M A R <br />19581Fircrest Dr. <br />Oct. 15, 2013 <br />Becky Taylor, Associate Planner <br />Eugene Planning & Development <br />99 W. 10" Ave. <br />Eugene, OR 97401 <br />C 0 N L <br />Eugene Oregon 97403 <br />RE: Oakleigh Meadow Co-housing Development <br />UPDATED PLANT LETTER <br />Document 3 of 6 <br />Dear Ms. Taylor: <br />E Y <br />Following this page is the updated plant list. I added some columns devoted to plant zones. Plants found <br />in these zones are so indicated on the relative column. <br />A disclaimer is that there has not been a year or two of full seasons to identify ephemeral plants that may <br />not be apparent at this time. One of them could be the lovely fluorescent-ultraviolet-blue Delphinium <br />trolifolium that grace the shady bike path boundaries about the time the university bells toll their <br />graduation tune. There could be rare, threatened, and endemic species here such as Willamette Daisy. <br />Who knows if there's a Kincaid's Lupine or two and an associated refugia population of Fender's Blue <br />Butterflies clinging to these hosts. <br />An observation I make is that not only are there individual plants as per the list, but also whole landscape- <br />habitats (also could be considered zones). We get so keyed on cliche wetland and wetland mitigation, or <br />trees only while not honoring shrubs and groundcovers as just as important. There are many others, some <br />unique to just this site. People don't think in terms of this, methinks. An example is the spacious <br />grassland, dubbed a meadow, which has a north-south soil trail intersecting it. Its generous horizontal. <br />scale - all of it, both sides of the trail - is required to be proportionate to the lovely towering vertical <br />Cottonwood wall to the east, which of its members forms another habitat-landscape. <br />An ecologist would say I am not using the right scientific terms. Who cares?!!! The aesthetic concept is <br />there, true, and real. People understand it intuitively, subliminally. I am bringing it to conscious level by <br />stating it. The terms I give it are not as important as its inherent aesthetic beauty, value, and healing <br />qualities are. <br />Another landscape not talked about, and I did not have the time and mental energy to address it, is the <br />historic remnant orchards and plantings by others long ago. Several of these are magnificent grand old <br />specimens such as the giant apple tree just south of the property in the undeveloped area. There are other <br />remnant isolated orchard and old-fashioned landscape plants in this entire area that speak a lovely <br />language of a bygone era that is part of the charm of this area, and impact the proposed development in <br />particular. They could be irrevocably lost if not talked about and honored, if not preserved, salvaged, <br />planted, and repeated on site. <br />625 <br />