Green Living
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Yard Waste
What do you do with your yard waste, primarily lawn clippings? Our climate is so dry that a lot of people have said not to use the mulch setting on the mower because the clippings will just sit on the top of the lawn forever. Similarly people have said composting it will fill the bin way too fast and it wont break down.
We have enough from mowing yesterday to fill 4 garbage bags. I saw the large yard waste bags, but I just hate the thought of throwing grass in the landfill inside a plastic bag =/ (The garbage co. said it has to be bagged if we throw it away).
What is the best way to handle all this grass?
Re: Yard Waste
We just let ours sit on the grass, it sinks down within a day or so, but maybe it is wetter where I am. Despite what your neighbors say, have you tried it? I am one of those "see for myself people". LOL! Also, small clippings disappear faster, so frequent cutting would be imperative. As for composting, if you turned it into a managed pile with your veggie & fruit food wastes, you could probably use some of the grass, you just can't have a pile of just grass.
For the more extreme idea...have you thought about lessening the amount of grass you have? We are working through this for our backyard. We refuse to spend money or water on making grass pretty when other landscaping (best involving plants native to the local climate) could thrive and be lovely without the fussiness grass involves. In a dry climate, that seems to even make more sense. I've been checking out neighbors' lawns who have amazing landscaping that seems low-effort--and still incorporates grass for hanging out time--but has much less of it than just a full yard of grass.
Does your city have any suggestions for you? CO seems like such a natural, healthy place it would be awesome if your local government had some solution you hadn't thought of yet.
Someone else in your area might be composting; maybe small farms, garden centers, or your town. Your master gardener extension may also have ideas.
We mulch mow and dont have a problem.
Our city just started requiring any yard waste for pickup to be in bodegradable yard bags, otherwise they dont pick them up. Maybe you can just order some of those and use them if you still want to have it collected.
Ditto what pixieprincess said, very well said. We leave our grass clippings on the grass and have had no problems with that. Your neighbors probably don't like the way the cut grass looks when it dries, but it should break down into your lawn in a few days. This helps keep your lawn healthy too. We would compost it, since our pile is always in desparate need of browns, but we have a dog so we can't. If you can compost it you should, grass clippings make excellent compost.
Our city only takes lawn waste in brown paper bags, you can get them at any home store (Lowe's, HD, etc...) If you leave grass, leaves, branches, whatever on the curb in the big plastic yard waste bags they won't take them. The city then mulches the whole bag. Check with your city to see if they do the same.
Like pixie said, have you thought about reducing how much grass you have? We pulled up our whole front yard (granted, it is a TH so it's tiny) and replaced it with drought-tolerant plants. They require very little, if any water or maintenance, and they bloom all year long. It brings me such joy to see all that color when I come into my home. The majority of our backyard too is no longer grass, it's raised beds and a blueberry patch.