Cutting the Grass

            Cutting the grass is the biggest waste of time known to man. Cut the grass, water it, feed it, weed it, for what - so you can cut it more often. Is life so without stimulus that man must spend a couple of hours a week, and more, just cutting the grass in an endless cycle? Wouldn't it be more productive to let the lawn take its natural course - let the rain nurture it and when it is a dry spell, let the lawn go to the colour of the Okanagan hills. It will start growing again in October.

            I cut my grass under protest. I water as little as possible, just so the by-law guys don't come and visit. "Excuse me Mr. Korpisto. Your neighbours reported that you have let your lawn die. We can't have that here. This is a family neighbourhood. You are setting a bad example. How can we tax you for the ever-more-scarce water if you don't use it to keep your lawn green".

            I also let the dandelions grow and have for years because I have never heard of anyone dying from dandelion poisoning or dandelions getting into the water table and making the water unusable. In fact, it is just the opposite. Dandelions are very efficient in bringing nutrients from deep in the earth to the surface. It stands to reason then, that the more dandelions that you have in your lawn, the healthier your lawn would be and you wouldn't have to waste your hard earned money on chemicals to make your yard green. Wait a minute. You don't think that lawns were first  introduced to man through a conspiracy of Monsanto, do you?

             I have to say that I did, in my foolish youth, cut lawns for money. I did cut my parents' lawn for food but Mr. Woods next door paid me a couple of bucks to cut his lawn every week. It wasn't so bad and I caught a glimpse of his daughter Linda now and then. Mr. Woods was kind of cool too because he drove the local ice cream truck that tingledy-dinged its way around the neighbourhood. I envied the Netzlaw boys because their lawn mower had a grass catcher and I just had my socks. Imagine, not having to rake too. Sigh.

            I think the answer is lambs. Let a lamb munch his way around your yard and eventually it would all be cropped off evenly. Natural fertilization, too. I suppose it would have to be watered a little bit for I don't think lambs do well on dead grass although what is hay if not dead grass. Hmm. And in December, lamb chops, lamb stew, etc. A win-win situation as far as I can see. We could make it painless.

            I notice now though, that they no longer put poison on the fields in the parks. Burdock, that tends to overtake any other grassy plants, is cut down before it can go to seed. Nor does the highways department poison noxious weeds at the side of the road. This is all good for us. No more birds and bees are dying in our effort to have everything a uniform green. Bees are having a hard enough time world wide that we shouldn't make it worse. After all, without pollinating insects, everything that we eat, again, EVERYTHING THAT WE EAT would die.

            Back to my own lawn. The biggest compliment that I received about my lawn came from a visiting Japanese student. One morning, she was walking around the lawn, bent over examining every blade. "What are you doing?" I asked.  "Oh, when I saw photographs of Canada and all the houses with green grass in front, I thought that it would be very boring. But not your grass. Look it is full of all different types of plants, some have little blue flowers and little white flowers, some have big leaves, some have little leaves". Come to think of it, my lawn is like a cross section of the Canadian population - all different.