In August 2023 Judith, who has been a long-time volunteer approached Toronto Wildlife Centre (TWC) with an idea for partnering with Project Swallowtail’s Underhill Seedsitter’s group to create a native plant garden. She knew that a native plant garden would be a natural extension of the great work that TWC does in taking care of sick, injured and orphaned wildlife in the Toronto area. Her idea was enthusiastically embraced by Victoria and other TWC senior staff and within a few weeks, Judith and Sayeh held a Zoom presentation for TWC volunteers and staff on the benefits of gardening with native plants and the possibilities of starting a seed-sitting group within TWC.
On October 1st, a dedicated group of volunteers from TWC and Project Swallowtail’s Underhill Seedsitters group joined forces to create a pollinator garden initiative by planting TWC’s first native plant garden.
We used a lasagna planting method by smothering the cleared area with a thick layer of cardboard and weighing it down with some found twigs and dead brush. The space was then covered with a thick layer of triple mix provided by TWC.
The plants were laid out in groupings since studies have shown that insects will prefer visiting larger patches.
Additional bee nesting locations were provided by drilling holes into wood pieces uses as borders for the beds. In nature beetles bore holes into dead wood and solitary bees use them as nests in subsequent years. This is much better than ‘bee motel” products on the market which often become infested with parasites that feed on wild bees.
Over the course of planning and creating this new garden many new friendships were created and through the great work of Judith, we look forward to continued collaboration with TWC. You can read more about this project by checking out Judith’s blog post at this link.
