The common American lawn has a problematic history, and creates a lot of problems for the environment.
June 18, 2024—The Santa Clara Valley and San Francisco Peninsula, thanks to a happy accident of geography and climate, are home to countless species of beautiful native plants—most of which can be easily cultivated. And yet, here as elsewhere in California, the most common landscaping choice is the non-native grass lawn.
Gardening with native plants helps pollinators, which play a key role in the entire web of life. Natives are also good for birds and other wildlife.
In this excerpt from an episode of the “Jumpstart Nature” podcast, host Griff Griffith entertainingly explains how the traditional American lawn came to be, and the myriad harms it inflicts on the environment.
If you feel inspired by this piece, below you will find links to resources that will help you bring some beautiful wild nature back onto your property. The birds, bees and butterflies will thank you.
By Griff Griffith
We’ve somehow inherited a curious tradition that traces back to colonial England, where our lands are valued for their decorative aesthetics rather than their functionality. Landscaping your yard was like a way of showing that you colonized the patch of wild that you had dominion over. And this choice we’ve collectively made has far-reaching impacts that are hard to fully understand.
So let’s connect the dots between the history and our relationship with plants and our yards, and together we’ll uncover the yard of the future.
Just to set the stage, there are over 44 million acres of lawn in the United States. That’s more area than is used to grow corn. In fact, one estimate concluded lawns occupy more space in the United States than all eight of our largest irrigated crops combined.
It turns out that most grasses used in our lawns in the United States aren’t even native. Even Kentucky bluegrass is European and Asian. It was brought to the United States by European settlers and became popular in Kentucky and thus was given the name Kentucky bluegrass. And non-native plants in general do a terrible job at passing the food they create to the native animals.
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When I was a kid, it was common to compliment our neighbors for a meticulously manicured lawn with no weeds, or judge them for an unmowed, dying or weedy lawn. In many communities, this is still the case.
I’m not bashing lawns 100 percent here. They do have a purpose—especially if you have pets and kids. But surveys show that even then, many people don’t actually use their lawns. And we mismanage them.
So here’s a fun thought experiment. Imagine trying to explain the concept of a lawn to, say, Benjamin Franklin. It might sound like this.
“Hello, Ben. Thanks for asking about my lawn. It all started when the house was built. We tore up all the existing wild plants and we flattened the ground out, and then we planted thickly with European grass seed.
“Since that grass doesn’t natively grow here, we have to feed it synthetic fertilizer every few months and water it about once a week, sometimes multiple times. And unfortunately it grows too fast and too long. So we have to cut it with a lawnmower every week.”
At this point, Ben Franklin is probably thinking we’ve gone mad—wasting our time and money on a never-ending task.
“But wait, Ben, there’s more. The grass doesn’t like our climate much, so we have to apply fungicide a couple times each year to keep those fungal infections from killing it.
“We have a few pest insects that like to eat the roots of our grass, too—we accidentally brought those from Europe.—oops. But we just apply some insecticides and we do it a couple times a year and it gets rid of them. Unfortunately, those insecticides kill other organisms, too. You know, bees and stuff.
“Ugh, and we hate weeds, so we apply broadleaf herbicides to kill those too.”
Just wait until Ben learns about how those fertilizers, fungicides, and insecticides end up in our waterways, watersheds, many miles away from where we applied them. And it causes havoc, such as harmful algae blooms, amphibian die offs, and water contamination, dead zones.
Making it worse, many consumers don’t even realize they’re applying some of these chemicals because they’re often mixed in with the fertilizers.
Follow this link to listen to the Jumpstart Nature podcast, produced by Michael Hawk. This episode, hosted by Griff Griffiths, features insights from Dr. Doug Tallamy, co-founder of Homegrown National Park, Mary Phillips, head of the National Wildlife Federation’s Garden for Wildlife program, and Leslie Inman, manager of the Facebook group Pollinator Friendly Yards. Follow the link above to find a transcript, as well as links to cool and relevant resources.
Native Plant Resources for Santa Clara County and San Mateo County
On Calscape, a powerful website run by the California Native Plant Society, you can search for plants, nurseries, and customize your search to fit your exact needs.
The Santa Clara Valley Chapter of the California Native Plant Society can help you find nurseries and other resources specific to Santa Clara County and southern San Mateo County. It also has an online plant store that offers pickup or delivery.
The Grassroots Ecology Nursery sells native plants grown from seeds and cuttings gathered in Santa Clara, San Mateo, and Santa Cruz counties.
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