Lawn Conversion: How-to tips and guidance to remove
your thirsty lawn and exotic plants and create a beautiful Native
Plants Landscape, Organic Vegetable Garden, Naturescape or Xeriscape ...
With the encouragement of city halls in various parts of the
United States and increasing concern for the ecology in recent years, many home owners are ready to rip out their lawns and
create beautiful Native Plants Landscapes, Xeriscapes (primarily in the
Southwest) and Organic Vegetable Gardens in their place. Many cities
actually provide grants to folks who convert their lawns to native
plants landscaping, as shown below, while others use the punitive
approach of increasing water utility rates in times of scarce water
resources. During an economic depression, the punitive method
can hurt some people very deeply, and may be perceived as
opportunistic, especially if no credit is given for prior lawn
conversion work.
Artificial turf and decorative
stones have also nudged out the growing grass in some places. Gardens you can
eat are
more likely to be established in the backyard away from public access, hungry
animals, etc. But some green garden enthusiasts proudly show off their
carrots, grapes, oranges and apples to all passers-by!
Scarce water resources, costs of time and labor to mow and
maintain lawns (including removing dandelions and other weedy intruders),
air pollution from gasoline-powered lawn mowers, ecological values and a simple
preference for native plant landscaping or growing your own food, are major
motivations for this trend. Clearly economy and ecology are the primary
carrots in addition to the stick of aches and pains from weeding and maintaining
thirsty lawns and exotic plants. Guidelines from permaculture and sustainable agriculture
help to promote a cultural evolution in the urban way of life. It's
enticing to grow a garden you can eat! With current drought conditions in California and other western states in the USA, increased costs of water and governmental restrictions lead you to consider alternatives to large lawns.
The articles below show various methods of removing an existing
lawn and several choices and resources for the more eco-friendly alternatives.
Some people plan to remove the entire lawn in one fell swoop and gather
resources to make that happen. Others start from the edges of their
driveways or walkways and incrementally replace the lawns one patch at a time.
Even without city grants, you can start to reduce lawn costs by removing small
strips of grass at convenient times and places. It doesn't have to be an
all-out killer project, if you plan it carefully.
Incremental Lawn Removal - Transformation
For quick results, the incremental plan can be accomplished by the use of a few hand tools, such as
the Ergonica Turbo Weed Twister,
hoes and shovels, for example, for removing an existing lawn in small strips as
well as preparing the
soil for native plants or organic vegetables, all in one day. Many people
like this approach, since you
don't have to make a big investment or plan the entire project to start your
lawn conversion project. You can progress at a pace that's comfortable for
you, and make planning and design decisions as you go along.
First Step Planning Guide: Ten Square Feet Test Area
With a supply of mulch at hand, and using available tools or
possibly some new tools if needed, time yourself when removing about ten square
feet of turf. Cover the area with mulch about
3-4
inches deep. This can be your gauge for planning the rest of the
project. If you have new native plants or edible goodies ready to plant,
you can complete the transformation in one day for your 10-square-feet test
area. This can also help you decide on whether you need additional tools,
mulching material, or
people power.
Instead of
waiting for mulch to kill your lawn or assembling a crew with heavy duty
tools or tractors to rip out your entire lawn, you can get immediate satisfaction by
quickly removing and replacing your lawn mostly by yourself, one small strip at a time!
Or give a neighborhood kid a few bucks to give you a hand if you get really
ambitious. Start working and start saving one day at a time. One small strip for you, one giant salve
for Mom Nature!
Helpful Tips and Information by EPA: Considering
Landscaping with Native Plants? Whether you are thinking
about planting a small urban plot or a few acres with native
landscaping, you may have some questions about getting started and
what you can expect from your new landscape. First, you need
to decide what you want to do with your land. Are you going to
incorporate some native plants into your garden? Restore an area to
its original pre-settlement condition? Is your goal to attract
wildlife or to solve an environmental problem such as flooding?
Suggestions for native landscaping on residential properties:
Draw your plan on paper
Start out small, only do a little at a time.
Tell your neighbors what you plan to do. Consider putting up a sign (e.g. Jane's Wildflower Garden) to define your natural area. This will help others feel more comfortable with a different approach to landscaping.
Talk with local officials to find out if there are any local ordinances you should be aware of (e.g. restrictions on the height of vegetation). If so, will they help you get a variance?
You may even want to register your natural landscape with the Backyard Wildlife Habitat Program of the National Wildlife Federation or with the National Institute for Urban Wildlife. There may also be other local associations available to assist you.
