Ecological landscapes designed, installed and cared for over time
We design and install landscapes using native plants, suited to your specific site.
But ecological landscapes need time to establish. Without ongoing care, even good installations fail. We stay involved—watching for problems early, adjusting as conditions change, and making sure your landscape actually works.
We serve the Haliburton Highlands and surrounding areas.
Gardening for life
Can we garden for nature as well as for ourselves?
Can we create landscapes built from native plants that have evolved with Ontario's insects, birds, and soils?
Can we work with how land actually behaves, rather than fighting it?
And can we leave our small patch of the planet a little better than we found it?
That's what gardening for life means here.
Why stewardship
Native plant gardens change. That's just how they work.
Plants compete, spread, self-seed, or fade back. Some thrive quickly. Others take years to show what they're capable of. The first seasons can look uncertain, but that uncertainty is the landscape finding its shape.
The work is to read what's changing—to know what's settling in, what needs help, and what to leave alone.
Stewardship is staying close enough to guide what's becoming.
Acting where it matters
With biodiversity under pressure worldwide, it's easy to feel overwhelmed.
One meaningful response is to act where you can: close to home, on the land you live with.
Native plant gardens and healthy shorelines provide real habitat, protect water, and reconnect people to place.
What makes the difference isn't perfection. It's care that continues.
How Grounded works
Every landscape is already doing something. The soil, the light, the water—they have a direction. Design works with that direction, not against it.
Grounded begins there: choosing native plants that suit the site's conditions and arranging them in dense, layered communities that can find their own balance.
Then comes the longer work. Returning season after season. Watching how the planting responds. Making adjustments as the land asks for them.
If you see land this way but can't be there month after month and season after season—Grounded is.
Get a free guide to natural gardens and shorelines
Fill out the form to get a free guide to creating natural gardens and shorelines in Haliburton County and surrounding areas, plus Grounded's popular newsletter.
"Great job on your newsletter! Well researched, fact based recommendations with excellent resources. Looking forward to more!" - Rita D.
What Grounded does
Design and installation
Native plant gardens, natural shorelines, lawn replacement, and restoration—interventions that create the conditions for native plants to succeed.
Ongoing stewardship
Returning to the same landscapes year after year. Observing, adjusting, reinforcing what's working, correcting what isn't.
These aren't separate services. The design creates the starting point. Stewardship is what makes it last.
Who's looking after your landscape
Care accumulates. So does neglect.
A landscape that's watched closely, year after year, develops differently than one left to chance. Knowledge of the site builds and small interventions compound.
Most gardens and shorelines don't struggle because they were designed poorly. They struggle because no one stayed.
Grounded stays. That's what you're hiring.
Who you'll be working with
My name is Simon Payn.
I work with native plants because they make sense—ecologically, practically, and aesthetically.
I'm interested in how plants behave in real conditions and how they interact over time.
Stewardship allows that understanding to build—and allows landscapes to improve rather than decline.
Education
University of Guelph: Naturalizing and Restoring Landscapes; Plant Identification
New Directions in American Landscapes: Ecology-based Landscape Practice
Kelly D Norris: New Naturalism Academy
Garden Masterclass: Naturalistic Planting Course with Noel Kingsbury, Nigel Dunnett and Cassian Schmidt.
The Living Landscape Guarantee
If we design and take care of your landscape, it will ask less of you as it establishes—and show more life over time.
If that’s not happening, that’s on us, and we stay with it until it is.
Examples of Grounded's Work
What Clients Say
"We get lots of compliments on our new native plant garden."
Leanne Tucker, Drag Lake
"We are very pleased with our native plant garden, and it continues to give us much pleasure. During this project, we appreciated how Simon always met his commitments to us; particularly with respect to design, budget, and installation. He always took the time to listen to our needs; responded promptly to any inquiries; and has made several follow-up visits after the garden was installed. Thank you, Simon, for a great experience and a wonderful new garden."
Scott and Marian Anderson, Kennisis Lake
From Our Blog
Biggest Haliburton Natural Garden Questions Answered
I was interviewed by Canoe FM for a new show that will be launched in January 2026. Here are my answers.
On hydro, roads, beavers… and you
Not all disturbance is bad. Here’s what we can learn from hydro, roads… and beavers.
Sunny landscapes that attract pollinators
If you’ve got a sunny site and you want to attract pollinators, follow this blueprint.
Get in touch
If you'd like to talk about Grounded gardens, please contact Simon Payn.
705-854-0663
Grounded
123 Maple Ave.
Box 261,
Haliburton, ON K0M 1S0
Get a free guide to natural gardens and shorelines
Fill out the form to get a free guide to creating natural gardens in Haliburton County and surrounding areas, plus Grounded's popular newsletter.
"Great job on your newsletter! Well researched, fact based recommendations with excellent resources. Looking forward to more!" - Rita D.