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@ 18. LEAVE IT A LAWN An acre of lawn needs more than 27,000 gallons of water every week. But Americans use even more cJ.an chat; we routinel, O1IerwateT OUT lawns by 20 to 40%. BACKGROUND. Lawn care isn't something you normally associate with saving the Earth. But when you consider that there are an estimated 20 million acres of lawn-and some 600 trillion grass plants-in the U.S., you can see the impact that watering, fertilizing, and mowing them might have. If you have a lawn, it's worthwhile to learn a few environmental# ly sound ways of taking care of it. MOW, MOW, MOW Some Mower Facts: · Set your mower blades high. Don't be a victim of "golf course syndrome." Many Americans believe a healthy lawn looks like a manicured golf course; but the opposite is true. For most types of grass, the proper length is 2" to 3" high. This encourages longer, healthier roots, and provides natural shade for the ground around each plant"":""which enables it to retain moisture in the soil. · Keep mower blades sharp. Dull blades tear grass (instead of clean~ ly cutting it), weakening the plants, and making them more susce~ tible to weeds and disease. Grass Clippings: · "Cut it high and let it lie." During dry periods, leave grass cuttings on the lawn. This works well if you keep grass long and cut small amounts each time. Cuttings will serve as a moisture~ retentive mulch and a natural fertilizer. · At other times, use grass clippings and other lawn and garden waste to make a compost pile. It will provide your. garden with nat~ ural mulch and fertilizer -and help reduce contributions to your local landfill. (See p. 86) FILL 'ER UP . Most established lawns need about 1" of water a week, applied slowly to prevent runoff. This is considerably more effective than 42 Artificial color is added to the feed of commercial. egg-laying hens to color their yolks. e @ e shorter, more frequent sprinklings. . How can you tell if it's an inch? Put 3 cans around the area you're sprinkling, at varying distances from the sprinkler. Check them every five minutes to see how long it takes for an inch of wa~ ter to accumulate in each. Add the 3 times together, and divide by 3 to get an average. That's how long to water. Watering Tips: . Due to outdoor watering, water use in America increases by as much as 30% in the summer months~ . Water from sprinklers evaporates 4 -8 times faster during the heat of the day than in the early morning. Watering at night is bet# ter than midday-there's no evaporation problem-but it can cause fungus in the grass plants. Best choice: water in the morning. . In a drought, don't waste water on grass beginning to turn brown. It's dormant and will revive after normal rainfall begins again. ABOUT PESTICIDES . Homeowners use up to 10 times more toxic chemicals per acre than fanners. . The average homeowner uses 5 to 10 pounds per lawn-for a na~ tional total of some 25 to SO million pounds! Many scientists be~ lieve these chemicals endanger the songbird population (by con# taminating the worms they eat), as well as polluting groundwater. . A green, healthy lawn is possible without chemical pesticides. (See Source below) RESULTS . If every lawnowner composted grass "clippings, we could cut the landfill congestion by a whopping 18% during summer and spring. . Avoiding overwatering can save about 12% of a homeowner's water use during the summer-an average of over SO gallons a week. If 100,000 lawnowners do it,S million gallons are saved. . If even 10% of lawnowners began using organic pesticides, it would remove 2.5 to 5 million pounds of toxic chemicals from the environment every year. SOURCE The Chemical#Free Lawn, by Warren Schultz (Rodale Press. 1989). 43 1/3 of the paper mills in the U.S. use waste paper exclusively.