221–230 of 277 posts
I wondered if it was helping a lot until I took a few walks in the grass and nesting birds were startled by my presence (I let them be after I knew where they were!). I don't think they'd had the chance to nest there when it was being cut for silage.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Other do better at hosting butterfly caterpillars, bees, etc, which helps feed birds and other wildlife, so I think that’s a great idea that everyone should consider.
Agreed, I want my yard to contribute to the ecosystem instead of contributing to my “status” in suburbia.
The previous owner of my house was maintening a picture perfect green. With the kids and the jobs, I didn't want to follow that practice. Too much time for a soil not made for this, lots of fertilizer, various chemicals... I fix the dead patches every spring and autumn with clover seeds and compost made from grass clippings, egg shells and vegetables/fruits peels. Zero fertilizer or weed killers, I remove by hand the…
I don't know if you're aware of this (you probably are but I'm posting it for readers anyway) but there's a movement for doing this in many aspects of our nature management called permaculture. It's pretty cool!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I live surrounded by hundreds of acres of forest. Wildlife is abundant, but there is absolutely no keeping up with the mosquito and tick population. Using deet and grooming ourselves and our dogs after they come inside every single time is just a fact of life.
It's a slow moving solution, but abundant bat boxes do wonders for mosquito control. Of course you'll never get rid of them entirely, but the population can be kept really low. Also promoting dragonflies helps a ton. For ticks, wolves are actually really important. They keep deer and coyote populations in check. Deer of course feed ticks, but what's really interesting is that coyotes have a two fold effect on ticks.…
What are good ways to do that? Everything I saw that's good for dragonflies is good for mosquitos, but I'm not going to promote mosquitos. (Sure they've got a place in the world, but I wish it wasn't so close to my house)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm going to be that guy and point out that clover wasn't considered a weed until a chemical that killed clover, but not grass, was developed by Dow Chemical and the company wanted to sell it as a weed killer, so they ran a campaign about it. https://laidbackgardener.blog/2020/11/04/clover-in-the-lawn-... The secret was to turn clover from a friend into an enemy. Pesticide companies decided to launch an intensive adv…
That’s great but, I independently came to the conclusion that clover looks horrible on a nice lawn.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's the point of a manicured English garden? What's the point of a fine suit or dress? What's the point of a nice oil painting? What's the point of a Porsche 911 or Ferrari 488? People have different preferences and that used to be OK.
Lawns would be like everyone owning the same model of Porsche.
This is happening in my front yard literally as I type this!
The colony in my tree is electing a new Queen. Last week half the colony left with the old queen - and a bee-keeper noticed they were all bunched up in the yard and brought a hive and harvested them off the lawn. (Ill ad pics of that later)
I havent needed to mow the lawn in months, and this literally just happened in the last 30 mins as I returned to costco...
Listen with audio they are swarming like mad!
https://imgur.com/gallery/2nnZBy4
---
What was crazy is I read this article this AM before heading to errands, and then I came home to this!
And I was recognizing the hive was there, and I was recognizing I havent mowed in months! and I planted a crap-ton of bee friendly stuff in the yard last summer...
Wait, what? Weekly mowing? What the hell? Who does that? This sounds absolutely disastrous for grass and its ecosystem. I don't see a reason to mow more than a few times per year .
Earlier quoted context omitted.
A lot of people would never live somewhere lacking greenery.
Are you implying that not having a lawn means not having greenery? I would argue the opposite is true. While a monoculture lawn may be "green" it's about as barren a green space as you can imagine.
What I do see all the time is the front setback given over 100% to driveway and parking. These neighborhoods become very drab, even though if you look on satellite view there’s plenty of plant life - it’s just all locked away in private backyards.
My personal preference is neither. Pull the buildings right up to the sidewalk. Present an interesting pleasant facade to pedestrians. But to the extent you are going to have setbacks, they should at least have some redeeming aesthetic value.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Might like going barefoot and not stepping on bees.
Yeah Americans not wanting to interact with pollinators is why they are disappearing from our environments. You could achieve the same thing with zero-scaping also, not like you need to waste water to create a pollinator-free zone. But then it wouldn't look the certain way you want, would it? That seems to be the main concern for Americans.
