Spring is coming, but…

…Hold off on that spring garden cleanup

If you’re like me, longer days and warming temperatures have you thinking about getting outside and starting the annual spring garden cleanup.

But don’t – at least not yet!  The remnants of last year’s garden may look like a mess to us, but consider:

• Dead plant materials and topsoil are winter homes to a lot of beneficial insects, notably bees
• Those insects often don’t wake up and emerge until temperatures get considerably warmer
• Early cleanup can destroy insect habitat and harm those helpful insects

So what to do?  If possible:

• Wait until temperatures are consistently at least 10°C before you clean up your garden
• Be selective: leave some leaf litter for the insects – in low-visibility areas of your garden if you don’t like how it looks
• Use leaf mould or compost (insect-friendly) instead of heavier wood chip mulches (insect-unfriendly) around your plants, and delay application until it’s warm so that insects that overwinter underground can emerge first
• Some bees overwinter in the natural cavities of dead stalks and grasses, so wait until as late as possible to remove them from your garden.  If you can’t wait, bundle up those stems and store them nearby so any late-waking bees can still emerge.  (Those stems may also become summer habitat for the bees.)

If you want to go a step further and make your garden a haven for bees and other pollinators:

• Set aside a corner of your garden for pollinator favourites like yarrow, bee balm, spirea, coneflowers, liatris and milkweed (discover more options at your local garden center)
• Build a bee house like this one, or simply drill holes of various sizes 10-15 cm deep into the end of a stick of wood, to create a hospitable habitat for our pollinator friends

Hello spring, and happy gardening – just not quite yet!

Thanks to subscribers Nicole McLaughlin and Don Ross for the social media posts that inspired this Green Ideas subject!