Conventional wisdom does, indeed, say plant California natives in fall.

But that was based on the idea that fall rains kicked native mycorrhizal fungi into gear and they, in turn, kicked the growth of in situ natives into gear.

Newly planted plants, especially those put into the artifical conditions of a home garden, don't have that mycorrhizal connection yet.

Planting plants in late January-early February seems to be better thinking. This assumes that we've had SOME rain to soak the ground (not guaranteed in fall) and that we can assume more rain soon thereafter (seeing that late Jan-early Feb is our rainest period, on average). This also takes into account that Jan-Feb is our coolest time and does not present the potential of undue heat stress associated with fall (especially those dang Santa Anas in So. Cal.).

I'm a firm believer in Right Place, Right Plant, Right Time. I do my darndest to plant when the season is right for the plant to be planted. So I stick with planting natives in Jan-Feb.

As for watering natives -- and pretty much anything else -- I create a situation whereby soaking/flooding is suitable. I usually build berms -- just outside the drip line of the plant) -- on planting and fill the berms with LOTS of water every few days to get the plants established. If it's an actual irrigation system, I recommend pop-up bubblers.

Where conditions don't allow for soaking-flooding, I go to sprinklers. New technology sprinklers don't spray a lot of water into the air where it blows away or evaporates too quickly.

Drip is the least EFFECTIVE way to get native plants established and to train them to be extensively-rooted, drought tolerant plants. They're common/popular but not because they're good in watering appropriately. Bert Wilson also talks about drip irrigation on his Las Pilitas website.

Joe

You are about the same as me inland valleys. I plant in the fall in October. I have planted natives in spring and fall and I feel they do better when planted in the fall.
Las Pilitas has missed us I guess. If I were you, use the same guidelines as the central valley, it's closer than anything else.
Theodore Payne did tell me spring was better. Due to watering needs fall is better I think. Most of mine are on a slope so I do what Joe said about building berms around them and drag the hose to them twice a week for the first year when rain isn't sufficient.
Jan-Feb should be good also like Joe said but I get frost here so too cold.

When I plant natives, I usually do it after Thanksgiving and before March. I've found that they do much better and it usually takes much of the guesswork out of watering when planted at those times, and as stated above, much less heat stress. Not to mention that IF we've had rain, the soil is much easier to dig.....

I think the current received wisdom is you can actually plant them any time if you're attentive to their needs, but I like wanda's idea--late enough so that there's already been some rain and the ground isn't rock-hard, but early enough that Mother Nature does a little of the watering for you.

I have California native plants in my front yard. I'm in Walnut, right next door to Pomona, and probably in the same zone. Being no experts on gardening, DH and I plant them whenever we find them. We do water them more when newly planted but once they're settled in, our preferred irrigation system for the natives is whatever rain they get. Works like a charm here. We love the redbud tree, and may plant a few of them on our backyard slope when we get around to it. We have coyote bush, sage, manzanita, matilija poppy, and a some others whose names escape me at the moment. Linda

Like Linda I plant them when I find them.

I've planted Cleveland sage in the spring and it's done very well for me.

This spring I planted some more along with Penstemon, Cal Fuschia, Calliandra and another Matilija Poppy. I have sharp drainage so I give them a good soaking once a week. So far they look like they're happy.

A watering method I happened on recently is laying soaker hoses in my flower beds on a permanent basis and giving the beds a good soaking once a week. I first discovered the method when I ran a 75 footer outside my fence to water a hedge because I was too lazy to always be dragging the garden hose over the fence to water it. For a couple years it seemed like the plants put there grew slowly. With the soaker now they're taking off.

I don't know if that qualifies as drip irrigation but it seems to work for me. I have not put a hose in the native/cactus bed. I think it would be too much water at a time.

Many native plants in the nursery are now flowering, so you can see what you are buying. I have had past success with buying the plant in summer, then holding it in it's container until just before the rain starts in the winter. I kept several one-gallon plants in an area of dappled sun or just an hour or two of sun a day and they did fine until I planted them. Also, only water when the container is almost completely dry.

Good luck!

I've planted natives at various times, but had the best success from mid-Nov to mid-Feb. I agree with gardenguru that they get the best start when the soil is workably moist and that occasional flooding of the bed is the preferred watering method. I will say that transplanting from container into clay soils when it is too wet is a good way to kill or stunt them, as the roots won't have any air spaces if the planting hole turns into a goopy, muddy mess.

Anytime can theoretically work, but it's definitely more difficult during the dry season. Many natives are very sensitive to transplanting stress, which is greater if you're transplanting them in the summer heat. If you plant any natives in the summer, I recommend planting them at night, so the roots aren't exposed to quite as much heat during the transplanting process.

Planting them during the very end of the wet season can also cause problems, because the plants may not have time to get their roots out before the summer drought sets in. I planted a silver bush lupine this past March, and it grew a foot, produced a flower spike, then shriveled up in May and hasn't recovered, despite the fact that I'm now watering it considerably more than before. (It's not actually dead so far, but it looks terrible, and I don't know whether it will survive or not.) My other silver bush lupine, planted in January, is still perfectly healthy - probably because it had more time to get its roots out before the summer.

A lot of natives are also prone to die from overwatering, especially in the summer, so I think it's much safer to try to plant natives early in the wet season and let them get their roots out before summer, rather than planning to give them extra water during the summer to keep them alive when they're newly planted.

I've had most success, with most confidence in their survival, planting natives in fall-winter. For me the ideal time has been early to mid-December. We are most likely (Temecula) to get serious rain starting in December, though some years it has come earlier, and we even had a heavy, soaking rain in late October several years ago. But that was an all-time record. I'm trying to allow maximum time for root growth before the plants decide it's time to flower. Now, it's true, I've planted things even in summer, but they're more apt to fail, and they require constant vigilance to get them through the 100 degree days. My most discouraging incident (having just now, at long last, dumped a pot that I vainly hoped would spring back to life) was a Dendromecon rigida (bush poppy) that I bought at a plant sale in San Diego last October. It was rather expensive, too, and I felt fortunate to get the last one. The thing didn't even last long enough in the pot to plant a month later. This species grows abundantly in a locale near me, but I was warned that they're fussy in captivity, and so it turned out to be for me. I hold in awe Tree-of-Life Nursery, who supplied the plant, and who are able propagate and bring to market this species.

BTW, has anybody here had success propagating Salvia pachyphylla?

I've not had luck with D. rigida either. D. harfordii is much more amenable to 'captivity.' I have a huge harfordii in my back yard that's been there for about 6 or 7 years.