I don’t think it makes sense to criticize grass in areas where it’s a native ground-cover plant. Green lawns are bad in North America because they require an absurd amount of resources to stay alive. European lawns stay green under heavy layers of snow and are never watered.
Still, (entirely) green lawns in Europe are a result of cutting the lawn all the time. If we give it more time to grow between each time it’s cut it’ll grow into a colourful oasis of all kinds of flowers that are both beautiful and allow insects to thrive. It doesn’t always make sense - if you want to lay down on the grass for a nap you’d rather have an even surface of grass and relatively fewer insects - but there’s too many green lawns around here as well.
My family started transforming the lawn in my childhood home into a field of flowers a few years ago, and the transformation is fantastic. Every year there are new flowers popping up. When cutting the lawn it helps to leave the cuttings a couple of days or so to dry, so that the seeds have a chance to fall off and enter the soil.
The tram track in the bottom picture looks like it’s doing good. A bunch clovers, and they probably won’t discourage other wildflowers as/if they appear. There seems to be some white flowers there already.
That makes sense that grass is a good option in some climates (especially with the diversity people have pointed out is in the 2nd picture). I guess I’m wondering what would be a good option for arid parts of North America, or other places where grass would be a poor choice?
I don’t think it makes sense to criticize grass in areas where it’s a native ground-cover plant. Green lawns are bad in North America because they require an absurd amount of resources to stay alive. European lawns stay green under heavy layers of snow and are never watered.
Still, (entirely) green lawns in Europe are a result of cutting the lawn all the time. If we give it more time to grow between each time it’s cut it’ll grow into a colourful oasis of all kinds of flowers that are both beautiful and allow insects to thrive. It doesn’t always make sense - if you want to lay down on the grass for a nap you’d rather have an even surface of grass and relatively fewer insects - but there’s too many green lawns around here as well.
My family started transforming the lawn in my childhood home into a field of flowers a few years ago, and the transformation is fantastic. Every year there are new flowers popping up. When cutting the lawn it helps to leave the cuttings a couple of days or so to dry, so that the seeds have a chance to fall off and enter the soil.
The tram track in the bottom picture looks like it’s doing good. A bunch clovers, and they probably won’t discourage other wildflowers as/if they appear. There seems to be some white flowers there already.
North America has all climates; not just desert. There are millions of hectares of land that require no effort to grow grass. Lots more than Europe.
That makes sense that grass is a good option in some climates (especially with the diversity people have pointed out is in the 2nd picture). I guess I’m wondering what would be a good option for arid parts of North America, or other places where grass would be a poor choice?
Can be, we make sure we replant grass with mixtures that contain multiple species. There are those who go full “golf grass”, we call them snobs here.