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Comment by nemo | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, the systemic issues driving habitat loss are massive. I have made my yard a refuge for native plants to support insects, birds, and other wildlife, but I see exterminators on my street all the time killing off any insects that appear in neighbor's yards, and that kind of mass scale habitat destruction/loss is going on all around us in so many ways (lawns, roads, industrial farming, et al). I also really enjoy my pollinator garden and rewilded habitat, but people are culturally conditioned to destroy habitat, and unless that changes we're going to keep seeing more and more loss.

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Right, which is why you have the opportunity to evangelize what you're doing.

Like for example, a two dudes in my hood have swapped their lawns over to micro clover because I did it three years ago; the lawn is packed with wildlife, and it looks great. Wouldn't have happened had they not come over for BBQ one day and asked about it.

I redid parts of my lawn last fall (first time ever doing so or even having the opportunity). I did about 30% of that new European microclover and 70% various fine fescues. Not sure if I feel it was a success or not, but the clover does make it look like a nice meadow. But the clover and fescue, if I let them grow, it gets so thick that I can't even mow it effectively. Do you just let the microclover fully take over and grow to a certain height before cutting? I have heard it has a memory of where it was cut and stops growing there. I haven't noticed that though. How do you keep other things fron taking over the yard?

Thanks!

It does have a memory of cut height, and I mow it with a reel mower once a week.

WRT other things taking over the yard, it's been rainy as hell here past few weeks and so the weeds have deff. sprung up unaccounted for; I just spend a day weeding mechanically, using a weed grabber tool.

Both count as my workout. Headphones + podcast = no gym membership required.

You'd be interested to know that this month I'll be finishing a huge trellis on the south wall of our house to let vines grow. This will reduce cooling costs and look beautiful (I hope).

Thanks. I use a battery powered mower, but because the fescue and clover retain so much moisture and has grown so thick, it has been really struggling (I think any mower would really) to mulch except at the highest height setting. I let it grow unhindered in the spring, and since it's been raining like crazy, I can't stay on top of it. (I should note that my lawn is probably only a 1/4 of my property.)

What reel mower do you use? Does it have height adjustments?

Its just a Scotts and yes it adjusts – you could also try scything if you wanted to truly scare the neighborhood kids ;-)

try to use some PGR. Like primo-maxx (or generic). it should make things easier

What are the environmental repercussions of that? I don't do any chemicals, weed killer, or chemical fertilizers. All I do, to feed the soil and not the grass, is dolomitic lime and organic fertilizer.

none that i saw. it just suppresses growth hormone of plants for a couple of weeks so they grow at half speed or less. less mowing. less watering. less fertilizers. etc. for plants that are not grass pgrs usually slow down vertical growth and promote lateral branching/density

PGR is just so expensive to use.

yea. generics cost 1/3.still not cheap. yet, i decided to try one this summer, because mowing grass that grows as crazy on the hill (frontyard) at 90sh weather - it's just not my definition of fun

>I never have to mow,

> I mow it with a reel mower once a week.

Maybe you mean you don't use a 2-stroke engine to mow as the point you were making, but if not, what the huh? There's evangelizing, and then there's just being the crazy guy on the corner making stuff up that sounds like evangelizing. You're leaning towards the latter with these kinds of non-ambiguous contradictory statements.

Was the comment edited? I don't see a comment saying "I never have to mow".

Yes, they secretly edited their comment without acknowledging the fact

Consider getting a European style scythe. It’s not much harder than a reel mower and can work quite well in tall grasses.

I’ve used one from https://scythesupply.com/

I have a couple on our farm and honestly really enjoy cutting hay by hand. The key is to get out there early when it's still cool, and keep the blade sharp as you go!

wild white clover is naturally short and takes up much of the lawn where we are renting. if it weren't for the other random tall stuff we probably wouldn't need to mow at all.

Part of it is evangelizing, but its bigger than that - the yards of tomorrow need to look at lot more like grasslands and a lot less like farmland or golf courses, though.

Grassland is long grass, and it shelters a lot more than just insects and birds. It can be cover for small dogs, cats, beavers, possums, moles, mice, snakes, etc...

Understandably most "neighborhoods" don't want snakes, raccoons, or possums in their yards, but that's the level of "wilderness" we need to return to. Might make living a lot more difficult for a lot of folk...

Yeah a lot of inhabitants of a healthy habitat are labeled culturally as "pests" and "pest control" does a lot of damage to native plants, insects, birds, and other wildlife. I go out identifying insects under my porch lights or out in the yard submitting iNaturalist observations. There' an amazing, diverse natural world out there that can be accessible in a local yard that's a native habitat. I'm up to 400 species at my house (lots of those are moths and other insects). But in reality there's a lot of people who see any snake, insect, or arachnid, and respond with "kill it with fire."

