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Comment by ivelostn | Hacker News Reader

These kinds of local ordinances are the same reason my partner and I don’t just rip up our entire front lawn and replace it with native wildflowers and vegetables. Our backyard has walking paths of cut grass and is otherwise vegetable plot and flower prairies.

The U.S. laws and norms that enforce cut lawns are crazy to us. They are biological wastelands.

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I feel like the drought in CA helped change at least some of those attitudes. Just today I got a check in the mail from the state for replacing my front lawn with low-water plants. The local water district matched the state’s rebate. We got enough to plant a fairly large tree, which should hopefully provide enough shade in a few years to further reduce our resource consumption. If you live in a drought-prone area, I would encourage you to see if your water provider has a similar program.

> They are biological wastelands.

That's the point. The whole idiotic point of grassy yards was that only rich people in feudal Europe could afford them historically because they were such an utter waste. The planners of these great nations thought what a great idea, what if everyone could be rich like that... yes we'll make everyone waste land so they can pretend that they are rich... while the banks own most of it.

For anyone who thinks that this is a conspiracy theory: https://www.planetnatural.com/organic-lawn-care-101/history/

That's not really what the linked article is arguing; while we could blame Capability Brown, a lawn is just a pasture that's been tidied. In the UK you can usually keep one just by mowing and ambient rainfall. No, the problem was copying that in a very different climate - and then Leavittown, which forced lawns on people with restrictive covenants.

An actual pasture will have a much greater diversity in species than your typical lawn.

Minnesota is offering incentives to turn lawn back to more natural vegetation to help out the local bee population [0]. I definitely enjoy the natural prairie land look many yards have gone back to. We've tried this in recent years and have fireflies again after not seeing them for the last couple years. It's also great work for our hive.

[0] http://m.startribune.com/program-pays-minnesota-homeowners-t...

My side-project, AutoMicroFarm has a secondary goal of keeping your edible yard beautiful and HOA-compliant (if your house is in an HOA neighborhood). The primary goal is to help you grow the majority of your food in your yard).

It just takes a bit of foresight and planning!

And an enormous yard, at least if you really mean to grow over 50% of the food required for a family of four people, which will take about an acre (or 4000 m^2) i.e. more than four times the usual front lawn space in a suburban home.

Hmmm, I think it's achievable in less space than an acre. What are your assumptions regarding needing an acre for four people?

> U.S. laws and norms

I mean, other than single-family residences and lawns being simply common in the U.S., that's nothing especially unusual.

If you want to read about hedge trimming legislation in the UK:

https://www.husqvarna.com/uk/lawn-garden/when-working/usage/...

There's a difference between a law that tells you your hedge cannot block a pavement / sidewalk and a law that tells you what plants you can have in your own garden.

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