Planting and garden beds in Windham, Maine.
Windham's housing stock grew fastest from the 1970s on. The comprehensive plan's table of home ages shows 17 percent built in the 1970s, another 15 percent in the 1980s and about a third between 1990 and 2009. Foundation plantings from those decades have now reached the age where yews swallow windows and junipers have gone bare in the middle.
Replacing tired foundation beds, and building new perennial beds on houses that never had them, is steady work across town, from subdivisions in the Farm Residential zone to lake houses along the Highland Lake shore.
What grows in zone 5b on Windham ground
The 2023 USDA hardiness map places Windham in zone 5b. On the sandy Hermon and Windsor soils that cover much of town, perennials and shrubs that tolerate dry spells do best, and beds get compost worked into the planting holes and a mulch layer to keep the root zone from drying out in summer.
Where Scantic or Lamoine glaciomarine soils sit near the surface, drainage is the limiting factor instead. Raising a bed slightly and choosing plants that accept wet springs keeps shrubs from rotting at the roots.
Beds as buffers near the lakes
Maine's shoreland rules require that vegetation under three feet tall and other ground cover be kept intact in the buffer strip, and within that buffer the state uses a point system to make sure a well-distributed stand of trees and shrubs remains. For a house on Highland Lake or Little Sebago, that shapes where a new bed can go and what it replaces.
Planted beds are also one of the simpler ways to catch runoff. The Portland Water District's Lakescaping guidance for the Sebago watershed favors deep-rooted plantings and mulch over bare soil and lawn running to the water's edge. A bed placed across the slope below a roof edge or at the foot of a driveway slows water down and lets it soak in before it reaches the shore.
Mulch and edges
Clean-edged beds finished with fresh mulch and, where it fits, stone accents are the finish on every install. Mulch in Windham earns its place twice: it holds moisture on the fast-draining uplands and keeps soil from washing out of beds during heavy rain on the lake lots.
On the older foundation beds, the job usually starts with removal: overgrown shrubs come out, the soil is loosened and amended, and the new layout leaves room for plants to reach mature size without covering windows again.
Plantings · Mulch · Garden Design
How we handle planting & garden beds
We build planting beds that look better every year — hardy perennials and shrubs matched to your site, finished with clean-edged mulch and stone accents. From single foundation beds to full hillside plantings.
See the full planting & garden beds service page or everything we do in Windham, Maine.
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Mon–Sat 7:00am – 5:00pm · Based in Cumberland, Maine