A Little Italy-Palmerston Backyard Garden Cleanup

Revealing Potential for a Toronto Pollinator Garden?

It seems that with every garden cleanup ("rescue" is a better word for this post as you'll see later) I complete, that question comes to mind. It was certainly the case with this project I finished for a client in the central Toronto area of Little Italy/Palmerston. The backyard garden bed was hidden by weeds, Virginia Creeper and an overgrown rose but once I tidied up things, I easily imagined the garden full of colour and life.

But here are some "before" pictures showing the overgrown garden bed and lawn:

Little Italy Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup Before

Little Italy Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup Before

Palmerston Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup Before

Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup Before in Little Italy 

Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup Before in Little Italy 

Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup Before in Palmerston 

Afterwards....

And here are some "after" pictures, post weeding and pruning:

Little Italy Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup After 

Little Italy Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup After 

Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup After in Little Italy

Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup After in Little Italy 

Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup After in Little Italy 

Toronto Backyard Garden Cleanup After in Palmerston

The bed is quite deep in certain areas so there's potential (that word again) to fill this bed with many flower-bearing native and non-native perennials and shrubs, given it faces south and east and receives full sun for part of the day.

Alas, it's a rental property (which may explain the state of things before I was hired) and the odds that weeds will reappear and re-establish are high. But I've given the owner and tenants a blank slate so the ball is in their court, to mix metaphors.

Big Time Weeding in Little Italy

Or "There's A Front Yard in There, Somewhere!"

At the end of every work season, I reflect back on some of nicer gardens I've worked in and some of the, well, not so nice. You may know some yards or gardens of the latter variety on your street; heck, you may even own one. That's o.k., I'm not here to judge but some cleanup jobs for me are simply more onerous than others due to the garden's size and amount of weeds, debris, etc. Occasionally, I'll just advise the prospective client that the scope of work is beyond what I can do and to hire someone else. There may be an awkward pause but it's better for me to walk away from this kind of project than take it on, find I'm overwhelmed and do a less than perfect job.

This post covers a recent cleanup I didn't walk away from (although when I first saw  the garden, I was tempted to!)

The owners of this property in Toronto's trendy Little Italy area didn't do much maintenance for their front yard this season, it's safe to say. The somewhat rectangular area is about 20 feet wide by 60 feet long and, more or less, covered with clumps of mature goldenrod, Yellow Avens, sow thistle, aster, burdock and lemon balm (all perennial weeds). Whatever remaining grass is overgrown and patchy.

They hired me to "tidy up" things so here are some pictures showing how the front yard looked like before and after my efforts:

Toronto Little Italy Front Garden Cleanup Before

Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup Before

The view from the sidewalk

Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup Before

Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup Before 

From the sidewalk, you may see the overgrown clumps of grass, sucker shoots from the base of the small maple tree, four mock orange shrubs and impressive stands of goldenrod and asters. What's not visible are several very-much-alive stumps of Siberian Elm (weed trees which were cut down in the past) and lots of thistles.

Mockorange shrubs in the forefront, 
goldenrods and asters behind them 

Toronto Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup Before

Above is the view leading 
towards the front door

And the view looking from the 
front door towards the street 
(Photo credit: picture taken by the clients) 

7 Hours Later....

How do you eat an elephant? Take one bite at a time, as the saying goes. In a severe clean up situation like this one, I start cutting down the stalks and leave the roots alone temporarily. Once all the vegetation above ground has been cut and carried away, I'll go in with my long handled shovel and start digging out entire root balls. All the mature weeds are perennials so just leaving them with their tops pruned looks nice but, of course, ineffective with dealing with them on a long term basis.

Fortunately, the weather was nice, dry and cool. Tackling this in the middle of July would not be fun!

Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup After 

Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup After

Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup After 

Little Italy Toronto Fall Front Garden Cleanup After 

Toronto Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup After 

Toronto Little Italy Fall Front Garden Cleanup After

Toronto Little Italy Front Garden Cleanup After 

Toronto Little Italy Front Garden Cleanup After

A Palmerston-Little Italy Front and Back Garden Cleanup

An autumn weeding project in downtown Toronto

It's mid-October and finally the feeling of autumn is here in Toronto. We've had above normal temperatures so far this month but it looks like more seasonal weather is here to stay. For the next month and a half, I'll likely be very busy again with fall cleanups, i.e., raking leaves, cutting down perennials and tidying up gardens. But this latest post covers my most recent project of pure weed removal!

The client rents out the house (located in Toronto's central neighbourhood called Palmerston-Little Italy) so the tenants naturally ignore the gardens' maintenance. I find in these scenarios, there comes a point often where the homeowner/s feel the need to do something with their neglected property in order to prevent complaints and attract new tenants; hence, I get hired!

