natural lawn alternatives

A new book I ordered from Amazon arrived yesterday, and I spent part of last night mooning over the gorgeous photos and poring over the interesting and informative text in the first chapters. The book is John Greenlee's glossy tome, The American Meadow Garden.

Bob's never much enjoyed the task of mowing the lawn (and, confession: I'm too scared of our lawn mower to attempt it myself). And neither one of us really cares about having a perfect lawn. Frankly, I find the look pretty boring. The only things that have prevented us from simply eliminating the lawn altogether have been lack of time / a limited landscaping budget and lack of know-how. I suspect once I finish this terrific book, the know-how issue will be one less barrier. (And hopefully as we continue to recover from our construction project, the time and money factors will become less troublesome as well!)

One thing I'm learning is that there are some good "middle ground" options if you want to replace your traditional lawn. Certain short grasses and sedges can be planted instead of traditional turf, and they don't require regular mowing, watering, and feeding in order to look good. The look can be similar to a traditional lawn, just a little less manicured. Here are a few lovely photos of natural lawns I found online...

From HGTV.com

From Blue Planet Gardening

From Rainie's Garden

From SFGate.com

From LandscapeStandards

To view some of the even more beautiful landscapes from Greenlee's book, click hereto view a video on Amazon.

And if you're interested in alternatives to the traditional lawn, The Lawn Reform Coalition's website is a great online resource.