LEAF has six Urban Forest Demonstration Gardens throughout the City of Toronto that showcase the beauty of native plant species and enhance the urban forest. Each of these gardens is cared for by a group of dedicated volunteer garden stewards, who recently put on their gardening gloves for the first time this year to wake up our gardens. Here’s photo evidence of the good times we had checking tasks off our gardening to-do list during our annual spring work parties.
Garden Stewards plant wild strawberry (Fragaria virginiana) seedlings to help combat erosion along the garden bed’s edge at the High Park Garden. © 2022 Sarah Halonen/LEAF
Veronica, LEAF Learning Garden volunteer, chops and drops softer dead plant material, like old plant stems, to use as cost-effective mulch! We always suggest that people leave any dead and dried up plant material in their gardens during the winter as it makes for important habitat for overwintering pollinators. © 2022 Sarah Halonen/LEAF
Volunteers Richard, Ariana and Lisa from the Spadina Garden team organize new plant labels while Ellen finishes a litter pick-up. © 2022 Sarah Halonen/LEAF
The St Clair Garden team plot out where to plant their new native perennials following the LEAF motto ‘right plant, right place!' © 2022 Sarah Halonen/LEAF
Ivan, Spadina Garden volunteer, works hard to divide and transplant Virginia mountain mint (Pycnanthemum virginianum), a late blooming native perennial. © 2022 Sarah Halonen/LEAF
What a way to jump start the 2022 gardening season. We can't thank our volunteer Garden Stewards enough for their commitment and care!
Sarah Halonen is the Stewardship Coordinator at LEAF.
Our Urban Forest Demonstration Gardens are supported by Ontario Power Generation, Toronto Transit Commission and the City of Toronto
