kudzu, ivy, and any vine plants. although kudzu is now being combatted with the weevil.

Corn is a garbage crop to grow at home. The height thing is kina dumb, because they probably wouldn’t bat an eye about sunflowers and roses up on a trellis. But corn basically robs all the nutrients in the gardens soil incredibly fast, starving the other crops. Also as produce corn is the cheapest and most abundant staple and to grow a some what substantial amount you gota give up a significant portion of your garden.

There is a house a few blocks from me that, due to the shape of their property, has no backyard, it’s all front. They have maybe fifteen young chestnut trees (bloomed for the first time this spring, but don’t seem to have set), hazelnut bushes between all the trees, and maybe a ten foot by six foot bed of corn. I think other stuff, too, but those are the eye catching things.

I have no idea what they think they are going to do with all those nuts once the trees and bushes start producing, or whether they are growing some interesting variety of corn or just find it entertaining to grow a supermarket variety themselves, but it’s their property and I feel like they should be able to do what they want (garbage crops included) without the city getting up in their business.

This is the real problem. Where the fuck did you find a plant only native in South America?

I understand what you are saying, but growing up the term ‘weed’ was always used in the ‘undesirable plants’ sense and the term ‘invasive species’ is more accurate when you are discussing them specifically. When I first started gardening, the guy who trained me defined weeds as ‘any plant the client doesn’t want growing on their property’.

Stuff like dandelions and such.

Dandelions are a complex topic. While some consider them “Noxious Weeds”, other people recognize their value as important sources of food for insects, they attract pollinators, and they also release ethylene which is a gas that encourages fruit setting and fruit ripening, so they are sometimes grown as ‘companion plants’.

Dandelions are only weeds if you don’t want them there, like any other ‘weed’.

HOAs are the invasive species

What the fuck. Really human supremist now.

be proud. get it on a t-shirt. let the whole world know. start a movement. keep killing animals in your basement. die an ironic death.

HOAs aren’t really a thing in Canada, she is being taken to court by the city.

It sounds like they are, but thankfully they haven’t taken root in Canada.

Only question I would have is which path is she stood on in that picture? If that is a public footpath then there might be an argument that she should cut the edge back a little. Otherwise: The bees are happy, leave her alone.

That’s funny, my kids named the basement spider “Terry” and they take pictures whenever he shows up.

i fucking hate ants (hyperope, can’t see them til they bite my ass), and Gary does a good job of patrolling the spots they enter and eating them. he’s a cool dude.

House centipedes eat ants.

they also eat Gary and he’s pretty cool

Meanwhile … it’s OK for the government of Ontario to sell off protected environmental habitats to mow it all down, dig it up and put up a luxury condo for a private enterprise to make money off while destroying irreplaceable natural habitat (irreplaceable during our lifetime or within several hundred years that is)

We should be encouraging people to plant and maintain wild habitat … not cutting everything down to turn it all into your person living room. It’s the outdoors that is shared with animals, not your personal property that looks like it has an ugly green throw rug. It’s a natural habitat and no matter what ideas, laws, regulations or rules you want to create or invent, nature will always take over and grow over it all, no matter how entitled you feel you are to the piece of property you call your own.

I live in northern Ontario where it’s hard to grow things. But I’ve adapted and now I grow a wild hedge of Caragana bushes (although not native, they are about the only thing that grow this strong in the northern cold environment)

I mowed down my ugly grass lawn to the dirt and planted clover and now my lawn is green all year long and I cut it only once or twice a year. Previously, I was cutting it every two weeks because of the tall overgrown grass and every month it would grow over with a huge bloom of dandelions, the lawn was literally yellow. As nice as the dandelions are, they only last about two weeks, then turn into the puff balls that leave behind an ugly lawn with headless flowers and tall grass. Clover grows low to the ground and never gets high, plus its a nitrogen fixer which means it actually feeds the lawn over time on its own, growing more clover with deeper roots making them all stronger.

This is also the second year I’ve grown a wild flower garden and this August was the first major bloom I’ve had. Beautiful flowers that are just starting to die off now. I’ll be planting more this fall and hoping for more in years to come.

Honestly, the lawn used to look like an abandoned lot before with overgrown grass and dandelion crops. Now it actually has colour, I don’t have to do much to take care of it and it actually has life, colour and interest to it all. And I don’t do a thing other than to let everything grow on their own.

Compare that to my next door neighbour who keeps a manicured lawn. His lawn is like a carpet with grass 3" tall evenly cut across his small plot. He contracts lawn specialists to cut, trim, aerate, thatch and fertilize his lawn at least four times a year. He spot fertilizes any foreign flower, dandelion or plant that appears anywhere. I’m sure it costs him a fortune to maintain it all … compared to mine where I spent some money and work up front but don’t spend much on maintenance annually, other than to mow the lawn once or twice a year.

I am aware, I was alluding to the whole idea of it, which the city has taken the role of in this case. I believe it is ridiculous beyond maintaining house size for sanity sake. I get there is building code for things, why is there garden code? Stay out of my yard!!