The Environmentally Unfriendly Obsession With Mowing Your Lawn
And an amusing anecdote to begin with
When I was in New York for the summer, we returned one evening - it was already dark - to the house we were staying in, only to find the neighbour mowing his lawn.
As I already said, it was dark, but he worked around that by having a small headlight on his ride-on mower, and he wore a light on his head too.
And I thought, that is beyond ridiculous.
What is it with this obsession, which I have never understood, about having permanently neatly trimmed lawns?
My father was just as obsessive about this back in the 1970s in England. His collection of lawn-moving devices (e.g., push mower, electric mower, Flymo, ride-on mower) was impressive, but he was always looking for the ultimate machine, which he never found. Not even his expensive ride-on mower satisfied him.
I, on the other hand, have always disliked gardening with a vengeance.
My father had to bribe me with money to mow his damned lawn for him, and he frequently told me that I would feel differently about it when I had a place of my own.
How wrong could he be!
I disliked it even more when I had to do it all. So much so that I eventually paid someone to mow my lawns and keep everything looking trim. The money was well worth it to me.
Of course, back then, I cared too much about what my neighbours thought. This was England, and when all your neighbours had neat, well-maintained lawns, you sort of felt like you had to too. Not because we had HOAs, or any similarly draconian organizations - just the sense of what was expected of you and bowing down to that.
Now, however, since I moved to the USA and live on a 20-acre property that wouldn’t know a lawn if it saw one (I’m on top of a mountain in what I guess you’d call a high desert), I don’t have to worry about it.
Which is good, because I prefer to see plants and shrubs growing wild, as they should do. Even in England, I would have preferred what I called a cottage garden, which was my euphemism for a garden that did what it damned well wanted.
It’s only more recently that I’ve discovered the downside to lawn-mowing, which happened at the same time as I generally grew more environmentally aware.
The main problems with regular lawn mowing include:
Water usage, where, in the USA, nearly nine billion gallons of water is used per day for garden and landscape irrigation, according to the EPA.
It can damage local ecosystems by replacing important wild grasses and plants.
Frequently mown lawns produce more greenhouse gasses than they soak up.
The usage of fertilizers and fertilizers causes significant pollution in the air or from rain water run-off. For example, fertilizers wash off lawns into storm sewers and eventually flow into the sea or ocean, where excess nutrients can cause algal blooms that choke out sunlight and kill the submerged aquatic grasses that young fish and shellfish need for shelter from predators.
Lawns that are mowed frequently have lower insect and plan diversity.
Regular mowing cuts flowering stems so that most plants can’t produce seeds, and it also clips the growing tips of many plants.
The disturbance caused by intensive mowing provides opportunities for both pests and weeds.
According to a Swedish study published in 2001, “operating a typical four-stroke, four horsepower lawn mower for an hour produced the equivalent emissions of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) as driving a car for 93 miles (150 kilometers).” And the Outdoor Power Equipment Institute estimates that, on average, people use their lawn mowers for 25 hours a year; this is the equivalent, then, of driving 2,330 miles (3,750 kilometers), although 25 hours per year seems on the low side based on my own observations.
Other emissions from lawn mowers include carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, ethane, ethanol, ethene, methane, nitrogen oxides, and particulates.
Even electric lawn mowers have their problems. Firstly, unless they are powered by electricity generated from clean sources, you are still abusing the earth’s finite resources. And secondly, if you go for the cordless, battery-powered mowers, then when those batteries finally die, they end up in landfill sites.
So, apart from stopping mowing your lawn altogether, what can you do?
At the very least, you could mow your lawn less frequently, because this is still better than continuing to cut the grass once or more per week.
You could plant something other than regular grass. For example, clover lawns are not only tolerant to drought but also provide a fantastic base for pollinators such as bees. In addition, clover lawns remain green throughout the summer, and they increase the popularity and diversity of bee species.
Well-maintained wildflower gardens produce stunning blooms all year round.
It seems to me that humans have been trying to tame nature for a long, long time, arrogantly, in my opinion. The very idea of something growing wild, without needing to be tended and shaped by mankind, is offensive to many. And people will, apparently, spend inordinate amounts of money, time, and energy doing their best to make it conform to their will.
But for what?
Why can’t people appreciate the innate beauty that is everywhere? (Well, it was, before men decided to “civilize” everywhere. Now, we have to drive, in our carbon-unfriendly cars, to special nature reserves to see the world as it should be seen.)
And, more urgently, why do people continue killing off the bees, who are vital to our survival too?
As Mokokoma Mokhonoana said, “Man’s exploitation of the environment is a circuitous route to unintended suicide.”
drinking and smoking
in the local pub
nascent cancer