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  <a class="underline" href="/kill-your-lawn">Kill Your Lawn</a>

# Kill Your Lawn

Yup, that's right. Your manicured suburban signal of prosperity is killing ecosystems and wasting precious resources and time. If you have the time, I would highly recommend watching the entertaining video below. 

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Don't have time to watch the video right now? Here's some highlights:

## Environmental & Ecological Harm

- Lawns destroy habitat for native wildlife that evolved alongside native plants, not imported grass like Kentucky Bluegrass (which is from Europe)

- They're a monoculture that reduces biodiversity and makes ecosystems more vulnerable to invasive species

- Invasive species already account for about 40% of endangered species loss in the US

## Resource Waste

- Lawns consume 3.3 trillion gallons of water annually

- They use 1.2 billion gallons of gasoline for maintenance

- Lawn equipment produces 5% of US air pollution

- They use 10x more pesticides per acre than farmland

- Fertilizer runoff pollutes water supplies

## Opportunity Cost

- Grass covers 2% of the continental US — more land than Iowa, Louisiana, Georgia, or Michigan combined

- That land could theoretically triple US fruit and vegetable production

- It's wasted carbon storage, wildlife habitat, and healthy soil potential

## Breaking Natural Relationships

- Native species depend on each other in deeply interconnected ways (monarch butterflies need milkweed, hummingbirds need specific flowers)

- Lawns sever these relationships; Western monarch populations crashed from ~10 million to under 2,000 largely due to milkweed loss

## Why Native Plants Are Better

- Deep root systems improve soil health, water drainage, and carbon storage

- They support entire food webs of insects, birds, and mammals

- Once established, they largely take care of themselves

## Now What? 

On board? Not sure where to start? Here's some resources 

- [iNaturalist](https://www.inaturalist.org): free app to identify plants near you by photo

- [NWF Native Plant Finder](https://www.nwf.org/NativePlantFinder): find native plants for your region by location 

- [Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center](https://www.wildflower.org): search native plants by state, soil, sun, and wildlife value

- [Homegrown National Park](https://homegrownnationalpark.org): guides, nursery directory, and community challenge to reduce lawn

- [Rewilding Magazine](https://www.rewildingmag.com/replace-lawn-with-native-plants): practical breakdown of lawn removal methods

- [NWF "Grow Beyond No Mow May"](https://blog.nwf.org/2024/04/grow-beyond-no-mow-may-options-for-reducing-your-lawn): beginner-friendly guide to getting started

- Local rebates: [kagi](https://kagi.com) "[your city/county] + native plant rebate" to find cash back programs for turf replacement

> Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.

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