I've observed the lawn culture to be strong here. Lawns bordering lawns, cut grass ditches and spray grass banks bordering fields. Great for holding down soil and limiting run off but the amount of work as well as additives going into keeping these lawns cut and green seems excessive.
Some alternatives I've read about for those wishing to ditch the high maintenance lawn are using fake lawns, spray painting browned out grass or even just paving over lawned areas. None of those seem particularly appealing or functional.
A rock garden is an interesting alternative but I've yet to see the function of that option besides getting a work-out moving the rocks around or whatever meditative properties the Japanese get out of them.
So the two viable options I've found are:
Low Maintenance Lawns - for those who still want to keep the basic lawn look and feel a low maintenance lawn is a combonation of existing grasses and an addition of low maintenance grass alternatives with one of the best being clover. Adding clover reduces the need for excessive watering, adds nitrogen, has deeper root systems that break up harder soils, and is easily turned into the soil if a garden is desired in the future.
Native Plants and Wild Grasses - This is a beautiful alternative which requires a bit of work in the beginning but leads to a self sustaining system in the future. Planting wild grasses and native plants has the benefit of attracting pollinating insects to your land and with a little research you have the option to add eatable crops to your previous lawned areas. One drawback is that you might attract rodents and some cities actually have banned this kind of wild lawn but more places lately are lifting restrictions.
Looking forward to heading down south to Arizona and seeing what kinds of things they do down their with their 'lawn' areas.
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