No Lawns

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A community devoted to alternatives to monoculture lawns, with an emphasis on native plants and conservation. Rain gardens, xeriscaping, strolling gardens, native plants, and much more!

founded 2 years ago

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greatwhitebuffalo41@lemmy.ml

Reminder: Your lawn isn't "being invaded by weeds," it's undergoing natural selection. (lemmy.ml)

submitted 2 years ago by HiddenLayer5@lemmy.ml to c/nolawns@lemmy.ml

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Especially ironic when suburbanites rave about how houses are infinitely better than apartments because they're "closer to nature." You want to be closer to nature? Let natural processes work and have a lawn of whatever grows in your area naturally (even an "invasive" species is better than lawn grasses, unironically, and lawn grasses are almost always also non-native species, just ones that can't actually survive in the environment.) Don't water, don't mow, don't fertilize, just let nature do its thing. It will also attract more pollinators, birds, wildlife in general and instead of a lawn, soon you'll have a natural meadow in your yard. That's nature, a lawn that needs excessive water, chemical fertilizers, and poison just to maintain isn't.

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[–] pjhenry1216@kbin.social 4 points 2 years ago

Is this from "101 ways to ensure your neighbors hate you"? Invasive species are a bad idea because they can actually harm native species, plus they can be difficult to prevent from spreading to others areas, in which you may get in trouble depending on local ordinances. It also "sounds" like it would like pretty, but 9 times out of 10, it is not. Many times the weeds are already an invasive species. There are other alternatives to planting grass that's a lot better for everyone involved. There's rocks if it's small enough, there's moss if you care about the environment, and if you really want a meadow (because let's face it, you'll likely get a fire hazard of weeds instead). Not all grass is invasive or non-native and you can purposely plant other things. And you may still have to water them as nature doesn't always care whether a tiny insignificant parcel of land because a dried out lawn fire waiting to happen.

Lawns will require maintenance to look good. And letting just nature take it's course is not always the best answer because it's no longer a balanced environment to begin with. The environment is already out of equilibrium and you could make it worse.