THE IMPACT OF LAWNS // environmental and cultural consequences of *grass* (yup) 

It sounds amazing with the upcoming garden, but fair that you're posponing, I can't even image how tought that would be otherwise. I hope everything went well though

That sounds amazing, I am so jealous haha 💚💚

Absolutely true 🌿👌 Thank you for watching 💚

That’s basically what I do. We moved onto our property 6 years ago. We mow our grass but it’s it. We have 2 gorgeous water oak trees on our property and refuse to use pesticides or anything that could possibly hurt the trees. We plant easy maintenance flowers and other plants don’t require anything other than the rainfall and sunlight to grow. We also have fruit trees that were already on the property. We have a ton of dandelions in our lawns but we utilize that in making teas and oils. My mother uses tons of pesticides and chemicals to make her lawn so unnaturally green and it irks me 😂 I’m at my home walking outside and picking things from the ground to make salads. She has to go to the store to buy hers bc she’s killed everything

haha did I overdo it? 😂✨

So sorry! I wanted to compliment Gittemary on her earrings. No offence!

@@Gittemary No, I love them! I am only distracted because of my ADHD. Thank you for your valuable content!

@@AlatarielMeneldur oh no I didn’t take any offence, I actually read it as a compliment, just tried to make a joke 💚💚 thank you for your good vibes and support 🌿

@@Gittemary NOT AT ALL! you are so beautiful 🥰

I'll be sending you good vibes, you guys rock for taking action in an otherwis nature-free neighbourhood 💚💚

@@Gittemary Thank you!! ✨

That is a great compromise 👌🌿✨💚 letting nature back in yes please

Robot mowers kill hedgehodges

I understand the sentiment, but want to add it’s also very valuable to put resources and effort into growing things things that native bugs, birds, critters, etc. can eat! :)

well... lower house prices means lower property taxes, am and less gentrification, maybe? :) Hopefully you can find some loopholes in the hoa rules, maybe plant some things that look ornamental but have value to you and wildlife, or otherwise get around them, and succeed in continuing to improve this space.

@@wiresa.reintresting7051 thank you! Yes, hoping to find some loopholes :)

If it’s possible, maybe they’ll let you convert at least some amount of it to garden, which is also pretty/ should look nice enough for them. :) My parents have a massive garden and only some lawn, but it looks very beautiful and they get compliments from the neighbors all the time.

@@coralovesnature yes, I hope so, gardens can be very beautiful :)

I'd be careful with fruited trees out the front, they can cause damage to passing cars if the fruits drop on the windows and cause car crashes, But yeah. The HOA sucks- I'm not American, and England doesn't really have much of a HOA (We have the council which has its own issues but isn't as bad as the HOA.) but my American friends get so annoyed when the HOA is mentioned. Even my friend who isn't into plants hates them for one reason for another. I was looking to find some way to help them find loopholes, like replacing the grass with a different species that's more colourful or something and I found something called Ruschia Nana. It's not much different from grass, but it's fire resistant, needs less water, doesn't grow over two inches, spreads somewhat similar to moss when it's dirt, stops 'weeds' from germinating so you don't have to maintain it as much *and* flowers whilst still having all of the visuals and walkability of grass. It's not much better than normal grass in terms of productivity, but if you're looking for something abit more substantive than grass, You can have a look at that. Here's a link to the video I found of it when searching: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-omT9k643oBw.html Edit: Oh, I also read up on them a little and found out that bees can produce honey with them. So yeah, I guess they're slightly more beneficial to the environment than grass is.

You're welcome 💚🌿

Thank you for the support!

Your mum sounds like an absolute queen 💚🌿

That sounds amazing, I am hoping to do a similar thing if ai get a garden one day - and thank you so much ❤️🌿

Love to hear about it 😎🌿

Thank you 🥺❤️

Love it 😍

@Trinity M I feel perfectly fine having a bit of lawn. The scynted bits are a great mulch and later on fertilizer for my garden, where I grow food. If I don't have that, I need to buy mulch from somewhere, which a) needs to travel, b) is harvested probably in an area which would give more to biodiversity and saving CO2, because they often use woods, or c) I can not grow much food from my garden, because it is evaporating more water an not holding it in the soil and have less nutrient in it, which will lead in the end to not fruitful soil which I will not harvest anymore and therefore become a grassland, which is not more beneficial from a agriculture and food-supply point of view then the lawn I have around my house (except you want to have there some animals...which anyway would not have the same amount of food from it). Lastly I have to say that I do not use pesticides, nor do I water the lawn, my lawn mower is electrical, charged with renewable energy. And as I said, while the children are playing outside, without me needing to be around them, I have time to harvest things. Leaving the children inside is not what I want, they shall be outside, but when else shall I find time to grow food, when I need to supervise them, while they are playing near the street. And one last thing: in the foreyard, there are trees and flowers, on the supporting walls are flowers, climbing plants which is a home for insects, lizards, etc., there is a bit of natural grassland with trees and bushes, so birds, mouses and so on have there place too, and there is a garden to grow a big part of our legumes and fruits, so I feel totally ok with having a few square meters of lawn (around 15 - 20% of all the surrounding space, including the vertical walls).

Okay goals 😍

I would like to be able to grow more edible but weather conditions are not sooo great.

That is such a way forward 😍

That is so great! Taking those areas that are naturally occurring in our areas is such a great way of letting nature reclaim these urban spaces

Nooooo I can barely get around grass already 😂😬🌿

Saaaaame, even more so after reaching for this video haha

Haha thaaaaat’s not amazing audience targeting 😂

yeah these company-created problems keep surprising me, and you know at this, I should be able to predict their douchebaggery 😭✨

that was not quite what I meant when I said you don’t get anything from a lawn, you don’t get a product, or a yield and it does not give anything back per se. The reason why our bushes and flower benefit from grass clippings is because we removed anything else, so had there not been grass that wouldn’t have been an issue 🌿 however, sure we can do things different and make small changes, and of course I cannot include all variants of lawn keeping, this was to highlight some of the main issues with it: the monoculture, the water consumption (which is necessary in some climates where lawns are still mandatory), the pesticides (which is the norm in many places, which is why I think it is important to talk about) ☺️ Lastly, most of these studies are done in the US yes, and yes it might also look different elsewhere, however I recognise these same issues in Denmark

I mean, if anything Astroturf is the most nonsensical and unsustainable version haha

@@Gittemary exactly

If you’re interested in storing carbon chopping down trees and native vegetation in favour of lawns is a pretty bad deal 😅 other than that I find it is interesting that you think I know nothing about lawns considering your comment seemed to ignore 90% of my focus points 👌 you’re free to comment and respond to my video without being rude 😅🌿

@@Gittemary 😂 let’s just say you are very versed in your (90%) old BS talking points but don’t have any idea about true modern landscaping architecture. You repeat 🔁 all the talking points and intentionally leave out the facts that lawns only use 3.5% of western states irrigation including CA, TX, NV, UT and AZ. Who use more water than every other state. If you completely changed every front yard, ball field, park and city landscape in America to Native species it would devastate microclimates and moreover the ecosystem with xeroscaping, overheated neighborhoods. This old way of thinking about lawns you perpetuate would hurt the climate and pesticide use more than simply leaving everything alone as is and slowly improve lawns with high quality drought resistant new grass cultivars, switch lawn equipment to battery operated solar charges equipment and use new irrigation systems for turf including subterranean irrigation for current lawn and new lawns. Please: learn what you are talking about and stop repeating guilt driven fascistic propaganda from the climate alarmists.

Pray do state what benefits lawns present to the environment and the gardener.😊