Considering Lawn
Mowed areas are great for playing on, pets, and pathways. But if you don’t use it, could you lose it? Do you have areas of your landscape that are currently mowed, that might make good contenders for native plant beds? Places that are hard to mow, like slopes, are great places to start.
REASONS WHY YOU MIGHT HAVE SOME LAWN:
You can walk on it and play on it.
The solid green makes a pleasing contrast next to more complex plantings. Low growing native plants can provide this affect.
You can see over it, which can be important for security purposes. (Other low plantings have the same advantage.)
Healthy turf grass is certainly better than a paved surface at protecting our natural areas from run-off, and better than bare soil at preventing erosion. (Established native plantings are better still at both jobs.)
Mowing is easy maintenance (unless you have acres to mow).
REASONS TO RECONSIDER LAWN:
All of our commercially available and widely used turf grasses are not native to North America. Non-native turf lawns create a barren environment that offers little to insects, butterflies, birds, and other wildlife.
Chemical inputs such as fertilizers and pesticides runoff into our waterways. They can also harm the people and pets who play on these spaces and the individuals who apply the chemicals.
Watering lawns uses billions of gallons every day of our most precious resource: fresh water.
Turf grass struggles in shade, making it a poor choice for those locations.
Lawn mowers create air pollution and noise pollution.
Mowing multi-acre lawns takes many hours out of your summer weeks, time when you might be on vacation!
Compacted lawns can be impermeable to rainwater. An excess of impervious surfaces leads to a reduced water table, massive stormwater runoff, eroded waterways, sediment filled rivers and streams which suffocate wildlife, and reduce beauty and recreational value.
Campaign Article Highlight
Shrink the lawn
If you grew up in suburbia, a pristine lawn was a welcome herald of spring. Everyone enjoys the smell of freshly mowed grass and the look of a well-kept, manicured lawn. So what, you might wonder, is the problem with turfgrass? After all, it is a green, living plant, busily photosynthesizing carbon dioxide and water into oxygen and glucose, while providing an even surface to walk and play on. But not all is as it seems…
Continue reading this blog post from the Plant NOVA Natives campaign.
