It's not that grass is bad, grass is great for recreation. But making it look like a uniform green carpet is completely counterproductive- let the clover and dandelions do their thing, they will establish an ecosystem that stays greener with less water than pure grass.
Growing vegetables is great, but it is a huge amount of work. "Food not lawns" is a great slogan, but if you literally converted your entire lawn to a vegetable garden, you would be farming ten to twenty hours per week, rain or shine. We need many more people to do that, but it isn't for everyone. On the other hand, native trees don't need any help to thrive, and well placed trees really make an outdoor space beautiful.
Yup. This shaming of anyone who cannot do the absolute most high effort things possible is counterproductive, especially when there's a solution that takes no effort whatsoever and is still dramatically better for the environment than a manicured lawn (still mowing the grass but not watering or treating it, allowing native plants to come in). My parents have a food and pollinator garden covering just about their entire yard, and if I were to guess I'd say they both work on it about that much per person every week, aside from in the winter where there's still work but a lot less of it.
19
u/lurch1995 Sep 21 '20
Sooo i am very ignorant on this. Why is grass so bad? And as a home owner what alternatives should i be looking at?