This is just so depressing...Anybody have any handy numbers on how many people in the world do not currently have access to safe drinking water....

J

"Anybody have any handy numbers on how many people in the world do not currently have access to safe drinking water."

Well, it's not like the US is shipping drinking water to Africa, so they might not have more even if the US didn't have the lawns.

But it's certainly a huge waste of taxpayer dollar to treat all that water, and the environment damages caused by pesticides and fertilizer are enormous.

Yes, nothing like a manicured lawn right down to the edge of the salt water estuary.
Where do them chemicals go? And people wonder about mass fish kills, dead zones, and brown tide.
Not to mention the time and energy (little 2 stroke cutters and blowers) used to keep it in shape.

How bout a Rock Garden?

vsk

Well, if your using treated city mains water to water a lawn.. that's just dumb. Most systems in My area use canal or pond water... non potable.

I personally do not have a system... other than "Let the rain do it.. and if no rain.. water by hand and only what needs it"

There are also some realllly tough turf grasses that grow and stay green no matter what... and don't even grow that fast and require a minimum of mowing.

I'd prefer a little green grass to an asphalt jungle any day.

Yes phatpat, most of us want to avoid an all-asphalt yard, but we could use plants that are native to the region or the climate, thereby reducing or eliminating the need for irrigation, and drastically reducing the amount of fertilizers and other chemicals needed. I've read that lawns use more chemicals per acre to grow grass than farms use to grow crops.

It's sad. I haven't turned on my sprinkler system in 3 years and no longer put loads of chemicals on my lawn. The result? I got a nasty anonymous note from my "neighbors" bitching about all the dandelions on my lawn and how I'm single-handedly bringing down the home values in my neighborhood. If I didn't think I'd get grief from the town (these wonderful people reported me to the town, BTW) I'd turn the front lawn into a meadow/field of flowers. I already reclaimed part of the backyard for a vegetable garden instead of landscaping it. I water that with drip hoses to avoid wasting water.

I'm seriously considering astroturf, if and when I can afford it. Sure, it's fake, but it's low maintenance and the neighbors can't complain about dandelions or too-long grass :-) Of course, they'd just find something else to whine about. I can't wait until I pain my house purple in the fall. Maybe it will give them a stroke :-D

Water use is certainly an issue that warrants attention for our future well being. I am a lifetime fan of water. But another issue just kind of slid on by in this report I'd like to point out. It's off the central point, so feel free to pile on if you want.
First, the DoD did detailed enough satellite studies of our own country to differentiate plant types, and you can well imagine they weren't interested in foliage studies. These are the guys that can read a license plate from orbit in real time. Pourquoi est ce?
One would think their concerns were at different longitudes. In terms of national defense, mine certainly are. Satellite time ain't cheap.
Second, NASA accessed this data and spent more money on analysis to present this. But their only operational role is to launch the satellites and put them in orbit. They don't operate them or control the computers that do. So if DoD is willing to share, wouldn't this be more in the purview of the EPA? It is more their cup of tea.
That's it. Sorry for the brief tangent.

Tula,

Get one of those garden hog weed removing tools from Home Depot. The ones that you push down, then step on lip to embed into ground, then pull up and extract dandelion root and all. Super easy, fun for those with OCD, and after sticking to it for some weeks, your lawn will look amazing.

Then, when you mow, mow on highest setting. Grass will grow more slowly, will shade out potential weeds, and will require less water/chems.

As for chems, forget them. Just spread a bag of organic time release granules in the early spring. Nothing else should be needed.

If you have to water, get a cheap digital timer for your hose/sprinkler and set it to water every other morning, around 4am, for 20 minutes. Unless you live in Phoenix (where you should not even consider a "lawn"), this should do it.

The EPA also found that 5% of all air pollution in the US comes from gas lawn mowers. In some suburban areas it was 33% - in a day when most people never even use their lawns.

People should seriously consider microfarming or going native.

Services like http://www.yourbackyardfarmer.com/ will come and do all the work, so even if you have no time, you can do it. It could also be a business idea for people in other areas.

If water wasn't a socialized commodity and had a real market price, people wouldn't let it run down the gutter. They would buy cisterns and rain barrels if they wanted to have lawns.

I don't water my lawn at all. I don't live in Phoenix, though. It usually gets a little brown towards the end of the summer, but it bounces back if we get some rain. Too bad the weeds grow faster than the grass, though. On the other hand, the weeds are often greener than the grass, so it's all good.

"If water wasn't a socialized commodity and had a real market price, people wouldn't let it run down the gutter. They would buy cisterns and rain barrels if they wanted to have lawns. "

That's a good point. Where I live water isn't even metered. Everybody pays the same.

Can you think of a bigger incentive for waste? Those who conserve get no benefit at all, and those who waste are subsidized by everybody else.

I wonder how much of that is from golf courses alone? I bet it'd be at least the size of Delaware.

It's true that a well-manicured lawn is definitely necessary if you're selling your house. But if that's not the case, follow Kevin's lead (if the neighbors don't have a fit). I don't water my lawn either and it's often greener than other houses because of the weeds.

One of the things that I appreciate about living in Seattle is that so many people let their lawns go brown or yellow during our two months of sun a year. Takes off that whole peer-pressure aspect of lawn maintenance.

As food prices continue to rise, we'll see lawns turned into gardens. They'll still use water, but at least people will be able to eat.

Grass gets a bit of a hard time. While I'd love a native prairie (and plan to put one in), replacing grass with a rock garden would be far worse in most climates. Rock gardens are not carbon sinks and elevate the temperature in their immediate vicinity like a barbecue.

Remember, dandelions are good salad greens, provided you don't put poison on your yard. The young leaves are good raw and the older ones cooked. It goes well with boiled egg. The root can be roasted and treated like coffee. And of course you can make dandelion wine with the flowers.

JSDreyer says

"As food prices continue to rise, we'll see lawns turned into gardens. They'll still use water, but at least people will be able to eat."

Exactly....if people returned to using their suburban lawns, areas that historically surrounded and provided the food and recourses for our cities to grow and prosper, mabey we actually could cut down on oil consumption from transportation of our food, reduce runoff pollution in the areas where we live, eat healthier, get 'environmental therapy' by actually spending time outside. Add to this the benefits a more diverse landscape would add to wildlife populations, especially bee and butterfly populations which we rely on to polinate our crops anyway and who's populations are in alarming decline.

Perhaps while spending time outside, neighbors would actually begin to meet and talk and re-form a sense of community which our country has so long been without

i think something 2 thing about it if all that grass space was used to plant indigenous species selected to be asthetic as well as practical then we'd be incouraging natural fauna and flora to move into back into our suburbs, as we destroy more and more habitat i think we really need to push incorporating our homes into the environment encouraging as much space as possible used to create mini eco-systems in and around our homes.im goign to try it in my street se how far i get.