Filed under: Cash for Grass | Tags: big, cash, Cash for Grass, grass, neighbors, pile, sod, tree, ugly
The pile of grass in my front yard grew big and ugly enough that I felt self-conscious. My yard is a mess, and my neighbors are nervous. I have a small courtyard between my garage and front door where I have decided to stack the grass to get it out of sight from the street until I can get rid of it. I still don’t know how I will get rid of it.
I also still have no actual plan yet for reconstructing the yard, but the picture in my head continues to look very nice.
Here are a couple of photos of the grass extraction so far from the lawn, and the pile, now moved into the courtyard.
I am leaving the tree, making an exception to my “all native plant” theme. It is pretty, and perhaps more significantly it is pretty big.
My big honkin’ grass pile that all our friends and relatives will get to walk past when they come over for Thanksgiving dinner, aka “Fall Decor”:
Filed under: Cash for Grass | Tags: California, cash, Cash for Grass, catharsis, chaparral, construction, debris, garden, grass, grasslands, lawn, native, plant, plants, sod, trees
Today I began ripping out grass. I don’t have any plan made yet as for what specifically I will put back in it’s place, but the grass is on its way out.
I have a picture that looks very nice in my head of what this will look like when done, but nothing on paper. I have started doing research on native plants on-line. Did you know that less than 10% of California’s land area has ANY native (pre-European) plants left excluding trees? Almost all the grasslands, hills, chaparral and forests have either been replanted with or entirely overcome by invasive and non-native species. I feel I have embarked on a kind of sacred mission to help preserve a few remaining bits of California’s botanical history in my own little garden.
After a long day at work, feels good to be out with a pick and shovel, ripping out the lawn I have decided to oppose on moral grounds. The sod peels away easily, as the roots have barely penetrated the native clay and rock even after 8 years.
I am also learning something about the construction industry. Under the sod I am finding bits of pipe, nails, siding foam, soda cans and construction waste that our builder laid the sod over without cleaning up. Among the more interesting finds: a large broken mirror, a 2-foot length of heavy chain, a 30 pound slab of broken concrete, and a hole with several beer bottles which I hope were not left by people responsible for the structural integrity of my home.
I have also created a waste problem. What do I do with the sod I am ripping up? We have a “green waste” can that the city picks up every two weeks that I had planned to use. I filled it to the top with about 30 square feet of lawn. That’s means I’ve got about 16 months worth of grass at that pace of pickup. Hauling is not in the imaginary budget that goes with my mental pictures.
For now I am making a big pile in the front yard. In just an hour or so I ended up with 70 square feet of grass pulled, one full green waste can, one pile of grass, and 630 square feet to go…