Los Angeles DWP offers incentives for removing lawns -
Faced with another year of drought, the Los Angeles Department of
Water and Power is offering customers a cash incentive to replace
their grass lawns with drought-tolerant plants. The current deal
is that the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power will pay $2
per square foot, up to $4,000 total, if you replace water-guzzling
grass with drought-tolerant landscaping. Imagine that — the DWP
sending you money instead of siphoning it right out of your wallet.
DWP spokesman Joe Ramallo said that in the six months that ended Jan. 31,
residential and commercial customers ripped out 813,000 square feet of turf.
Since 2009, 6.6 million square feet of grass have become history. Ramallo
said there was a tenfold increase in applications last fall, when the price
per square foot went up from $1.50.
Long Beach is offering $3 per square foot in its lawn-to-garden program,
with a maximum payout of $3,000. Kevin Wattier, general manager of the
city's water department, told me there's been a spike in applications since
the city upped its payment from $2.50 a square foot.
New landscaping plans must be approved
by the DWP before they are implemented and evidence of installation
must be provided to receive the rebate.
How to turn my lawn into a Food Not Lawns project: Claremont
Food Not Lawns is a local community organization dedicated to
replacing our lawns with edible gardens in the name of
sustainability and self-sufficiency. We hold monthly meetings which
are both social and educational.
Santa Fe Sustainability with Solar:
Solarsmith, a green building firm out of Santa Fe, New Mexico,
recently helped Betsy Armstrong and Richard Barr build an
eco-friendly, traditional southwest-style home in the foothills of
Santa Fe. Except for a small orchard, the design uses the
xeriscape method of landscaping, which means using low-maintenance,
native plants that require little water.
Smart Growth Naturescaping What is Lawn
Conversion? Many homeowners today are choosing to convert
their lawns or a section of their lawns to a more natural state.
This includes planting hardy native plant species of grasses,
shrubs, wildflowers and/or trees, which require less maintenance
than the conventional bright green lawn. Naturescaping is similar to xeriscaping,
which is the term for yards designed to use little or no water. The term naturescaping
includes other aspects like biodiversity into the design.
Water Efficient
Landscaping Methods (Xeriscape) at
Texas Christian University - TCU.
Seven xeriscape principals:
Start with a good design
Improve the soil
Use mulch
Limit lawn areas
Choose low-water-use plants
Water Efficiently
Practice good maintenance
East Mesa makes switch: On July 25, 2007 staff from
Mesa’s utilities conservation department rolled out a revamped
rebate program. The city will pay homeowners $500 for getting rid of
grass in favor of a xeriscape yard. To receive the rebate,
homeowners must remove at least 500 square feet of grass and
re-landscape with plants requiring less water. A list of acceptable
plants, along with a rebate application, is available at
www.mesaaz.gov/residents/water-conservation/residential-grass-to-xeriscape-rebate. Drought tolerlant plants official list for Arizona is listed here (PDF file).
Lawn is gone, cactus and veggies are in, thanks to volunteers at
children's home: Over
several months, volunteers from the Master Naturalists, Master
Gardeners, the El Paso chapter of the Native Plant Society of New
Mexico, and the El Paso Rock and Cactus Club, along with Duncan,
have replaced a large turf area with a cactus garden, have restored
a greenhouse, and are building vegetable and flower beds. "We have
grass everywhere, and it takes a lot of water and upkeep," Thomas
said. "But what we're trying to do with the Master Gardeners, the
Rock and Cactus Club and the Native Plant Society is to xeriscape so
that we use a lot less water."
Lee & Beulah Moor Children's Home resident Rosie Gonzalez watered
tomato plants after she and other children planted a garden with the
help of Master Gardeners April 23 outside the home. (Photos by Mark
Lambie / El Paso Times)
Lawn Care for Cleaner Air - Landscaping Awards
Program: Are you interested in
trying a different approach to lawn care that would mean less work
and pollution while providing more beauty and wildlife habitat in
your backyard or corporate lawns? Operating a typical (4 HP)
gasoline-powered lawnmower for one hour produces as much
smog-forming hydrocarbons as driving an average car almost 200 miles
under average conditions (more than the distance from Louisville to
Nashville).
