WEBlue

Since we moved to suburban America, we've noticed that there are many lawn-obsessive people living here. Lawn OCD seems alive and well in this country.

People around us not only mow their lawns VERY regularly, which is just about all we do, really...and not all that regularly either. But they also fertilize their lawns with chemicals, spray with other chemicals to prevent ticks & other insects, re-sod and re-seed at intervals, and water via a bewildering variety of sprinkler/watering systems.

Some of them seem to spend endless time, money, and products on their lawns, or else they pay someone else a lot of money to come do all that work week after week.

These lawns look lovely (in a slightly sci-fy, surreal way) but I just can't see myself doing all this for a few strips of green. In fact, our lawn is full of weeds (daisies & clover, which I love!) and not terribly green right now unless it's rained recently. It doesn't look nearly so nice, but I'm not going to water it, or throw chemicals or even more grass seed on it. Hopefully it will survive.....

I agree with this blogger about this "lunacy":
http://www.thehealthyhomeeconomist.c...american-lawn/

civilservant

I bet you're a real outcast

Id be the same, more important things to obsess about in life than your lawn.

robin1234

Where we live, far northern part of New York State, you can just brush hog or weed whack an area that has been brush, or mixed weeds, brambles etc. for years, and after merely mowing it a few times, it miraculously turns to a lawn. Not a grassy manicured lawn, obviously, but a nice mix of grasses, dandelions, clovers and other weeds. Unlike down south (Boston area, where we used to live..) it is so wet and cool up here that the lawn stays green all summer and fall, too, unlike Boston etc. where it goes brown in high summer and stays that way till the next spring.

And we've never used any chemicals or fertilizers anywhere in the yard. The wildlife seem to appreciate it!

WEBlue

Not exactly an outcast, but ... we seem to be in the somewhat "cranky" minority.

Two abutting neighbours are like us, can't be bothered to do more than mow once in a while with the ordinary gas-powered mower (self-propelled?). The grass gets yellow when it's dry, and then greens up when it rains. Our lawns are not carpets of lush green, but kind of raggedy off-green.

One abutting neighbour has the garden service come in once a week, the same service that does many houses around. The mowing-guy drives out of the truck on a stand-on mower and zips around the property quick as a wink. Their lawn is smooth & even, their flower beds are perfectly mulched, etc.

Yet this neighbour's property doesn't have quite the vivid deep green grass colour of the neighbours round the block who get the garden service AND have the in-ground automatic sprinklers. THOSE lawns are breath-takingly green and those flower beds are spectacular!

I just want my flowers and my tiny vegetable patch to survive, so I do get out the watering-can for those when it hasn't rained for a week. But the grass? I just can't bear to water grass....

My husband says I'm not assimilating properly...as well as trying to grow an English garden in a place where that won't work.

scrubbedexpat091

Where I lived in San Diego area, you could always tell the area's that had those organizations that control everything you do, I forget what they are called, from those that were free from such rules because of the lack of lawns....lol

Cost of maintaining a lawn in the summer costs a small fortune in water bills.

Nutmegger

My thick patch of lovely emerald green broadleaf weeds is always neatly mowed. It doesn't care if there is drought or monsoon. And it looks great -- from a distance!

AdobePinon

I'm safe since it is illegal to plant a lawn in Santa Fe.

Uncle_Bob

The flowerbeds belong to you and the lawn belongs to your husband, as stated on your immigration papers. If your lawn is brown and full of weeds then your husband is fat and lazy. You didn't mention the state of your flowerbeds but i'm guessing the same

Fortunately for me I live in a HOA area, they take care of the trailer trash. You got a brown lawn you pay, don't want to pay then they place a lien on your a house, rules are signed when you buy the house. The HOA also supply reclaimed water for lawn watering and the golf course via a network of natural lakes, how nice.

I fertilize my lawn twice a year because funny enough the kids prefer the grass to dried cracked mud and brown straw. Fancy that. I don't mind mowing, I mow once a week or every two weeks, I'm not sure if that's regular by your standards but you do come across as a lazy type. Mowing is exercise and there's nothing better than sitting down with a beer and enjoying the look of a nice lawn when its done.

I find it odd that when someone takes pride in something other people can still find it in themselves to get their knickers in a twist about it. If taking care of the lawn is OCD lunacy to them you can imagine what the state their house is in and their personal hygiene etc.

Karrie72

I'm not a member of the OCD lawn club, most definitely not. I'd rather putter about in my vegetable garden and grow some flowers.

Pulaski

Sounds exactly like mine.

Uncle_Bob

But by no means does that make it right or socially acceptable

WEBlue

Oh no, Uncle Bob, have you drunk the Koolaid?

You need to step. away. from. your. lawn... and seek help immediately. If not sooner! Good luck to you.

ChocolateBabz

I'm only as obsessed as my H.O.A. insist I be, but I kid you not the lawn gets better care than my hair, a lot better

redglade

I NEVER waste water on the lawn - it gets mown once a week in the summer and the clippings left to return nutrients to the soil. That's it. I never apply insecticide or weedkiller and it looks fine. My flower beds actually take up more space than the grass - less work and more interesting. A "perfect" lawn doesn't provide habitat for any pollinating insects and a dangerous amount of chemical product used or in most cases overused on keeping it perfect ends up polluting local streams, rivers and eventually the Gulf of Mexico anyway. I agree that people can obsess over whatever they want, but people wasting precious resources and polluting the environment on having the perfect lawn annoys me no end. I agree with the original poster - nothing wrong with a few clover or dandelion flowers anyway.

Bob

A lot of folks around here turn the grass into a veg patch or fill in concrete... Very Brazilian thing apparently.

A few streets over, they're a little more anal about it.

Me, I just leave it to the chap upstairs.

I am surprised the striped lawn isn't as popular here though with all the lawn mania.