For your Ottawa lanscaping needs (locally grown plants)

Here are two local Ottawa businesses that have started through the Just Food Start Up Farm Program
that sell landscaping plants: flowers, shrubs and trees:

Barefoot Gardens

Products: non-certified organic seedlings, mixed vegetables, herbs, and flowers.

Contact: Randi Townsend & Sarah Lawrance
Website:  www.facebook.com/barefootinthegardens

Twigs Nursery: Native Trees and Edibles

Products:
- potted seedlings from broadleaf trees (sugar maple, mulberry, walnut, oak & hickory)
- conifers
- various shrubs (winterberry, highbush cranberry)
- wild small fruit (raspberry, dewberry)

Field-grown and container-grown seedlings are available in 1-gallon and larger sizes, grown from wild seed using organic practices.

Contact: Catherine Copp
Website: www.twigsnursery.com

From Architecture Design: Patterns of Biophilic Design

Happy to see architects debating the benefits of biophilic design!

From the Architecture Design website:

"American sustainability consulting and strategic planning firm Terrapin Bright Green has released a white paper that promises to guide building designers towards more environmentally connected outcomes...  The Terrapin document goes further than just abstract observations however, and offers 14 building design interventions that can be incorporated to facilitate this human connection to nature through built form."

The 14 interventions are:

Nature in the Space

1. Visual Connection to Nature
2. Non-Visual Connection to Nature
3. Non-Rhythmic Sensory Stimuli
4. Thermal & Airflow Variability
5. Presence of Water
6. Dynamic & Diffuse Light
7. Connection to Natural Systems

Natural Analogues

8. Biomorphic Forms & Patterns
9. Material Connection to Nature
10. Complexity & Order

Nature of the Space

11. Prospect
12. Refuge
13. Mystery
14. Risk/Peril

Read more here: Architecture Design.

Photos from Architecture Design

Propagation Project Exhibition (Windsor)

How brilliant is this?  I love the impact this has - seeing trees growing from discarded disposable drinking cups. From Broken City Labs.

TRIAGE: A PROPAGATION PROJECT BY PATRICIA COATES
Exhibition Runs September 16th – 26th 2013  (Windsor)

"Triage: A Propagation Project by Patricia Coates is an ecological intervention and a commitment to acquiring a personal knowledge of the land where she lives... During Triage, a search to acquire a personal knowledge of how the land, trees, soil, and the ecosystem as a whole function has revealed her own complicated relationship, in which good intentions and ‘saving nature’ are questioned." 

Also from the website: "The seedlings are grown from acorns gathered from Pin and Chinquapin Oaks, two Carolinian species indigenous to Essex County. The ‘pots’ were gleaned from city streets, rural roads, dumpsters and contributed to by family, friends and her own consumption. The trees will be planted on the restoration site and the Essex County landfill: enthalpy and entropy–growth and decay–playing out simultaneously." 

*Patricia Coates Image (from Broken City Lab website)

S.O.S. Ottawa Trees

Ottawa Roger's Cable company (Channel 22) has an interesting show called S.O.S. Ottawa Trees that was produced in ??. Currently there are three episodes that talk about different issues regarding our urban canopy.

From the website:

One of Ottawa's greatest assets, the trees that green our neighbourhoods, are under threat from pests, new construction and a harsh urban environment. S.O.S Ottawa Trees takes a closer look at the challenges facing our urban canopy and how you can help keep Ottawa green.

Episode 1

In Ottawa, 40 million ash trees are threatened by the Emerald Ash Borer. We take a closer look at this tiny insect and how it's changing the landscape of the National Capital Region.

Episode 2

Ottawa is a growing city, but when new homes and buildings go up, often mature trees come down. We look at infill and new construction and how to embrace change while preserving our greenspaces.

Episode 3

Planting a tree is easy, right? Get tips from the experts on how to properly plant a tree, and get inspired by our 'Tree Heroes': people who are making sure Ottawa's future is a green one.

P.S. Check out my latest "urban wild" nature blog: Wild. Here. (2016 update)

front yard gardens (Ottawa)

1 . 2 . 3

4 . 5 . 6

7.  8 . 9

A friend wants to convert her front yard to a native wildflower meadow.  Would be great as a xeriscaped yard that also requires less mowing and it would provide beneficial flowers for pollinators.

There is precedent in terms of navigating the city by-laws in Ontario.  Hank and Vera Jones were asked to mow their pollinator garden in Constance Bay (Ottawa) being told it was violating code.  But they managed to overturn this requirement:

After weeks of calmly delivered, persuasive statements where the couple stood firm, citing their Charter rights and explaining their environmental goals, the City of Ottawa ultimately withdrew the bylaw violation. Their case attracted Will Amos, director of the University of Ottawa’s Ecojustice Environmental Law Clinic, who offered his legal services pro bono. Former councillor Clive Doucet lent support—as did roughly a hundred organizations and individuals.

A gentleman in Toronto also had similar issues:

Toronto’s Douglas Counter created a tall-grass-prairie habitat garden featuring more than 80 native species. It evolved into a storm-water infiltration garden on the adjacent city boulevard. When neighbours complained, he took his case to court—and won. 

Counter recalls, “It was the first time in Canada that a provincial court of appeal recognized that expressing environmental beliefs is a form of expression protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and the first time anywhere in Canada that a court ruled that citizens have a Charter-protected right to express those beliefs on public land.”

Toronto has a "Natural Garden Exemption" bylaw but it sounds like it may be more of a pain than a saving grace for those who want to naturalize their lawn.  (If anyone lives in Toronto and knows of the current status - please share in the comments below.)

For those in Ottawa, they should take note that the Property Standard by-law is still in force and it might help if you enlist neighbors support before you convert.  These property standards can also be used to ban front yard food gardens.

CITY OF OTTAWA BY-LAWS 

PART II - RESIDENTIAL PROPERTY STANDARDS - SECTION 6 - YARDS 
(3) Heavy undergrowth shall be eliminated from the yard so as to be consistent with the surrounding environment.  

(4) A yard shall be cultivated or protected by ground cover, which prevents the erosion of the soil.  

(5) A tree or other plant, or limb or branch of it, that is dead, diseased, decayed or damaged shall be removed from the property or otherwise pruned to remove the dead, diseased, dying or dangerous portions of the tree or plant so as to prevent an unsafe condition or damage to any building subject to the provisions of By-law No. 2009-200, the Urban Tree Conservation By-law.  

(6) Lawns shall be kept trimmed and not be overgrown or in an unsightly condition out of character with the surrounding environment.  

(7) Subsection (6) shall not apply to yards which have been landscaped or maintained with materials such as: (a) trees, shrubs, ornamental grasses or flowers; (b) decorative stonework, walkways or screening; (c) any other horticultural or landscape architectural elements. 

Seems like it is still a case-by-case issue in Ottawa as shown by this Facebook post from the Allbirch Pollinator Garden page this summer (2014).

Top Images:

Front Yard Food Gardens (1,3,6,7)
Xeriscaping - Dry Beds (2,4,5)
Native Wildflower Gardens (8,9)

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Text from Canadian Gardening article "The Politics of Gardening - Bygone By-laws" by Katharine Fletcher

Legal Front Yard Gardens

Other Options: Blog Post on a Small Front Yard Makeover