Information for Home & Property Owners

Why Manage Your Property for Pollinators?

More than 50 per cent of households in Canada have a yard, which means that 6.2 million home owners could help make a difference for pollinators. If everyone set aside a portion of their lawn as pollinator habitat, together that would add up to many thousands of hectares in new habitat for pollinators!

Doug Tallamy, leading researcher, author and head of the University of Delaware’s Entomology and Wildlife Ecology Department, says in his book Bringing Nature Home : “Gardeners have become important players in the management of our nation’s wildlife. It is now within the power of individual gardeners to do something that we all dream of doing: to make a difference.”

Contrary to popular belief, providing habitat for Monarch Butterflies and other pollinators does not need to involve a lot of extra work or money. In fact, there are many simple things you can do to make your garden both beautiful and beneficial!

CWF’s Gardening for Wildlife web pages can help you along with basic and wildlife-friendly gardening tips, handouts, a Native Plant Encyclopedia to help you choose plants for your garden and much more!

What You Can Do

Get Certified

Our Garden Habitat Certification recognizes the efforts Canadians are taking to meet the habitat needs of wildlife.

Learn More >

Webinars & Workshops

Buy Native and Neonic-free Plants

Find out where CWF’s neonic-free plants are sold and explore our Native Plant Supplier List for a nursery, annual plant sale or wholesaler near you.

Learn More >

Get Gardening Pathway

Choose a starting point below and you’ll learn how to help wildlife by creating habitat in any garden.

Learn More >

Explore iNaturalist

Get help with identifying wildlife, learn about projects in your area and Contribute to the ongoing inventory of Canada’s species by downloading iNaturalist.ca and uploading your observations! CWF even has a Gardening for Wildlife project for gardeners where you can share photos and get help identifying the wildlife and native plants on your property.

Learn More >

Schools

Join WILD Spaces! Encourage a local school to plant a Monarch garden through CWF WILD Spaces

Learn More >

More Things You Can Do

Additional Resources

Get the Seasonal "Grow Wild" E-newsletter!

Grow It! Don't Mow It!

Bees, flies, butterflies, moths, beetles, hummingbirds and even small mammals are pollinators, meaning they carry pollen on their bodies and move it between flowers. This almost invisible act occurs millions of times each day and creates a third of our food. It also sustains the native plants and habitats on which humans and wildlife depend.

Action for Pollinators

Help the Monarchs

Across North America, populations of the iconic Monarch Butterfly are in steep decline. The brilliantly-coloured Monarch is a summer breeder in many areas of southern Canada, and most Canadian-born adults head to the highlands of central Mexico to overwinter. It takes four to five generations of Monarchs to make it to Canada during the spring migration. In 2016, the Committee for the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) listed the Monarch Butterfly as Endangered.

Donate Today

Donate to support Canadian wildlife conservation!