I remember my old house, i replaced 75% of the lawn with a flower garden and meadow flowers, moss, etc. the HOA was PISSED. I swear HOAs exist only to be miserable killjoys
this post was submitted on 10 Mar 2025
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No Lawns
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My dad did the same with his, only to find his neighbour had tried (sincerely) to be helpful and mowed it while dad was out of town. My dad does not speak highly of his neighbor's intelligence.
Mowed...the moss?
Is this your yard? No shame! Many people inherit landscapes like this when they move in and haven’t found the time to make a change. Check out the sidebar for resources on how to get started on a more pollinator-friendly landscape!
You don’t have to remove the whole lawn at once if it seems overwhelming. Even a small insect-friendly garden area or changes in how you manage the lawn can make a big difference.
This Xerces Society article also has some basic and easy steps: https://xerces.org/blog/bee-friendlier-with-your-lawncare
Check out the sidebar for resources on how to get started on a more pollinator-friendly landscape!
That's what I'm here for. Thanks!
Even a small insect-friendly garden area can make a big difference.
I appreciate the regular advice here, and that is what I'm starting with.
It's not perfect, but I spread a lot of regionally appropriate clover all over my existing lawn. By getting a variety of colors it means I get pretty flowers, it doesn't grow tall which keeps the neighbors from being too unhappy and I regularly have a decent number of polinators just doing their thing.
It hasn't killed the grass, but it is doing a good job stunting it.
I'm still occasionally required to mow by code, but when I do it doesn't eliminate the flowers and just lops off the top few inches of grass and clover.
Same! Clover is great ground cover.
Its not, I found the picture somewhere else.
Haha I meant to direct more at the general audience, as in does your yard look like this?
I figured it out from context, but you could add "Readers, " to the beginning of the comment to make it clearer.
Ohh, right. also, the resources are really useful btw.
Lawns are giant funko pops for the modern suburbanite home owner.
The bees are dying because of neonicatinoids in RoundUp presticides.
Yes, neonicotonoids probably kill bees.
But if we want to be taken seriously, we need to be knowledgeable about the subject. Neonicotonoids are a class of insecticides. Roundup is a herbicide (glyphosate). They can both be bad, but they are bad in different ways.
And parasitic mites
And the lack of dead leaf cover over winter.
We’ve stopped mulching at the end of the year. We let the leaves fall and stay. In the spring we wait a long time until the grass is quite long.
Loose the bees and things will get bad, quickly.
We replaced our grass with clover as the bees like the flowers.
Chuck some creeping thyme into it also and some creeping camomile.
Both are factors
I have a yard for my dog. But also have a massive vegetable garden, insect houses, different flowers for attracting different helpers, worm garden, and soon bees will be getting a home for honey.
All this can be done in a backyard and it's honestly way less hassle to set up than dealing with fruit and veg picking in the store.
Assess what's on your plate most, what grows well in your region, which bugs help the most, and grab some seeds! Tastes so much better too, omg.
Nope, not my yard.
Current contents of my yard:
Misc cardboard garbage (the bin fell over due to wind recently)
An exhausted pipe (the mounts broke, and I'm getting rid of the car soon anyway, so it was easier to just tears it off)
Misc trash wood and furniture (indoor building projects)
An old crappy looking car (because for the next month I will still be driving an old crappy looking car)
I may not be helping the bees, but neighborhood cats love the "terrain"
Also, I'll be supporting a local dumpster rental as soon as the building project and shit weather is over, hopefully in a week or so.
You sound like me. Also an old trampoline. My grass has a lot of other stuff growing in it too, it all mows though. But I won't be ready to rent a dumpster for a few months.
The trampoline in my yard is reasonably new. The kids are waiting for better weather so we can properly rig it.
*Solely
Fuck. I googled it and everything, but still misread it.
Now you got me looking at the word "solely" and wondering for the first time at how weird a word it is.