — USDA PLANTS (via GBIF)
[05] Invasive / introduced status — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — native status
[07] Description — Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
[08] Ecological value — Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts · Smith et al. 2024 (CC BY)
[10] Conservation rank — NatureServe Explorer (CC BY)
[11] Federal ESA status — USFWS ECOS (U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service)
[13] Functional traits — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[14] Photosynthetic pathway — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[15] Cold hardiness (derived) — Derived from U.S. range × USDA PHZM zones
[16] Wildlife & visitors — GloBI — Global Biotic Interactions (CC0)
[18] Flower-visitor value (derived) — Noori et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0) · GloBI
[19] Caterpillar host count — Warren II 2026 (Dryad, CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts
[20] Caterpillar species — NHM HOSTS (CC0)
[21] County range — GBIF Open Data — open-licensed occurrences (CC0/CC-BY) → county
Spot an error or have a better photo? Every field links to its source, and the whole dataset is open.
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PlantKey’s data is open under CC BY-SA 4.0 — free to reuse and adapt, with attribution and the same licence. Photos keep their own per-image licence + credit (see Sources above).

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