Breaking the lawn: Grow more than grass

Rubi Orozco Santos and V. Quevedo
La Semilla Food Center
This article was originally published in the Las Cruces Sun News» on August 24, 2019.

This Las Cruces resident is growing corn, squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, okra, rosemary, and chiles instead of grass. La Semilla Food Center

On Highway 28 south of Las Cruces, a farmer faces a thousand-dollar fine for allowing wild greens on his front yard. “I eat them; they’re great in salads,” he says. He’s not alone. Despite the ubiquity of lawn culture in North America, there have throughout history been people who resist the concept.

Settlers in what is now the eastern U.S. found broomstraw, wild rye and marsh grass, which their livestock extinguished, leading to the first grass seeds being imported from Europe. Lawns first appeared in estates in 1700s England and France; though these were more likely planted with chamomile or thyme.

Lawns were first constructed in the U.S. in 1733 by wealthy landowners influenced by European tastes, states Virginia Jenkins in “The Lawn: A history of an American obsession.” Initially, only the rich could afford to hire the workers needed to maintain the grass; a lawn was a mark of wealth and status. Scottish immigrants brought golf and lawn bowling, sports requiring smooth, soft surfaces that meant cultivating grass — a nonedible, water-intensive plant.

Community cleanup campaigns in the early 1900s promoted lawns while ignoring “the existence of other standards for yard care” held by indigenous people and people of African descent. The latter would “deliberately clear their yards of grass to keep mosquitoes (sic), rodents, snakes, and brush fires away from the house.”

While lawns grew fairly easily in the northeastern U.S., hotter and drier climates could not sustain them. A peculiar stubbornness led Americans to force this aesthetic on all regions by any means necessary. Jenkins wrote, “(from) the male perspective, the front lawn is an area to be controlled and mastered. A good lawn has sharp edges with strict boundaries. No weeds or animal life should mar the manicured and manufactured perfection of the grass. All intruders must be guarded against and, when found, killed.” The desire for a pristine, emerald green yard led to spraying paint on lawns and removing unwanted plants by stabbing them with acid-dipped sharp sticks, covering them in gasoline, or, eventually, herbicides.

The agricultural revolution of the 20th century and defoliant war chemicals provided the weapons necessary to fertilize lawns and kill unwanted plants with ease. With the advent of herbicides containing toxic chemicals like 2,4-D, plants that were beneficial to lawns became collateral damage. To cover this up, any plant that the chemical killed was reclassified as a “weed.” This was the case with clover, welcomed in lawns until the 1950s.

“The standard held up for lawns that requires the grass to be of a single color, texture, and size was unrealistic even for the most devoted gardener; however, it enabled manufacturers to sell more weapons to homeowners in their battle against nature.” The American lawn industry cemented its place in the market with multiple products and services. In 1987, its annual revenues were $2.8 billion. In 2019, it reported $99 billion.

By the 70s and 80s, court challenges against “weed ordinances” began appearing. One court found the grass-cutting section of an ordinance unconstitutional. Rodale Press won a case against a local weed ordinance by growing a meadow on company grounds. Finding no effect on neighbors’ “health, safety, cleanliness, or comfort,” the judge restrained the borough from enforcing its ordinance on the company’s meadow. More recently, Chicago gardeners growing native pollinator plants challenged the city’s weed ordinance.

The Lawn Institute once stated the natural lawn movement had “been festering for years” but brushed it off as “environmentalists … mainly talking to themselves rather than the public.” We seek to change that. Our yards hold the potential for home meadows, food gardens, native plants, pollinator habitats or xeriscaping.

Beyond aesthetic preferences, what we do in our yards undeniably impacts the environment. The US EPA estimated that yard trimmings (34.7 million tons) comprised 13.3% of municipal solid waste in 2015 and that using native plants or plants adapted to the local climate can reduce outdoor water use by nearly 50 percent. This is significant. Nationwide, Americans use over 7 billion gallons of water per year to water their lawns and gardens.

In a region with limited water and food access, it would make sense to not drain resources for a lawn. We are living in a time that demands change, including small changes we can make at a local, personal level.

A lawn originally referred to a glade in the woods, but later designated artificial stretches of land. It’s time to consider a return to its original meaning.

Sources: Turf War

This article is part of a series by La Semilla Food Center that seeks to spark curiosity in and increase appreciation for the Chihuahuan Desert ecosystem.