That symbol of American suburbia is an ecological dead zone that's bad for us and the planet.
By Agnes Walton Senior Video Reporter |
This has been a year of extreme heat and extreme drought across much of the planet. We've all seen the pictures: cracked earth, roaring wildfires, rapidly draining reservoirs. Against this bleak backdrop, America's lush green lawns offer a glorious escape from the parched brown beyond. |
Lawns have long been a national obsession. The quintessentially American architecture of suburbia is arranged on and around grass — encircling houses, decorating malls, surrounding schools and extending playing fields. And suburban life itself revolves around the lawn, from neighborly landscaping one-upmanship to barbecues and family gatherings. |
Despite numerous sweaty, mosquito-plagued hours spent mowing them, people clearly love and enjoy their lawns. |
That only makes it harder to say what I'm going to say next: Lawns are actually terrible not just for the environment but for our health, too. |
The classic manicured lawn is a status symbol imported from long-dead European aristocrats. It is a monoculture of nonnative plants that don't belong in America's ecosystems and offer very little value to the birds, pollinators and other animals we love. |
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In our new Opinion video, Kirby Ferguson and I delve into some of these problems, which include the astounding amount of water needed to keep our lawns vibrant, the toxic herbicides and chemical fertilizers we saturate them with and the air pollutants that billow out of mowers and into our lungs. |
We also wanted to dig into solutions. Making this video, we were surprised to discover just how aesthetically pleasing the many alternatives to standard turf grass are. Planting a few native plants and drought-tolerant native grasses and adding clover and wildflowers to your lawn are all positive steps. |
With such sound options available, the abiding fascination with bright, tightly manicured grass lawns might start to seem a little bizarre, especially considering the cost to us and the planet. And they're really easy to replace. So maybe it's time to start working with our surroundings, not battling them. |
What Our Readers Are Saying |
This piece has moved me to action, hopefully. 1) I will ask my town if I can legally convert our modest-size lawn into a nice rock garden (if not, will lobby to get the ordinances changed), and 2) I will check with my wife if she's in favor (if not, will lobby her — therein lies the real challenge). — Mostly_Bitter_Old_Man, Somewhere_on_the_Fringe One thing that no one ever addresses in these articles is that a lot of families rely on those lawns for usable outdoor space. I cannot play with my kids in a cactus field. So tell me what the alternatives are to grass, because you can't walk all over other plants and play soccer on it. — Greg, Los Angeles We are facing the prospect of wholesale ecological collapse. I can't control deforestation in the Amazon, but I can and did convert my lawn to native plants that support pollinators and local species. It has a much smaller carbon footprint and is about the same amount of money and work as my old monoculture monstrosity. — Metastasis, Texas A big thank-you from a desert dweller getting ready to rip out the front lawn of a newly purchased home on a double lot in the drought-stricken Coachella Valley. Hey, state lawmakers! How about serious rebates for turf removal? — Sam Chittum, Palm Springs, Calif. |
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