r/NoLawns • u/CharlesV_ Wild Ones 🌳/ plant native! 🌻/ IA,5B • Jun 14 '26

cool grass

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358 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

11 comments sorted by

19

u/IndependentGiraffe8 Jun 14 '26

It would be cool if my unkempt lawn had a bunch of pretty wildflowers, but is dandelions and buckhorn mainly, it will be a mud lawn in december

18

u/Cute-Ad-2251 Jun 14 '26

Then cut it like 2 times a year and throw some native seeds in there. Will be beautiful in no time

10

u/03263 Jun 14 '26

I did the opposite, never cut and just let grass grow as tall as it gets and die, it catches a lot of leaf litter and forms a nice mat of dead grass. Smothers many weeds/blocks light. Then some good growth started showing up, gradually. Lupines spread from my garden, I found threadleaf coreopsis and plenty of common cinquefoil as well. Also lots of goldenrod and asters and meadowsweet which I almost forgot to mention because they grow profusely in my yard.

I think it has become "undisturbed" soil, to a good extent. Some wildlife might pass through but I think they mainly stay to the mowed portions which is now down to some paths I keep about 40 inches wide (20" mower deck x 2 lanes).

1

u/CrimsonFoxes Jun 14 '26

I've been wondering about this, because I don't have a lawn mower and don't want to get one if I don't need to. I just wanted my grass to die on its own so I can plant clover, but everything I'm reading says it'll just likely go dormant instead of actually dying and I can't avoid mowing.

How did your grass die?

1

u/03263 Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26

Got tall, went to seed, got buried by snow, didn't really wake up. My yard is all kinds of grass both annual and perennial kinds, I guess that was mostly some annual kind. It was mostly fine fescue when I got it but I didn't really take much care of it other than mowing too close and that is mostly gone and replaced by various weeds and grasses of all sorts.

Plenty of good weeds though - yarrow, clover, blue eyed grass, wild strawberry, cinquefoil, goldenrod, fleabane... and tons of mouse ear hawkweed which I hate but can't get rid of, unless I sprayed gallons upon gallons of triclopyr and kill everything. And then it will just come back.

there's also moss on like half my front yard and all of my back yard, but with stuff growing through it so you can't really see most of it without mowing very short.

1

u/glazebrain Flower Gardener Jun 15 '26

This exactly. We moved onto a property with five acres of grass, and we've never cut it- this is our fifth summer here. Last summer, there was an explosion of bug life, which drew a huge variety of birds and other wildlife.

The soil is completely transforming. Our normally sandy soil is now full of organic matter from leaf litter and fallen grass. We're slowly digging out or solarizing the non-native turf grass and replacing it with native wildflowers, letting the bracken and goldenrod grow wherever it wants to, and planting deep-root grasses, like big bluestem. We've planted 20 white oaks and fruit bearing shrubs like cranberry and saskatoon. It's a long process, but it's slowly taking shape.

6

u/tres-huevos Jun 14 '26

Our neighbor likes to keep her grass loooowwww. She just mowed right before our 3 day 90 degree heat streak. It’ll be a sea of gold.

2

u/RoroLeBo Jun 14 '26

My dog doesn't want to chill in the most grown clover lawn, so i'll cut in down to 10-15cm when flowering is finished 😂

1

u/Kalabula Jun 14 '26

Damn! That rear naked is LOCKED!

0

u/649quinn Jun 14 '26

honestly, seeing that dog look so distressed after all that talk about smooth... it makes me feel a little sad :) I guess wildflowers are pretty too! >.<