Restricting seed collecting to local populations is a common practice in restoration because it is assumed that most plants are

adapted to local environmental conditions. However, there is still considerable debate about whether local seed collection

should be the default seed-provenancing strategy as the effects of climate change are increasingly considered in restoration planning.

It is especially important to explore whether local seed provenance is necessary for dominant species used in restoration because the

success of these projects often rests on these species. Stipa pulchra is one such species that is commonly used in grassland restoration

projects in California. To explore how different seed-provenancing strategies affected the establishment and growth of S. pulchra, we

established three common garden experiments distributed across a latitudinal gradient in California. We collected seeds from seven

wild populations, germinated seeds in a common greenhouse, then planted all populations at the three common gardens.We assessed

growth and reproduction for 2 years. We found limited evidence that restricting seed sourcing to local populations increased the

establishment of S. pulchra compared to seeds from more distant populations. Instead, we found evidence to support the use of

regional admixture seed sourcing to increase resiliency to environmental variation. In particular, we found being sourced from a

dry location during the dry 2018 season was a benefit, highlighting the importance of including dry-adapted populations to increase

climate resilience. Our experiment highlights the importance of exploring multiple seed-provenancing methods when designing a

project to improve long-term success.