Lawns are a ubiquitous part of our culture, and lawn-care equally so. It is simply expected that a house will have a lush carpet of grass around it, and equally expected that the grass will be meticulously groomed and even watered to match our definition of how it should look; thick, green, trimmed, and completely free of other plants. But how many have really thought about what the cost of a lawn is, individually or collectively? When you think about all the lawns in America alone, and cost in water, fuel, and time to keep them perfectly verdant, it starts to be staggering.
According to an article on the website of Backyard Nature, as of 2001 there were 27.6 million acres of turf grass in the united states. A little looking on the always-accurate source known as ‘Google’ tells me that a reasonably generous estimate would be that half a gallon of gasoline is used per acre to mow a lawn, and personal experience says that lawns should be mowed about once a week. There are 52 weeks in a year, give or take, but we’ll cut it in half due to seasonal changes keeping the lawn down for part of the year. 27.6 million acres times half a gallon per acre times 26 weeks comes to 358.8 million gallons of gasoline burnt keeping lawns short, per year, just in the united states. Certainly these numbers are not totally accurate, but they give you an idea of the scale, particularly when you consider three dollar gasoline, which brings you to over a billion dollars.
Even better is the practice of watering a lawn. As growing populations squabble over shared water supplies, our nation dumps considerable water on its lawns. The lawns consequently grow faster and need to be cut sooner, and the water uses up it’s own energy in the collection, filtering, and pumping; energy that is spent effectively so we can mow the lawn sooner, spending again more energy. Fertilization has much the same effect as well. And to what end? Certainly there is something to be said for safety. Animals or forgotten objects can lurk, hidden in long grass, as can pests like ticks, but is it really necessary to grown the lawns as religiously as is the norm? Surely you could knock them down every few weeks, when they get up to a dangerous length, while not encouraging the growth, and still save considerably. There are those who would baulk at the idea of the carefully manicured lawns of the nation being allowed to go wild, as we become increasingly aware of our energy needs, I believe we really need to reexamine rote habits such as this.
