4 Dandelions and Peer Pressure

Our lawn is less green this year. Instead it has been replaced with bright yellow dandelions. Where dandelions stood last year there is now a small dips in the ground that was left when I ripped them out. What is left is bumpy ground with the odd patch of grass but mostly weeds. When the dandelions were in full bloom it kind of looked beautiful. B and I ran through them one day, me giggling as we ran, he squealing that the dan-lions were touching him.

I kind of love them.

But I know that my neighbours, your neighbours, don't love them. A lawn full of dandelions is seen as "unkept" and "lazy". People see them as weeds but did you know that a weed is just a plant that it isn't in its place? So if someone wants dandelions on their lawn then in fact they are not a weed.

Grass is annoying. Where we live there is a lot of sand which means it is hard for grass to grow and if you can get it to grow the ants living in the sand will probably kill it. To keep the perfect lawn that won't result in side-eyes from your neighbours you need to constantly water it, seed it each spring and fall, fertilize, top it up with more soil and use natural methods (not chemicals people!) to get rid of weeds. Maintaining grass is an environmental nightmare. It requires 10,000 gallons of water each year on top of the water it receives from rain.

Why do we do it to ourselves? Is it because we bow to the pressures that society has placed onto us? That we need to have a perfectly green lawn. We need that nod from our neighbours as we mow our lawns each week and spend hours pulling weeds over and over again. Lawn does not have to mean grass. It could mean moss or clover, both of which require much less water, absolutely no fertilizers or chemicals and little to no mowing. 

OR

We could all just stop picking our dandelions. 

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