Wild flowers much better than mowing grass
Jack Hughes
A cluster of bluets in my backyard.
Jack Hughes
It蘑菇视频 a typical Saturday morning and across most neighborhoods you can hear the buzz of lawn mowers, weed trimmers and leaf blowers all doing their weekly battle with the lawns that surround most of our homes.
Every spring, I resist this weekly ritual for as long as I can and the reward is less work and a beautiful lawn of colorful ground wild flowers. Some people see our wildflowers as weeds to be cut, killed and sprayed out of existence. We don鈥檛 use chemicals or lawn fertilizers on our grass and this results in a nice cost savings. We use the cost savings to buy a few new plants each year or to replace a few that didn鈥檛 make it through winter.
Little blue Quaker ladies or bluets are our favorite. They grow in colorful clumps as do the brilliant blue forget-me-knots. The deep purple ajuga are more widespread and will quickly fill in areas if we give them some space and resist mowing until after they bloom. Large bees love the ajuga and add a pleasant sound to the spring garden. A few yellow dandelions always seem to sneak into the mixture and the yellow provides a bit of contrast to the blues and purple.
Our back yard is very shady and, again, we allow the ground wild flowers to have their way. Over the years, the tree canopy in the has grown to the point where we get very little sun and, along with the wildflowers, this has promoted the growth of moss instead of grass. Again, I particularly like this arrangement since the moss only needs to be mowed a few times a year. It is also beautiful to look at and feels very soft and peaceful when you walk on it.
Once the wildflowers fade, we do get out the lawn mower. The joy is that this does not start until the middle of May and by then, many folks have already cut their grass five times or more.
Next year, when you load up your cart at the store with your lawn chemicals and fertilizers, you might want to give some thought to buying a few nice plants instead and enjoy a lawn of colorful ground wild flowers.