U.S. lawn care service is now a $12 billion annual. To get a perfect, putting green style lawn, one must use immense quantities of water, along with fertilizers and pesticides to ensure the lawn consists of no weeds, dandelions, or inferior grass. There are plenty of ways to reduce the burden of your lawn, and in turn, to save money. Listed below are 4 tips you can use to save money and the environment when dealing with your lawn this summer.
- Mulch – By mulching over areas of your lawn in shaded areas, you could cut down on the weed population. This will also help to retain moisture. Mulch is also pretty cheap, while you can make your own from shredded leaves and twigs!
- Hardscaping – If you’ve already had enough with the work involved in keeping up your lawn, you can institute environmentally friendly “hardscaping” strategies like the use of river stone, gravel, and flagstone that can act like an indestructible mulch. If you want to do this, you should lay down several layers of newspaper, or a fabric weed block below the rocks to prevent weed growth.
- Tall Grass and Wild Flowers – To keep the grass look, but cut down on maintenance, you could go with a taller prairie grass with some wild flowers that can survive in your climate. These drought resistance seeds will do most of the work on their own, and only require perhaps an annual trim, if that.
- The Push Mower – Instead of worrying about gasoline powered or electric powered lawnmowers think about picking up an old fashioned lawn clipper. Modern versions of this classic are now much lighter, easier to push, and incredibly quiet. They are also pollution free, as they are powered with a little old fashioned elbow grease.
There are a lot of other things to consider when dealing with your lawn, but it is always best to steer clear from the pesticides and fertilizers that are used in most of suburbia these days.
