Spring and fall property clean-ups

The two clean-up visits do more for a property than everything in between. April decides how quickly the lawn recovers from five months under snow, and October decides how much damage winter does. Both are labour jobs, which is why they are priced by the hour or the truckload rather than by area.

The spring visit, step by step. Debris comes off first: branches, road grit, the sand and salt bank along the driveway and walk. Matted grass is raked or lightly dethatched so air reaches it and snow mould dries rather than spreading. Beds are cleared of last year's collapsed perennial tops, better left standing over winter as insect habitat and cut back now. Edges are re-cut along beds and walks, because frost pushes them out of line every year. Mulch is topped up to 50 to 75 mm, no deeper, and pulled back off shrub crowns and tree trunks. The crew should also look at the grade along the foundation and say whether melt has been pooling there.

What spring clean-up should not include. Heavy dethatching of a wet lawn tears roots out. Cutting perennials that flower on old wood, hydrangeas being the usual casualty. Piling fresh mulch against a hedge or trunk, which holds moisture on the bark. And digging without a locate: Ontario One Call is free, needs five business days notice and is a legal requirement (Ontario One Call).

The fall visit, step by step. Leaves first, and more than once on a lot with mature maples. A thick wet leaf mat left over winter suffocates turf and causes the bare grey patches people find in April. A light layer can be mulched into the lawn with a mower, which is good for it, but a heavy layer has to come off. Then perennials cut where appropriate, annuals pulled, vegetable beds cleared, and the last cut slightly shorter than summer height. Downspout extensions checked so melt leaves the foundation. Irrigation blown out before the first hard frost, hose bibs shut and drained. Burlap or a snow fence screen on tender shrubs and on cedar exposed to road salt.

Timing, which is tighter than people expect. Spring clean-up wants dry ground, which in Kanata means mid April to early May, and working saturated clay does more harm than waiting a week. Fall clean-up happens after most leaves are down and before the ground freezes, usually the last two weeks of October into the first week of November. Contractors book both ends solid, so a specific date needs booking months ahead.

Yard waste and disposal. The City collects yard waste seasonally in paper bags and rigid containers, and there are depots for larger volumes. Confirm the current collection dates and rules on the City's own waste pages, which could not be read automatically for this page. Practically, a fall clean-up on a treed Beaverbrook lot can produce twenty to forty bags, and whether those bags are included in the quote or billed on top is the single biggest source of surprise on a clean-up invoice.

What it costs in Ottawa in 2026. Indicative ranges. A spring clean-up on a standard suburban lot with modest planting runs $200 to $500, and a fall clean-up on the same lot $250 to $600. A large treed lot in Beaverbrook can run $600 to $1,500 for the fall. Disposal is often $10 to $20 a bag, and a two-person crew is commonly $90 to $150 an hour. The variables are leaf volume, bed area and whether the crew can back a trailer in.

What makes a Kanata clean-up different. Bed volume, mostly. The 1970s Beaverbrook lots have deep planting beds and mature trees, so the leaf and bed work there is several times what a 1990s Bridlewood lot needs and should not be quoted from the same price list. Kanata Lakes and Morgan's Grant have thinner canopy but long open frontages that collect road sand and salt in a band two or three metres wide, and that band is where the lawn dies if the spring visit skips it. Stittsville's newer streets have the least leaf volume and the most bare builder soil, so their spring visit is really a soil and seeding visit.

Licences and credentials. None required, and none exist. Clean-up work is unlicensed in Ontario, so the useful checks are liability insurance and a WSIB clearance number, valid for up to 90 days (WSIB). Two exceptions matter. Applying any pesticide requires an exterminator licence, and the company needs an operator licence (Ontario). And pruning a tree of 30 cm trunk diameter or more at 1.3 m on an urban lot of a hectare or less is regulated under By-law 2020-340, a threshold taken from an arborist firm's summary because the City's pages could not be read automatically (Advanced Tree Solutions).

What to ask before you hire. Is disposal included, and how many bags. How many fall visits. Are you dethatching, and how aggressively. Will you check and extend the downspouts. Are beds included or only the lawn. Is the irrigation blow-out part of this. What date range am I booked into. Ask about bag counts, because that is where a $300 quote becomes a $550 invoice.

A last point that saves money. A fall clean-up done properly removes most of the reason for an expensive spring one. If you can only pay for one visit a year in Kanata, buy the fall.