How I Rewilded My Front Garden With Native Plants

In late 2021, a few months after we got married, my husband, Scott, and I bought our first house: a modest, 100-year-old semi-detached home in Toronto’s east end. In lieu of a backyard, we had a parking pad that fit our small car. Not having a backyard was one of many compromises we made in buying our home—especially because we had a small, three-by-four metre garden in front of the house. 

When we first moved in, we didn’t think much of the front garden, which was buried beneath the winter snow. But the next spring when the ice thawed, we were eager to see what lay beneath. Scott, an ecologist specializing in native plants and pollinators, had dreams of transforming our front garden into wildlife habitat, but we planned to wait a full year to see what would show up. 

We learned through our neighbours that the family we had purchased the house from had planted mainly medicinal and edible herbs, including thyme, mint and chamomile. Other parts of the garden were covered in rocks, bark mulch and landscaping fabric. Those same neighbours, who have lived in their house for several decades, told us that one of the previous owners of our home were major native-plant growers. So we decided to rip up the landscaping fabric to see what would sprout.

By April, dense patches of native plants—mayapple, wild ginger, bloodroot, strawberry and lots of violet—appeared. We sat back and waited some more, and then came beardtongue, turtlehead and several kinds of asters. In July and August, a big patch of purple flowering raspberry bore an abundance of fruit we shared with our neighbours. 

The first spring and summer in our home was spent waiting and watching—in more ways than one. Scott was diagnosed with and treated for testicular cancer. Recovery forced us to slow down and stay close to home, so there was plenty of time for watering and cutting the plants to make room for new growth. 

We continued to plant more: hepatica, golden alexander, tick trefoil, evening primrose, native mountain mint, bellwort, milkweed, blue lobelia and obedient plant. Our small front garden held more than 30 species of plants, which attracted over 50 species of pollinating insects.

The phrase “save the bees” gets thrown around a lot, but to truly help wild bees, we need more native plants. Planting flowers that bloom at different times of the year with diverse flower shapes and colours not only ensures a steady supply of food for pollinators but attracts a wider range of bee species. Gardening that considers the needs of native pollinators helps the greater environment and, at the very least, is something that feels practical and impactful in this era of eco-anxiety.

Lorraine Johnson’s 100 Easy-to-Grow Native Plants for Canadian Gardens is a great resource for anyone wanting to get started. The tome details which plants thrive in local conditions—whether your gardening plot is sunny or shady—and contains information on how to support local pollinators. Another book co-authored by Dr. Sheila Colla, A Garden for the Rusty-Patched Bumblebee, provides residents of southern Ontario with a practical guide to pollinator gardening in yards and communal spaces, as well as on balconies and rooftops. Contacting your local native plant society and joining a community gardening group is also useful. The best time to get started is any time, since different native plants grow at different times of the year since so much of gardening is done through observation. 

In the fall, with Scott’s cancer thankfully in remission, we added a plum tree that had grown from seed at Scott’s grandmother’s house in New Brunswick. When his grandmother passed away, the tree was transplanted to his parents’ place in Kitchener, Ont., where it grew for several more years, and finally, it made its way to our garden.

In the years that have followed, our little front garden has continued to bloom with native plants, and on summer days, we enjoy spotting the different flying insects that visit. All the time we spent outdoors also helped us get to know our neighbours better, and several of them have revamped their own gardens with milkweed, blue lobelia, primrose and thyme from ours.