This duo scatters native flowers round San Francisco

“Seeds are nature’s magic trick,” Shalaco shares as we stroll down 24th Street in the Mission, seed and rice hull-filled parmesan cheese shakers in hand. We’re sprinkling seeds into tree planters, and can already see nature’s magic coming to fruition, with greenery and blooms popping up from previous scattering sessions.

This is part of a daily routine for Shalaco (who goes by the mononym professionally) and his fiancée, Phoenix (who declined to share her last name). Together, they are SFinBloom, a TikTok account with more than 200,000 followers and a shared mission to “normalize planting native wildflowers.” This duo isn’t using the standard tools to get the job done — they’re riding Onewheels around San Francisco, dressing like bees and using parmesan shakers and toy guns to scatter their seeds, including local plants like white yarrow, farewell to spring, lupine, baby blue eyes, poppies and more.

SFinBloom’s work is visually entertaining (Shalaco runs a creative production studio), but it’s also based on a deep knowledge of gardening and native plants. Phoenix has almost 20 years of gardening experience in the Bay Area and owns and operates Green Earth Gardeners, a sustainable garden and landscape design company.

So how did this all get started?

“I thought to myself, the world’s on fire, how can I make a difference? Well, I can increase biodiversity locally to support pollinators — namely bees.” Shalaco told me recently on our wildflower scattering run.

Much of the world’s nutrition is pollinated by honeybees.

@shalaco, courtesy of Shalaco Studios

Greenpeace says 70 of the top 100 food crops are pollinated by bees, and there’s been a near 60% decline in honeybees between 1947 and 2008. In short, bees equal food and food equals life, so flowers aren’t just for beauty — they ‘re a matter of existential importance for the planet and its inhabitants.

SFinBloom plants mostly in public spots, like street medians and tree planters. (Watch them sprinkle around Lake Merced, for example.) The pair lives in the Mission, and one of their favorite spots to sprinkle is on 24th Street, where we walked together on a recent evening.

When 31 ficus trees were cut down on the street in 2021, Shalaco and Phoenix were saddened by the loss of the historic plants. Shaking wildflower seeds in the beds where trees had been cut down eased some of the pain.

“Greenery is starting to come up everywhere — and the blooms will be next,” said Shalaco. “The shallow roots of native annual wildflowers interplant well with the deep-rooted trees.”

When I ask if what they’re doing is legal, Shalaco shares a video of him shaking seeds at the Mission police station. He also said, “I think there’s a better question: ‘How do you encourage responsible planting?'” (The Department of Public Works, which did not want to be quoted for this story, hinted that it’s within the bounds of the law. )

In general, SFinBloom does have some suggested guidelines to follow if you’d like to start planting yourself. Do look for freshly turned soil. Don’t plan on someone else’s lawn. Don’t plant in a bed where a tree might just be getting established or where there is already a planting program, like in state or national parks.

Plant with intentionality and ask yourself, “Is this the right plant in the right space?” and “Is this going to detract from or be invasive to the environment?”

Shalaco said, “If nothing’s there and you get something to grow and thrive, and it’s not pushing out the native ecology, you’ve made an improvement.”

SFinBloom’s information is packaged up into snappy social media posts, and the word has gotten out. Shalaco and Phoenix have received comments and questions on how to replicate what they’re doing — plus reaction videos — “from every continent except for Antarctica,” Shalaco said. Back here in the US, some were inspired to pass out toy guns filled with seeds at their wedding instead of throwing rice.

SFinBloom’s mission is to democratize gardening and normalize planting native wildflowers.

Courtesy Shalaco Studios

And SFinBloom has also taken their message to professionals. They’ve run corporate offsites, have been invited to talk with beekeeping associations and UC Davis and have even traveled to Maui to volunteer at Kipuka Olowalu Cultural Reserve, interviewing the organizers about sustainable land practices and amplifying their message.

In the future, they said they want to work with businesses and the city government to organize events and invite people to plan in neglected places that need love and attention. Working with the government, for example, look like the city or Caltrans might encourage medians to be planted with a percentage of native pollinators and beneficial plants (you can visit an example pollinator median on Dolores Street). Phoenix said, “We want to reach out and work with civic groups and existing organizations and get the community involved to collaborate on and promote new and existing programs.”

The duo reminds me that seeds are the cheapest way to get into plants, and shaking some seeds takes just a few seconds. It can have an addictive quality as I learned on my walk with them, but they also reminded me to be patient: Plants can take time to sprout.

“People often think of reasons why they can’t garden and give all sorts of excuses. They say, ‘I don’t have time to garden, I don’t have money. I don’t have enough space,’” Shalaco said. “The reality is you can make plants work for you. And we are here to show people how to do that. People want to help the world; they’re just not sure how. We came up with a simple way to do that.”

If you want to join the movement, check out SFinBloom’s website for some seed starter kits, to take classes on converting your lawn to a habitat garden or to join their mailing list to take part in an upcoming community planting event.