The Garden at Lucas House
About the project
In December 2022 I completed a course with the University of Guelph on naturalizing and restoring landscapes. My final project was a proposal to create a natural native plant garden at Lucas House, in Haliburton, Ontario. Introduction Lucas House is a Century home in the centre of Haliburton, Ontario. It is co-owned by myself and…
Updates
Haliburton Deer: Lessons and Hope From the Garden at Lucas House
Haliburton deer and gardens: it seems like they’ll never get along. But maybe there’s a way embrace our hungry friends.
The Great Haliburton Used Plant Pot Drive
Do you have empty plant pots you want to get rid of? Don’t just throw them away or put them in the recycling – they can be re-used! Find out how.
Happy first birthday to the garden at Lucas House
The garden at Lucas House celebrated its first birthday last week. Here’s an update of where it’s at. And where I’m at in relation to it.
Wakey, wakey! Native plants in spring
With the early end to winter, it seems spring has taken a long time to get going. That feels especially true to impatient old me at Lucas House, Grounded’s native plant demonstration garden in Haliburton village. But things are happening. And they’ll ramp up as we go through May. It’s a nail-biting time in the…
Leave the dead plant stems!
With this scarily warm weather we’ve been having, it’s tempting to get out there and do a bit of tidying up in the garden. Please wait!
Planting the part-shaded garden
As you’ll see from the images, I planted the matrix grasses in a grid pattern. This will make it easier to see what is grass and what is weeds. Then I planted the forbs in the gaps. You’ll see some of the grasses are starting to go into dormancy by late September. Fingers crossed they’ll…
Removing the grass (take 2)
I rented my good friend Ryan, the sod-cutting machine, again. I didn’t need it as long this time as the areas is smaller, less bumpy and I know what I am doing. I was able to remove the grass and stack it up in a couple of days.
Now on to Phase 2
Planting in the fall can work too, so I decided to go ahead with planting the rest of the garden: the part-shaded part to the north of the building. I did things a little differently: primarily, I planted more densely by creating a matrix on 12-inch centres of three types of grasses. Within this matrix,…
Still work, but good work
My mentor Benjamin Vogt linked to an article in the Wall Street Journal today. In that article was a quote by another of my mentors, Kelly Norris: Kelly Norris, U.S.-based author of the book “New Naturalism: Designing and Planting a Resilient Ecologically Vibrant Home Garden,” helps clients move into the aesthetic by first redefining what…
The Garden in September
August was a month of weeding. The crabgrass started to flower, which made it easy to get rid of it. I think I’m keeping the weeds under control – enough. Highlights as of September 1:
The plants
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