• pearsaltchocolatebar
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    11 hours ago

    My neighbor brags about his $400 water bill to keep his monoculture lawn green.

    He always asks me what my secret is, but doesn’t seem to believe that I’ve done literally nothing to my yard, so everything growing in it is adapted to our ecosystem.

    Well, not literally nothing. I strategically neglect it in the spring so the shit that survived the last summer and winter can put down deep roots.

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      10 hours ago

      Someone here on Lemmy told me that if I didn’t rake my leaves, my lawn would just turn into dead grass and slime and yet our lawn is covered in green grass despite our happily assisting our oak trees with their annual attempted murder plan.

      • lud@lemm.ee
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        5 hours ago

        I’m very sceptical our lawn wouldn’t pretty much die if we didn’t rake at least a little.

        We have a single maple (probably a norway maple) tree and the leaves are very plentiful and quite big so they cover pretty much the entire (small) lawn and in some places to absolute perfection and in multiple layers.

      • pearsaltchocolatebar
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        10 hours ago

        Leaves on the ground help retain soil moisture, and provide nutrients to the soil, so that person was an idiot.

        Also, damn you for reminding me that I have at least 3 oaks in my yard that need to come down. I’ve been repressing that experience.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          10 hours ago

          Take them down now, because if you wait and a big storm comes…

          We started with 12. All of them much older than the house. Several came down before that happened in June after our roof got holes punched in it from falling branches during previous storms. It wasn’t the only one that came down either.

          Now we’re down to 4.

          • pearsaltchocolatebar
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            10 hours ago

            Luckily most of mine have already dropped most of their big limbs. Unfortunately One of those pierced the roof of my houses shitty sunroom kit.

            I’m tempted to get tree climbing gear and do it myself.

            • Zorsith@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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              9 hours ago

              Dont: the branches/logs hitting the ground will result in years of tiny pits in your yard just big and deep enough to break your ankle on. And if you hire someone and they break shit it’s not necessarily your problem.

              • pearsaltchocolatebar
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                8 hours ago

                I’m not worried about pits. I have a fuck ton of cat feces tainted dirt to fill holes with over dug fire pits.

                I can expand if wanted, but I don’t think it’s wanted