mowing is like vacuuming…
I don’t have many opportunities to mow the lawn. I’ve basically told John that the day he can’t keep up with the grass will be the day I break into the Monsanto factory and abscond with all the Roundup they have and then apply it to the lawn. There’s lots of other ways I’d rather use the space.
The day has come. John had some work done on a foot and will be hobbling around for a couple months. The grass, however, well-watered from the January and February rains, didn’t stop growing, and it was time to have the conversation.
Well, in the end, I’m embarrassed to say that I caved, reasoning that he should be back to pushing the mower around in a few weeks, and now isn’t the best season to think of planting something that will require water to keep it going through the dry summer and fall ahead. Besides, John really likes his little patch of lawn, and he lets me have my way with most of the rest of the garden.
So I popped some allergy tablets and pulled out the electric mower and headed for the patch of grass. Back and forth I went over the browning green surface. Back and forth, back and forth. It’s weirdly meditative, like vacuuming, I decided, only with a device that can chop off your toes.
My diverse lawn
As I took down the seed heads it was a chance to look at this what we call a lawn. It’s never been a fanatically maintained piece of green, and features little colonies of Saint Augustine, Bermuda, rye, clover and whatever other species the wind has delivered. The biological diversity of this patch would do the Amazon proud and drive any single-species lawn fanatic to distraction.
The cat, last fall, shaking off the thatch from the lawn. This is inside the house, of course.
By mid-summer it’ll go mostly brown as we cut back on watering to continue with our water conservation. At that point, facing four to six months of brown, four to six months of thatch being tracked into the house every time you walk across the garden, that’ll be when we might continue our discussion with whether we might want to do something else with this patch of prime garden real estate.
Whatever we decide, you can rest assured that we will not be installing the plastic turf that’s getting to be a popular garden surface around town. In fact, I like that stuff so little I’ve started my very first Facebook group, Plastic Turf Must Die!!!!!! As far as I’m concerned fardens are about life and growing things, and this stuff is as dead and cheesy as anything out there. If you’re any sort of joiner and hate the stuff yourself, join the group!
March 31 2010 06:30 am | Categories: gardening • my garden | Tags: grass • lawns • mowing
Noelle/azplantlady on 31 Mar 2010 at 9:53 am #
I love the idea of your facebook group, but my father-in-law has some of that stuff and I don’t want to alienate him
I love your collection of turf grasses all in one small area.
floridagirl on 31 Mar 2010 at 10:57 am #
I’m not any sort of joiner, but it sounds like a reasonable group. I’m trying to imagine where on earth you live that people are applying plastic turfs!!!!! I personally am a huge fan of mowing. It is very meditative for me; well, it would be more so if there weren’t sprinkler heads at every turn to be avoided and ridiculous slopes to navigate. But truly, I do love mowing. No one understands why, but I insist on mowing my son’s acreage every week. My own half-acre is not enough. Have to say I hate vacuuming, though.
Town Mouse on 31 Mar 2010 at 7:11 pm #
A facebook group. Well, I’m not on facebook so I’m not yet worried about joining groups. I’m also of two minds about green grass in a very thirsty state. If my neighbors want to have plastic instead of real grass, it’s honestly fine by me. But maybe I would need to join the group to understand all the compelling arguments against the stuff…
Christine on 31 Mar 2010 at 8:25 pm #
Like Town Mouse, I’m not on Facebook– but I agree wholeheartedly. How long is that stuff going to last? And then off to the landfill! Plus, think of the senseless suffocation of habitat. The potential water savings really don’t balance out the negatives. Way better options out there. Good for you for spreading the gospel!
Country Mouse on 01 Apr 2010 at 5:46 am #
I tried to maintain a little patch of lawn near the swimming pool, with ideas in my head of stretching out there on a towel after a vigorous swim. well, not much vigorous swimming I confess, and less laying about, and now no lawn, just a lump of piled up turf descending slowly towards the earth. But I did see at the SF garden show vendors with “ecolawn” seed or sod not sure — there were a few lawn alternatives there. The ecolawn looked very soft, i was surprised. So you might look into reseeding with something like that. I loved this post — fer sure I chuckled at all the right spots!
Elephant's Eye on 01 Apr 2010 at 12:01 pm #
Our previous rented house, had a lawn. We had a push mower, and yes, it is satisfying to mow. But we didn’t water or fertilise. Just mowed what nature brought us. Green in winter, thatch in summer.
Stone Art Blog on 01 Apr 2010 at 12:56 pm #
I really cant understand what people see in plastic turf, its hideous. I have seen it used recently in a modern garden, and it just made the whole thing cheep and tacky.