Turbo Weed Twister
attached to a 3-speed cordless hammer drill pulls out Bermuda grass
quickly and effectively. There is no other tool currently available
that can remove troublesome Bermuda grass, crabgrass and similar
grasses as quickly and effectively as this tool. For lawn
conversion, this unique tool can remove a strip of lawn in just a
few minutes. Use it to prepare the soil for your native plants
or organic vegetables, as well. Get immediate
satisfaction: Quickly remove and transform your lawn one small strip
at a time!
Is Your City Supporting
Lawn Conversion? Should it Be?
Bye-bye Golf Courses, Hello Nature Preserves: At the Ocean Meadows Golf Club in Goleta, California, the ping of an iron hitting a
dimpled ball is gradually but inexorably fading from the fairway. Taking its place will be the whistles of white-tailed kites,
the chirps of snowy plovers, and the warbles of tree swallows as the University of California-Santa Barbara transforms the 64-acre,
nine-hole course into a nature preserve during the next two years.
SHRINK Your Lawn: Let Her Run Wild:
A great way to reduce yard work and water use, create a more
interesting landscape, and increase wildlife habitat all at the same
time is to restore some of your property to a self-sustaining
natural ecosystem.
Within the larger landscape, the dominant ecosystem varies according to local topography and climate, so consider your site's
attributes and your needs as well as your area's climax ecosystem when planning your wild area.
For sunny, dry places, plan a prairie.
For shady hillsides, try a forest glade with ferns and rocky outcrops.
In the desert, consider xeriscaping with native desert plants and rock.
If you want to create shade, design a woodland.
In low areas that trap runoff, make a wet meadow or thicket.
Lawn Conversion: We’ve spent the entire
weekend smothering our grass lawn. The method we used is called
“sheet mulching“. Basically, it’s a way to build up the soil without
having to till or add synthetic fertilizers. Because of the horribly
compacted soil and multiple layers of sod netting, we thought this
would be the best way to prepare the soil for planting our edible
and medicinal landscape.
A friend of ours rented a sod cutter and removed a large
piece of turf for her
dirt backyard. Then came the first step of laying down cardboard.
The best place to find cardboard for this project was the billiards
store! The cardboard creates a barrier that kills the remaining
grass and any weeds.
Going Native: The trend to convert unused lawn to
natural areas can increase recreational potential and solves many
management problems. While lawn is an important component
of sports areas, its ability to provide space for many other forms
of recreation is actually very limited. With this idea in mind, many
parks and nature centers in the Midwest are beginning to convert
their un-used lawn to native landscaping as a way to provide space
for other forms of recreation, including outdoor classrooms for the
study of native plants and animals.
What is the Native /
Exotic Plant Ratio in Your Public Parks? Excessive Lawns?
Balancing native, non-native plants in a yard is
a tough act: I think the biggest problem is that many of
us introduce non-native plants into our gardens, fully expecting Mom
Nature to take care of them, and she doesn’t want any part of it.
How do we introduce interesting species and coerce nature to help?
It sounds sneaky, but really, it’s the secret to good gardening
practice.
Powerful
Ergonica Turbo Weed
Twister digs into rocks to remove weeds by their roots: Let
your 1/2-inch drill do the twisting with this 36-inch tool that can
quickly uproot small and large weeds. Rocky or desert
landscaping and xeriscaping in California, Arizona, Texas, Nevada,
Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and other western states, as well as
Australia, Africa, etc., can now be cleared of weeds, quickly and
efficiently, by this powerful and safe tool made by Ergonica. No
chemicals, herbicides, pesticides needed! Great for removing all
types of grasses for lawn conversion. Muscles optional! Requires 1/2
inch drill such as the 18 volt Makita impact drill used in this
demonstration.
Landscaping with Native Plants: Across
North America, more and more people are discovering the satisfaction
in beauty and the benefits to the environment of landscaping their
homes, schools, businesses and places of worship with native plants.
Native plants are those that evolved naturally in North America.
More specifically, native plants in a particular area are those that
were growing naturally in the area before humans introduced plants
from distant places.
How to Naturescape: Curious about native
plants? Interested in a beautiful, low-maintenance landscape?
Concerned about health and water quality? In the pages that
follow, we will introduce some basic Concepts of landscaping with
native plants, referred to by many as "naturescaping," and follow
that with steps you can take to get started.
San Jose Lawn to Natives Conversion: In
contrast to the lawn-centric design, this mature garden requires
only bi-annual trimming, semi-annual weeding, and about 4 deep
waterings per year.
Are the Highways -
Freeways in Your State Landscaped with Native Plants? Should
they be?