The project was broken into two stages: the small front yard and bigger backyard:

Palmerston Little Italy Front Yard Garden Cleanup before 

Above is the front area of the garden adjacent to the sidewalk. The bed is mulched, thankfully, but is quickly being overwhelmed by the Creeping Charlie weed ( Glechoma hederacea aka ground ivy) invading from the right neighbour's garden which is not maintained at all. I also had to prune back the several scarlet firethorn (Pyracantha coccinea) shrubs away from the path leading to the house. The orange-red berries are on full display now but the shrubs are a real pain, literally, to work around due to their ferocious spines (thorns). 

Palmerston Little Italy Back Yard Garden Cleanup before

The second part of the weeding work involves the backyard beds as shown above and below. I'm certain no weeding occurred this year so, not surprisingly, the beds were choked with foxtail weed, goldenrod, more ground ivy and 3 weed tree saplings. The patio pavers also needed to be weeded and swept and the wisteria trimmed.

Palmerston Little Italy Toronto Back Yard Garden Cleanup before 

Little Italy Palmerston Toronto Back Yard Garden Cleanup before

Palmerston Little Italy Toronto Back Yard Garden Clean up before 

Little Italy Palmerston  Toronto Back Yard Cleanup before 

And afterwards...

Palmerston Little Italy Front Yard Garden Cleanup after 

Not much of a retaining wall as shown above, just a strip of plastic edging. The mulch does help reduce the amount of weeds germinating but offers no protection from the ground ivy which has taken over the right neighbour's front area.

Palmerston Little Italy Back Yard Garden Cleanup after 

I suggested to the client to at least put down a few bags of mulch to reduce the weeds, even if she doesn't want to add new plants. Otherwise, we'll be revisiting the same situation a year from now.

Palmerston Little Italy Toronto Back Yard Garden Cleanup after 

Little Italy Palmerston Toronto Back Yard Garden Cleanup after 

Removing the root balls of the several large maple and tree of heaven saplings in the narrow area above was quite a task!

Little Italy Palmerston  Toronto Back Yard Cleanup after

Palmerston Little Italy Toronto Back Yard Garden Clean up after

And finally here's the picture of the weeded paver area leading to the back laneway parking space. I dare not show you this area. That would require a separate session to deal with the monstrous weeds growing back there!

Bad Weeds? You Bet Your Grass!

A Garden Rescue in Toronto's Little Italy-Palmerston Neighbourhood

What's the worst weed to deal with?  As with most things in life, "it depends" on where you garden, what you are growing, whether or not you can or want to spray herbicides, and your health and mobility,  among many factors. I've come across a cute definition of a weed as a flower that hasn't been appreciated yet but you could also say weed is a plant that's in the wrong place.

What comes to your mind as a "bad weed"? Dandelions? Crabgrass? Japanese Knotweed (!) Again, it all depends on the context. If you're the type that loves a pristine carpet of turf, you'd likely find a single dandelion that has the audacity to emerge particularly egregious. And if you've been trying to eradicate creeping bellflower (Campanula rapunculoides) from your garden bed over the decades, I commiserate, since that's what I've been doing for clients it seems for years.

But would you consider lawn grass a weed? From my experience, you bet your grass it is.

I was reminded of this when Terry, the client, asked me to clean up (i.e., weed) the front of his rental property in Toronto's trendy (read: ridiculously expensive, but the city's in a real estate bubble so what's not expensive?) Little Italy-Palmerston neighbourhood.

He calls me once a year (maybe twice at most) to deal with the front garden. Since it's a rental property, the tenants naturally have nothing to do with area's upkeep so things tend to go wild until someone (me) gets hired to deal with the situation.

Before arriving, I always wonder how "bad" things will be and in this case, they were bad indeed!

 Above is a "before" picture of the north slope which has more than a few maple saplings.

 Here's the south slope. The property line runs about half way so the left side is part of the work. The groundcover is periwinkle but you'll easily notice the many grass clumps which have emerged. Removing grass from periwinkle on a slope equals pain for this gardener.

Here's the view from the sidewalk looking one way...

And the other way....

Coming up the steps.... 

A view of the garden looking left towards the front door

and backwards 

Here's the view looking down from the front porch or landing

Nothing ornamental about this grass, just plain turf growing up and through the periwinkle (Vinca minor) groundcover. This view is from the front porch or landing looking the other way.

A Few Hours Later....

We've tried growing more periwinkle on the left side of this slope but the transplants never get established since the variegated goutweed is almost impossible to remove completely without a herbicide 

 A lot less "meadowy" with the grass clumps pulled out. 

Palmerston Toronto Front Garden Cleanup after 

Palmerston Toronto Front Garden Clean up after 

The walk to and from the house is now safe without the fear of some critter running across your feet 

A fresh layer of mulch to keep the weeds at bay

There are actually some perennials here! 

Not a bad view from the porch now

Bye bye grass, until next year...