> But in reality there's a lot of people who see any snake, insect, or arachnid, and respond with "kill it with fire."

Did you have a natural (or learned) revulsion for bugs? If so, how did you get over it?

I’ve gotten over mice completely, never felt right killing one in the first place.

I’ve been trying to make peace with bugs; I unplugged my mosquito zappers last summer shortly after getting them when I realized they were zapping mostly everything but mosquitoes.

Still something inside of me that has such a visceral reaction to bugs. I wish they would just stay away from me and I’d happily respond in kind :’(

> I wish they would just stay away from me and I’d happily respond in kind :’( I mean, that’s kinda the line I draw and live with.

Anything in the house is fair game. I don’t feel good about it, but mice, insects, or anything else that’s in my living space has to go. I’ll do what I need to to keep my living space mine.

Anything outside… that’s shared space. As much as I can I try and co-exist. I see the bugs as much a part of the nature I appreciate as the bunnies, the deer, the turkeys, the foxes, the ducks, and everything else. None of it exists without the rest. Anything that isn’t an existential threat to myself or my property I leave alone. If I can’t personally handle them right now, I can always go back in the house.

Where I can, I try and balance my use of the space with everything else. I appreciate the nature where I live, so I only do what’s necessary to make it livable for me. I mow only enough space around the house for us to use. I’ve been working on evicting some groundhogs because they’re trying to turn the ground under my garage into swiss cheese. I get rid of poison ivy when it encroaches in our space but we don’t “weed”. When the mosquitos got so bad we were scared to open a door I did spray some pesticide immediately around our house, but made sure to keep the space I sprayed well mowed to discourage the bees from coming here and getting caught in the crossfire.

I guess it’s just a small mindset shift—I still want the bugs to stay away from me, but I can’t be pissed about bugs when I wander into their home any more than I could wander in to a bear’s den and be annoyed that a bear attacked me.

Oh, except ticks. Fuck ticks. Those are kill on sight.

BTI is a great targeted solution for mosquitoes. Tick tubes can work well for ticks. Although targeted, the tick tubes have some potential for larger impact. More effort, but there tick drags and CO2 traps too.

Oh wow, not sure how I missed that one. I'm up in Canada so it's probably restricted or only sold in tiny 100g retail packages, but if I can chase down some industrial sized bags of that somewhere I'll definitely add that to my toolbox. A little bit of that spread around the wet spots during the spring melt would probably go a long way.

So far I've been primarily relying on permethrin. A gallon of 36.8% was something like $100 and dilutes out to ~600 litres of spray for my purposes. It's not water soluble and binds strongly to soil so I don't need to worry about it getting into the water table and spreading beyond where I spray it (or into my well water). I've been spraying just around my house (and, well, _on_ my house) to make a moat to keep away the mosquitos, ticks, ants, and all the other bazillion things that kept finding their way in.

We've also invested in a couple of the CO2 traps for mosquitos. Have those out in the yard a little ways out.

End of the day though... we live in the middle of a forest situated on wetland. That's part of how I got to a place of picking my battles. I know I'm not going to make much of a dent. As long as my house isn't overrun, it is what it is.

Hang a bat house. :)

I have seriously considered it, but I do wonder about the neighborhood response. Although I don't think there's any danger and that there's actually more danger from the mosquitoes carrying every disease under the sun, I'm not sure if it's a battle I want to take on if someone has an issue with it. Once the bats are in place, I believe it requires engaging with state wildlife authorities to relocate them. Maybe I'm being too paranoid. I mean, there are already bats in the area anyway. They probably just have a hard time finding shelter.

I have a bat house. It's been empty for years. Apparently they prefer my neighbor's attic. But all least they'll have a place to go if they get evicted from the attic.

Sorry, late reply. I've never really had any serious issues with bugs, but desensitization by exposure is the way to go. I've used the iNaturalist app photographing and identifying insects for years, so when I find a new to me species I learn about their life history, and explore what I've seen in its taxonomy. So I'm comfortable around most bugs now since I know which are harmless, and which are the handful that have a sting/bite they'll actually use. Most insects, like most animals, don't want to fight, and would prefer to be left alone. Bees aren't going to sting unless you harass them or you threaten their hive, most wasps don't sting, and very few are aggressive. Grasshoppers and katydids totally do bite though, they scare me. Also I steer clear of anything that looks like a fire ant, centipede, warrior wasps, hornet, or yellowjacket.

Why would one not want possums? They are great. Eats bad bugs, highly resistant to rabies, and generally non-aggressive towards humans.

If you have a garden or chickens they can be a problem. Otherwise, they're out of sight and out of mind.

They are very much not fun when they try to take up residence in your house and start eating stuff.

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