Re: Lawns

Katherine Pyle wrote
> I think we should admit that there are times when nothing else can
> really replace a good lawn. When I was growing up, we children played on
> lawns a lot -- and for some activities, neither tarmac nor wood-chips nor a
> sand pit nor wood deck nor packed dirt field nor cement sidewalk was nearly
> as satisfactory. Especially for young children, a lawn is by far the nicest
> surface to play on.

The middle part of our back yard is a slope. which flattens out in the
area just behind the house where we have our vegetable patch, fruit
trees and main flower garden. When our house was built, over 40 years
ago, this  slope was a farm paddock, which we converted into a rough
lawn by mowing. As the years have gone by the fine grasses have
increased and by feeding with compost in recent years we have largely
suppressed inappropriate weeds to give a sturdy rough turf, very nice to
sit on (with a groundsheet) in late winter early spring, as it faces
right in to the returning sun and is completely screened from icy south
winds coming off Antarctia. 

When our kids were young they could not play most ball games in the
section (yard to you) for lack of a flat space and used to go down the
road to the nearby park, but the slope was a geat part of the action for
rolling and downhill running and later for a terrifying game of riding
down in a tiny toddlers wheeled cart, ending just clear of the metal
pole which supports the clothesline. (I used to go indoors for this!!).
Our experience though, was that young children also need a hard surface
for ride-on toys and for running trucks etc, so a hard drive or similar
is also a good amenity.

Now our children and even our grandchildren are largely past the stage
of slope racing, some people might say we should do away with the grass
in favour of other plantings, maybe with terracing, but both being now
well into our 70s we find it less effort to keep mowing. None of the
clippings are wasted anyway as they all go either among the vegetables
or in the flower borders as our principal form of mulch, doing the
weeding for us and providing both food and shelter for the soil. So I
guess you might say that our lawn at least is not a useless decoration
but an essential part of our garden's ecosystem.

Moira
-- 
Tony & Moira Ryan <theryans@xtra.co.nz>
Wainuiomata, New Zealand
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