How Green do you want it?

Paul O’Neel
10/27/2011

From the title, I’m sure there are individuals reading this who think that I am talking about green energy. Well… I am actually talking about green lawns in Stevens Point. What has always struck me weird is how people will go too great lengths to manicure their yards. Much of my life I have lived outside the city limits and maintaining your grass is not a huge priority. After living in Stevens Point for a year, I see the mentality is much different in the city.
This past summer I had observed my neighbors spend hours a day watering, mowing, and fertilizing their yards. One day I remember driving down my block, when it was raining, and saw sprinklers running. What sense does that make? I spoke with my neighbor next door on hot summer day about his daily routine of lawn care. He informed me that he didn’t really have anything else to do so he was going to have the greenest yard in the neighborhood. Really? You mean to tell me that going fishing, reading a book, or 1000 other activities you could be doing would not be a better way to spend your time, not to mention better for the environment.
For the next few minutes I spoke with my neighbor about adverse effects of fertilizing his lawn, especially since he is located right next to a storm drain, and how increased nutrient loads are detrimental to aquatic ecosystems. We spoke of increased water usage and how watering one’s yard really is a poor use of this resource and that on average a family of 4 uses nearly 400 gallons of water a day, 30% of that in outdoor use (U.S. EPA). We also discussed how in these times of increasing fuel costs that mowing and trimming your yard is extremely expensive. According to a Yale University study, the U.S. uses 600 million gallons of gasoline for lawn care activities including mowing, trimming, and other power equipment use. Some suggestions I made to reduce adverse effects were to fertilize only when needed, if watering is needed to do so early in the morning to reduce excessive evaporation, and to use a push reel mower to eliminate the use of a gasoline powered mower.
A few days after our conversation I had noticed my neighbor was back at it. None of the ideas I had presented to him were incorporated into his lawn care routine. Watering, fertilizing, and mowing were all continued without any change in behavior. Thinking about our conversation, I thought I had made a convincing argument for reducing some of these poor practices. Why then didn’t behavior change? Your guess is as good as mine. The story of my neighbor illustrates the wasteful practices that we are all guilty of in some form. We all have to start thinking about how we conduct ourselves on this planet and quit worrying about superficial things like how green our yards are.
References:
United States Environmental Protection Agency. . Accessed 25th October, 2011.
U.S. Lawn Care Facts as Annual Totals and Percentages from Redesigning the American Lawn, Yale University Press, 1993.