Spring cleanup checklist for Ontario yards

A spring cleanup in the GTA goes better as two rounds a few weeks apart. Branches, driveways, walkways, the lawn and shrub pruning can start once the snow has melted and the ground is firm, often in April. The garden beds wait for steady warmth, because insects are still overwintering in last year’s stems.

If you’d rather hand the whole thing off, this is what our spring and fall cleanups cover across Markham and nearby.

When should spring cleanup start in Ontario?

Start when the snow is gone and you can walk on the lawn without leaving footprints. University of Minnesota Extension’s advice is to rake only once the soil is no longer soggy.

Around Markham that’s often in April, though it shifts by a few weeks from one year to the next. What the lawn needs after that, month by month, is in our Ontario lawn care calendar.

The beds come later. Many native bees and beneficial insects spend the winter in hollow stems and under leaf litter.

The City of Toronto points out that stems cut too early often go to the curb with insects still in them. It advises waiting until temperatures, overnight lows included, stay well above 10°C for at least 10 days.

Taken strictly, that’s later than most people expect. Environment Canada’s 1981–2010 normals for Buttonville in Markham show why:

Scroll sideways to see the whole table.

So the strict version lands in late May or June. The Toronto Master Gardeners word it more loosely: temperatures consistently above 10°C.

What goes on a spring yard cleanup checklist?

A full spring yard cleanup checklist has eleven jobs, starting with branches and ending with the first mow. This is the order we’d work in, with the timing that usually fits the GTA.

Treat the months as a guide and go by the ground and the forecast.

Scroll sideways to see the whole table.

The first round: hard surfaces, lawn and shrubs

Clear the big stuff first so you can see what winter did. Pick up branches, then sweep or blow off the driveway, walkway and patio.

While you’re there, look at the interlock. Heaved or sunken pavers, washed-out joints and the first weeds in the cracks are easier to deal with in spring than in July.

Our guides on weeds between pavers and why interlock sinks explain the fixes.

On the lawn, a light rake is enough. Grey or pinkish matted patches are usually snow mould.

It looks bad, but Minnesota Extension says it rarely kills the grass. The Ontario turf manual (OMAFRA Publication 845) advises raking the matted areas in spring so they dry out.

Keep it gentle. Hard raking on soft ground damages the turf and the wet soil under it.

Shrubs are easier to prune before they leaf out, because you can see the branch structure. The Toronto Master Gardeners split it by bloom time:

• Shrubs that flower after mid-June get pruned in early spring.
• Shrubs that flower before mid-June, such as forsythia and lilac, wait until right after they bloom.

Take out dead, damaged and crossing branches first. To bring an old, overgrown shrub back, remove no more than a third of the oldest stems from the base each year.

Hedges have their own timing, which our guide on when to trim hedges in Ontario covers.

The second round: beds, edges and mulch

Once the warm stretch arrives, work through the beds in this order. The first three steps follow the City of Toronto’s pollinator advice.

1. Leave leaf cover that’s under an inch thick, and gently lift off the excess before new growth comes up.
2. Cut old perennial stems to about 30 cm rather than flush with the ground.
3. Bundle the cut stems loosely and lean or hang them somewhere in the garden, so insects still inside can get out later.
4. Replant any perennials the frost pushed out of the soil.
5. Weed while the weeds are small and the soil is still damp, so they come out with the root.
6. Recut the edges where the beds meet the lawn.
7. Mulch the beds.

Weeding is mostly by hand now. Ontario’s cosmetic pesticide ban means products with 2,4-D or glyphosate can’t be used to kill weeds on lawns, gardens, patios or driveways, so hand-pulling and mulch do most of the work.

For mulch, the Toronto Master Gardeners suggest about 2–3 inches (5–8 cm). Our mulch guide works out how much you need for a given bed.

How do you get rid of spring yard waste in Markham?

Put it out for the City of Markham’s curbside pickup, which collects leaf and yard material every other week from spring to fall.

In 2026 the season runs from April 7 to October 30, so check the city’s calendar for next year’s start date. The rules that catch people out:

• Use kraft paper bags or open rigid containers such as a lidless garbage can. Plastic bags and cardboard boxes aren’t collected.
• Each bag, container or bundle has to weigh under 18 kg.
• Branches go in bundles under 1.2 m long, with no branch thicker than 15 cm, tied with string rather than wire.
• Keep the bags dry. Broken or overweight bags can’t be collected.

Other GTA cities have their own schedules, so check yours before you fill twenty bags.

Common spring cleanup mistakes

• Working the lawn while it’s soggy. Footprints and rake marks on wet ground compact the soil and leave thin patches for the rest of the season.
• Clearing every bed down to bare soil on the first warm Saturday in April, before the insects in the stems have left.
• Pruning lilacs and forsythia in early spring. You cut off this year’s flowers.
• Piling mulch up against tree trunks and shrub stems in a “volcano”. It holds moisture against the bark and invites rot.
• Mowing the first cut too short. The City of Guelph recommends a 7.5 cm (3 inch) cutting height and never taking off more than a third of the blade at once.
• Leaving weeds in the interlock joints until summer, by which time the roots are deep and the joint sand is loose.

When is it worth hiring a spring cleanup service?

It’s worth it when the job is bigger than a couple of weekends. Think mature trees dropping a heavy load of branches and leaves, beds that have been let go for a season or two, or a lot of bagging and hauling.

Most of this list is fine to do yourself on a small lot with a rake and pruners. Some people would just rather spend April doing something else, and hiring it out means someone else watches the forecast and times the two rounds.

That’s the work we do on our spring cleanup visits: clearing, trimming shrubs, weeding, recutting bed edges and fresh mulch if you want it.

You can see a fence-line bed cleared of weeds and long grass and finished with fresh mulch in our weed treatment and clean-up project. When fall comes around, our fall cleanup checklist picks up where this one leaves off.

To get a free quote, call (437) 684-2535 or text us a few photos of the yard with your street or postal code.