Eat Your Front Lawn!

A few years ago, I looked at my front lawn and decided I had had enough mowing and resolved to find a better solution. The previous owner had spent thousands of dollars having the lawn sprayed with chemicals to achieve perfect grass. I could not consciously or financially continue on with this practice. Once the spraying stopped, the perfect grass died and unsightly weeds sprung up. Nothing I found remedied the situation. So there I was spending my energy mowing weeds. I knew I had to find or do something else.

I spoke with my neighbor, Mary, who had the same lawn experience and we decided to take a radical step and replace the lawns. While it might stir up the neighborhood, we decided since two homes would be moving out of the traditional lawn box to a more unlimited vision there would be strength in numbers.

My neighbor decided to put in flower garden complete with curving walkway. I chose to create an edible front yard. I built garden boxes and filled them with local mushroom compost and topsoil. Slowly vegetables were planted. Butterflies, dragon flies and birds came to visit along with rabbits, raccoons, possum and deer. All were welcome. It was a sign that I had made the right decision.

Mary's Garden

By then end of the season, I had bright red tomatoes, peas, zucchini, yellow summer squash, herbs, brussel sprouts, green and red hot peppers, onions, leeks and a variety of salad greens. There was enough bounty to share with neighbors who had been watching my shenanigans with doubt. Funny, how a bag of tomatoes grown with love can bring so much more joy than a lawn of grass.

Catch the next blog to read about the steps to an edible front lawn.