Inside this edition of Natural Garden News

• Letting go
• If you want a Grounded garden…
• Native plants to solve thorny problems
• How to create your own cottage ‘savanna’
• New here? Start with these articles
• Today’s recommended reading
• Today’s VIP (Very Important Plant)
• A look at some client landscapes
• What’s happening at Lucas House?
• Sedging your bets

I hope you enjoy the newsletter! If you have any questions or feedback, please reply to this email.

Simon Payn
Grounded
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Email: hello@groundedgardens.ca​
Web: groundedgardens.ca​

Letting go

I made a visit to one of my clients the other day. Their shoreline was naturalizing nicely.

Funny thing is… I didn’t work on their shoreline. I’d planted their septic bed, the other side of their home.

In their smiles and in their relaxed attitude, I saw that they understood the power of what we’re doing here at Grounded.

Instead of mowing to the water’s edge, they’d allowed the Sweet Gale shrubs to grow. “I’m just letting it go,” said one of the homeowners with a relaxed smile.

He pointed towards a neighbour mowing his lawn on that hot and sunny day. “At least I’m not doing that!”

And did they like their septic bed (which was going gangbusters)? It look a bit of getting used to, they said, but, yes, they like it. “I just love the bright yellow of the Coreopsis,” said the other homeowner.

This is how you become a Lake Legacy Leader. You allow yourself to break the shackles of conformity, which says our landscape needs fit certain parameters (and makes your cottage look like suburbia in the forest.)

This is better for the land, better for the lake and, as my clients’ relaxed attitude showed, better for you, too.

Simon
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If you want a Grounded garden… I’m currently booking garden and shoreline installs for 2025 and 2026. My pipeline is filling up, but I still have some space for summer and fall installations. We start by having a quick call to see if it makes sense for me to come look at your site. ​ Learn more To see some of my recent work, please see this page.

Native plants to solve thorny problems Some garden plants are useful. But they can also do more harm than good. Here are some native alternatives. Read more.​

How to create your own cottage ‘savanna’ How to use native plants to enhance the view to the lake. Read more.​

New here? Start with these articles

Today’s recommended reading

Mowtown? Here’s some magnificent eye-candy: the garden in Detroit designed by the legendary Piet Oudolf. Read more.

Test beds: An experiment in creating a meadow. It’s actually a very similar approach to the one we use. Read more.

#PlantTheRain: An example of roadside rainwater harvesting. I love how it uses something that would normally be washed away. Read more.​

Natural maverick: More natural garden eye-candy. This time from over in England. Read more.

Dancing with nature: A super landscape in Ontario – and I love the approach to weeds in the caption to this post. Read more.

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Today’s VIP (Very Important Plant)

I’ve put together some information “cards” about native plants. These are plants I use in my designs.

Today let’s look at Cylindrical Blazingstar

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A look at some client landscapes

What’s happing at Lucas House?

I’m still battling deer (and rabbits), but I’m starting to win the war of attrition. The deer like eating flower buds. But the more plants you have, the more buds there are… and they can’t get to them all.

I installed a device that shoots jets of water to scare deer.
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It scares people, too.

Sedging your bets

In the last newsletter, I talked about shade gardens. Here’s an example of what they could look like. Indeed, it was the designer of this, Benjamin Vogt, who first taught me about sedge meadows. More pictures here.

Thank you for reading!

Simon

Email: hello@groundedgardens.ca​
Web: groundedgardens.ca​
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