Kathy Hedberg: UP FRONT/COMMENTARY: Immutable stares on the subject of lawns

Apr. 13—If you want to do something that's about as popular with your neighbors as smoking in a restaurant or letting your dog loose to do his business on their lawn, just try letting your dandelions grow for a month or two.

There seems to be this huge public shaming of householders who wait until the middle or end of May before mowing their lawn and who refuse to use herbicides on their grass. In no time at all lawns like that (and I am speaking from personal experience) develop from mere peach fuzz turf to become a veritable wilderness with grasses, wildflowers and weeds thriving in abundance.

Meanwhile, all around you neighbors are getting out their lawn mowers and weed whackers the moment the last pile of snow has melted, keeping their yards nicely trimmed and manicured. And there's your property sitting in the middle of the block looking like an abandoned lot. All you need is a rusty old pickup truck out there by the mailbox to complete the picture. People are generally too polite to say much but you can tell what they're thinking when they walk by and shake their heads in disgust. Sometimes they make snide little remarks like: "Moving soon?"

In spite of this negativity I was gratified to hear about the NoMowMay movement that has caught on in certain communities that are eco-conscious and also have lax city guidelines. People realize that letting their lawns go for a month or two provides food and shelter for pollinators like bees and butterflies.

Of course not everybody thinks letting your grass grow is a good idea. Besides becoming an eyesore where weeds thrive, they say, tall grass can also become a refuge for rodents, snakes and other undesirables, such as the tennis balls your dog lost last fall when you were playing catch. Many people take great pride in having a tidy, manicured lawn. It must be the latent farmer in all of us — living in the city we can't grow much, but at least we have nice grass.

The reason I side with the NoMayMowers is because I have honey bees and I can see they are hungry and looking for lunch after a long winter of living on nothing but Doritos and leftover pasta. A couple of years ago when it was so wet in the spring people couldn't mow their lawns even if they wanted to, we had wonderful crops of dandelions around my neighborhood. The honey that year was abundant and light-golden in color. The bees were happy and it convinced me to hold off on mowing and other lawn work for a few weeks.

I have since tried to persuade some of my neighbors to wait to mow at least through the end of May to give the pollinators a head start. I make the case that if we all agree not to mow our lawns or use herbicides for awhile we may look trashy but at least we'll look trashy together.

Neighbors look at me as if I've suggested we all go live in a hot air balloon or run stark nekked down Main Street. I'm guessing that's a "No."

Hedberg may be contacted at khedberg@lmtribune.com.