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Interesting. I'm a big proponent of Xeriscaping instead of lawns, but Xeriscape can look great, or absolutely awful, depending on how well it's done, and I thi
by wanderfowl 11y ago
Interesting. I'm a big proponent of Xeriscaping instead of lawns, but Xeriscape can look great, or absolutely awful, depending on how well it's done, and I think that's part of the reluctance.
The problem is that lawns are easy to do: put down sod, water, mow, fertilize, and it'll look fine. Any idiot can make a surface look OK with grass.
Xeriscape doesn't need mowing nor water, but it needs to be designed by a competent landscape architect to look good, and needs decent layout and rocks and whatnot. If you just tear up your lawn and mulch the remainder, throwing in the odd plant, it's going to look like hell.
I think part of this battle, then, is showing people that xeriscape can look really good, and although it's a different kind of pretty than a lawn, it's still pretty. HOAs will take a while to come around to it, still, but it's nice to see the conversation starting.
- mturmon 11y agoI very much agree about the turnkey nature of a turf grass lawn. Everyone knows how to do it, and everyone knows how to take care of it. But for example, the outfit called "Turf Terminators" (they convert your front yard for free, and pocket the ~$4/sq.ft. rebate) has been churning out travesties like this all over LA: http://s3-media2.fl.yelpcdn.com/bphoto/WsdchuaR6H96tnC2LEZ9Rg/o.jpg http://s3-media2.fl.yelpcdn.com/bphoto/WsdchuaR6H96tnC2LEZ9R... Not enough people know that it's possible to do much, much better with a zero- or low-irrigation landscape.
- roflchoppa 11y agoi recall something posted here on ycombinator about kids having lung diseases from playing on turf football fields? It's due to the rubber in the turf getting kicked up into their lungs, and into their cuts.
- sbov 11y agoYeah, from my friend's experience, if you want a terribly Xeriscaped lawn you can get it from just the rebate. And the ones who provide a good Xeriscaped lawn bumped their price up by the same amount of the California rebate. So you can get a terrible one for free, or a good one for the same overall price as you had to pay before the rebate was introduced.
- city41 11y agoThe other problem is you can't play in a xeriscaped yard. Most people have kids at some point, and being able to play in the yard is pretty important for most.