Eat Your Lawn: A new wave of gardeners replants
front yards with food - A mile from the White House, in
Washington DC’s Columbia Heights neighborhood, Ed Bruske is growing
vegetables where his lawn used to be. During the summer, the
garden provides about 80 percent of the produce Bruske, his wife,
and their eight-year-old daughter eat.
San Rafael, California - Retired Lawn: In
1975 after having replanted dead grass in his front yard twice,
Michael Duffy decided to cover the entire yard with decorative
stone. Inspired by his recent lawn conversion he purchase Snow White
and the Seven Dwarfs from a local store, and installed them in the
stone surfaced garden. He next added the lawn mower and hung a
“Retired” sign above it. He was soon asked by people to add lawn to
his sign as it looked like a Retired Lawn.
Does your
school or
college campus apply sustainable landscaping, native plants,
xeriscaping?
Are harmful chemicals used as
herbicides or pesticides on campus?
Teacher, students create native-plant garden at
their school - Project will help teach others about water-wise
landscaping: San Marcos Middle School now has a native-plant
garden that will provide ongoing lessons in water-wise landscaping,
thanks to the efforts of a teacher and some of his students.
Seventh-grade history and geography teacher Lawrence Osen oversaw
the garden's creation Thursday and Friday afternoons. "You see a lot
of land that's been disturbed or had its vegetation removed," he
said. "And instead of putting ice plant in ... there are a lot of
benefits from putting in native plants ---- their variety, erosion
control and the color of their flowers."
Ryan Ortiz, 13, prepares to plant a manzanita
shrub at a drought-tolerant garden at San Marcos Middle School last
week. (Photo by John Koster - For the
North County Times) April 25, 2009
Keeping UNLV’s head above water - Facilities
management replaces grass with xeriscape, saves money: In an
effort to conserve one of Southern Nevada’s most valuable resources,
UNLV is also saving millions of dollars a year by replacing grass
with drought tolerant xeriscape and conserving water. By converting
turf to xeriscape the facilities management department is hoping for
$150,000 in annual savings, Reynolds said. Currently 82,000 square
feet of turf east of the soccer fields are being prepared for a
landscape conversion that will be completed by the end of June
according to Robert Lynn, UNLV facilities supervisor. The
conversion projects are paid for by the university and then a
rebate check is received from the Southern Nevada Water Authority.
Botanist restores native plants at CSU campus in
Carson: Botanist Connie Vadheim and a few dozen recruits
in grubby clothes and stout shoes will be pulling weeds and planting
buckwheat and California sunflowers on April 12 along a seasonal
creek just south of parking lot seven at CSU Dominguez Hills.
It's all part of Vadheim's campaign to restore as much of the campus
as possible with shrubs and flowers that are native to the South Bay
area and raised from local genetic stock: sunflowers, coyote bush,
tidy-tips, gilias, California wild roses, willows and bunch grasses.
Garden Me, But Where’s the Front Lawn?
Haeg's "Edible Estates" project replaces lawns with gardens -
Haeg was standing in front of about 40 people in the
multipurpose room of the Ann Arbor District Library to present his
project, “Edible Estates,” which involves installations of gardens
in place of front lawns. He’s implemented gardens as front lawn
replacements in various locations across the U.S., and has done one
in England. Haeg first traced the history of the lawn from a
demonstration of wealth in the English estate, to the definition of
a unfenced democratic space given privilege at Jefferson’s
Monticello, to a hostile no-man’s land in post-war suburban
development.
The perfect garden is
one that makes YOU feel good! Not necessarily your neighbors,
your nursery store, landscaping service provider or hardware
vendors... It's Your Dirt!
Loans to help rid residents of their lawns:
The Southern Nevada Water Authority, of which Henderson is a member,
pays $1.50 per square foot to homeowners who tear up their grass
through its Water Smart Landscapes rebate program. But the water
authority estimates up to 30 percent of residential applicants
withdraw from the program before completing it, often because they
can’t afford new landscaping. So, Henderson will lend up to
$5,000 at 3 percent interest for seven years to a limited number of
residents who participate in the water authority’s lawn conversion
effort.
Time to lose the lawn? With officials calling for at
least 30 percent less water use this summer, landscaping may be
where most customers cut back: Tired of spending her
weekends on expensive and time-consuming lawn care, Kathleen Tornow
finally decided to get rid of the grass and put in a water-saving
front yard.
See the
Garden Tools page for a comprehensive listing of
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