Natural Lawn Care for Indiana and Everywhere Else
Grass is one of the easiest things to grow, but industries and chemical companies complicate things, padding their bottom line. This article will help you navigate the confusion surrounding natural lawn care, irrigation, chemicals, fertilizers, and grass seed.
As always, this is not intended as one-size-fits-all, professional advice. Do your own research, exercise discernment, and above all, don’t trust what the “experts” declare. We are here for you both locally and for remote consultations.
Irrigation
Irrigation often does more harm than good, resulting in shallow root systems. Some companies spend thousands of dollars, only to end up with brown grass for part of the year. Thus, irrigation is not something we recommend based on decades of careful observation, and rejection of standards of an industry that cares only about profit.
Many non-irrigated lawns look greener than those that are irrigated and chemically treated.
Chemicals
Stop using them! Many chemicals are extended release and end up causing problems for months- and sometimes years. Chemicals not only harm you and your family, but your pets, neighbors, pollinators, local wildlife, and wildlife/ humans thousands of miles away as the chemicals leach into aquifers and rivers.
We don’t use chemicals here at Non-Toxic Home. You probably don’t need to, either.
The application of chemicals by some homeowners has impacted the health of customers’ lawns throughout the growing season in some cases, making natural intervention impossible and resulting in sickly-appearing grass throughout the season.
Unfortunately, many chemical applicators don’t actually understand what they are doing. One even declared to me that he wasn’t applying anything toxic, as he held a bottle of known toxic yard chemicals and waved the applicator around. Apparently, no amount of court cases can convince some that a product is indeed harmful to human health.
Synthetic Fertilizers
Once again, please stop poisoning your lawn and the ecosystem! Synthetic fertilizers often have unintended consequences, often resulting in grass that is essentially addicted to regular application.
Truly, grass is one of the easiest things to grow in existence. Synthetic fertilizers likely are unnecessary with proper soil care.
Fortunately, when homeowners elect to use synthetic fertilizers, this doesn’t impact my work generally.
The Right Grass Seed
There is no one-size-fits-all grass seed that is best for all situations, but it is important to avoid grass seed sold at big-box stores like the plague, along with any variety of plants. Plants from such stores often die quickly, while those from local greenhouses have a much better chance of survival in a changing environment.
The right grass seed and mixture of species will help increase the success of maintaining a lawn naturally.
We use a contractor’s mix of grass seed. If relevant, we use shade and sun, or all sun, or all shade. Ours grows as fodder for hens in our relatively dark bathroom- in winter! Besides experience, that’s how we know this grass seed is indeed superior.
Embrace Polycultures
Nature absolutely abhors monocultures! As a result, if you insist on a lawn with one type of grass and nothing else, you will forever be fighting nature to maintain such a monoculture. It is critical to always have multiple types of grass, which is slightly less of a monoculture.
Ideally, embracing native weeds will not only calm your nerves, but also nourish your soil. Here in our garden, which is of course managed without any chemical intervention, certain weeds are permitted to grow. These weeds indicate various deficits in the soil, correcting those deficits. Furthermore, those same weeds are often edible and medicinal, offering nutrient-dense foraged foods at one’s fingertips.
It truly is a win-win situation!
Allowing such weeds to grow in an urban lawn, however, could result in displeasure from neighbors and potentially homeowners’ associations, so this sort of approach will vary.
Increasing the number of beds of native plants or gardening areas offers refuge and food for pollinators while reducing the amount of monoculture (grass) on your property. In fact, the first year we were in business independently, one client specifically sought to increase the beds around their home and prepare them to grow more food.
Dethatching
Dethatching can help reduce thatch in a grassy lawn, improving the health of the grass. However, it can be difficult to find dethatchers these days.
Mowing
Proper mowing management by a true, honest professional (such as you’ll find here at Non-Toxic Home) can go a long way in managing your lawn naturally. Often, those in the industry mow grass too short, and mow when they really shouldn’t be mowing at all to ensure a consistent profit.
In fact, I would estimate that 95% of homeowners and contractors mow too short, which results in an opportunity for weeds to thrive. Grass and soil also ends up drying out sooner.
It’s All About the Soil
For healthy grass, you need healthy soil. Chemicals kill off essential soil biology. Healthy soil is teaming with life! Soil bacteria produce natural antibiotics that help your grass resist disease. Algae, protozoa, nematodes, fungi, and other tiny creatures are absolutely essential to soil health- which is essential to a natural lawn.
Soil is not dead. It’s living! Let it live!
Natural Turf Regeneration
Turf regeneration, applied monthly, can be made from nutrient-dense weeds- dynamic accumulators such as stinging nettle. Here, we have a large patch of stinging nettle growing for just this purpose, along with its important medicinal value. (Nettle is also of food value, but we don’t use it as such.)
We intend to share in a later video as to the process of making your own turf regeneration. We also apply this to our garden plants, with smashing success.
This turf regeneration not only supplies essential nutrients, both macro- and micro-, but also improves soil biology as it is a ferment. Ferments, of course, produce lots of happy beneficial microorganisms!
It really is amazing stuff.
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Another product we apply in some cases is EM-1. This helps increase soil biology, and has other uses as well.
Give It Time
Natural interventions take time, whether for soil, plants, or humans. It takes time to recover soil that has been chemically altered and barely has any soil life in it.
Be patient.
Non-Toxic Home provides mowing, landscaping, and handyman services regularly in Bloomington, Carmel, Greenwood, Columbus, Nashville, and Indianapolis, Indiana, and surrounding areas. I am open to travel. I am currently scheduling all services for this year, so if you are pondering a project or mowing, now’s the time to reach out!
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