
My township calls my lawn ‘a nuisance’ (2015) - teslacar
https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/08/03/my-town-calls-my-lawn-a-nuisance-but-i-still-refuse-to-mow-it/?postshare=9241470881470420&tid=ss_fb-bottom&utm_term=.69163f
======
magpi3
I grew up in a suburb where everyone was expected to have their lawns properly
manicured and treated to prevent dandelions and other weeds. For about two
years recently I lived in an intentional community, and discovered two things.

First, untreated lawns are beautiful. Different colors, gorgeous blues and
yellows, emerge as different "weeds" take root during different times of year.
Now, nothing speaks to me more of the blandness of the suburbs than its staid,
boring green lawns.

Second, I had NO IDEA that grass reseeded itself if you just let it flower. In
fact, I had no idea grass flowered. If parts of your lawn are worn by activity
(read children), all you have to do is let it grow and flower and it will
"heal" itself.

Yes, I know how ignorant I sound. But that's my point. Homogenous, controlled
environments breed ignorance. And in more ways than a child's lack of basic
understanding of grass as a plant.

~~~
ianai
You speak to what frustrates me about living in a large city. Everything's
been pushed aside and replaced with concrete and asphalt. Driving and walking
around this city just feels dismal. The concrete and asphalt make everything
feel hard, oppressive, and stinky. The summer heat never leaves. Nor does the
litter ever leave. Whereas if there was just a little less concrete and
asphalt at least there wouldn't be concrete/asphalt to fall apart. Just maybe
there would be plants growing in the excess. In attempting to engineer a city
people wound up with less than was there initially.

~~~
oftenwrong
I find that places built for cars tend to be unpleasant. Where people walk
more, the urban environment is often kept in a state that is more enjoyable. I
especially enjoy narrow streets.

a particularly nice, narrow street in my city: [https://s-media-cache-
ak0.pinimg.com/originals/2b/ea/06/2bea...](https://s-media-cache-
ak0.pinimg.com/originals/2b/ea/06/2bea06ff6b629cfd93090cb0d59b3430.jpg)

an article on the benefits of narrow streets:
[http://www.andrewalexanderprice.com/blog20140422.php](http://www.andrewalexanderprice.com/blog20140422.php)

~~~
throwaway6556
Where do you live?

I've never been to the US so my mental picture of it (which Google Maps seems
to confirm) is 99% extremely wide roads, not European-style walkable at all.

So I think, I could never move there (I can't drive a car) and places where I
wouldn't need a car are to expensive to live in (NY, Washington).

Are there many Londons in the US?

EDIT: oh, it's Boston.

~~~
oftenwrong
Yes, it is Boston. Most American cities are sparse and have wide roads and are
not compatible with walking as a form of transportation. Boston included.
Boston is one of the older cities in the country, so it retains some of the
European-style walkability in a select few areas, like Beacon Hill, which is
the neighbourhood in the picturesque street photo. There used to be more
neighbourhoods like that in American cities, but they were destroyed after the
second world war for "urban renewal"/"slum clearance" \- to drive out the poor
and minorites, and to build car-oriented neighborhoods and highways.

The destruction of Boston's old West End neighbourhood is an infamous example:
[http://www.bostonstreetcars.com/the-west-ends-
transformation...](http://www.bostonstreetcars.com/the-west-ends-
transformation.html)

Here's before and after of Hastings Street and the surrounding area n Detroit:
[https://detroitenvironment.lsa.umich.edu/wp-
content/uploads/...](https://detroitenvironment.lsa.umich.edu/wp-
content/uploads/2014/02/Hastings-Street-Before-and-After-Small-Article.jpg)

The surviving walkable neighbourhoods like Beacon Hill in Boston and Greenwich
Village in New York (which was almost destroyed to build a highway) are now
some of the most desired in the country. You would think people would want to
build more neighbourhoods like these, but it is actually illegal due to car-
friendly zoning codes, and politically impossible, and quite unpopular - car
dependence is all many people have ever known, and a dense neighbourhood
without copious free parking and wide roads is seen almost as a personal
attack on our way of life.

~~~
throwaway6556
Thanks a lot for this. I wonder what it'd take for the tide to turn against
cars. That picture is depressing.

------
BugsJustFindMe
At first I read "A mutilated garter snake, a sliced frog and countless slashed
grasshoppers. That was the scene of carnage" and laughed. "Carnage indeed.
Grow up," I said out loud. If people wanted to live in the middle of a bunch
of bats and snakes and shit, they'd go live in the middle of nowhere instead
of next to other people.

But then I looked up Alexandria, Ohio.

"Alexandria is a village in Licking County, Ohio, United States. The
population was 517 at the 2010 census"

517! Wow! And they don't even live _in_ Alexandria. They live outside it!

So these people did go live in the middle of nowhere, and whatever counts out
there as the agency of local dominion has decided that plots of land in the
middle of nowhere need to be free of animals. Wooo boy.

~~~
i80and
I grew up on a farm in the middle of nowhere. I'm used to dealing with large
animals killed by coyotes, old age, and butchering.

But I don't like your attitude towards death. You might not care about snakes
and frogs and such. That's fine. But they're neat animals, and it's not
childish at all to not want to harm them.

~~~
ianai
I don't know what you're responding to in the original comment. S/he appears
to agree with the article generally.

~~~
i80and
Oh, I agree on the whole. Just the first line of their comment rubbed me the
wrong way.

~~~
ianai
I somewhat get that, but in this case i think it's in the context of the
"natural world". We all know it's not just lollipops and cupcakes out there.

------
valuearb
This type of regulation should be the province of HOAs, which have covenants
that home owners agree to when buying their homes. It shouldn't be part of
state law, and this one sounds particularly over-reaching. Basic property
rights should dictate that "nuisance" be clearly defined in a very limited
way.

And she has an entire acre, at least 4x larger than the typical lot size. At
what size does her property become a "farm"?

I live in Arizona and have a lawn. It's expensive to upkeep and requires a ton
of water. Many homes in my neighborhood have "natural" landscaping, basically
rocks and cactus. I would too if I didn't have kids and a big dog. Natural is
much more environmentally sound, and should be encouraged, not fined.

~~~
DoodleBuggy
HOAs are the height of absurdity pertaining to land ownership, I will never
understand why someone would volunteer to pay a monthly fee (basically a tax)
to have a group of bozos tell you what you can and can't do with your own
property.

If the rules imposed by even a mild HOA were put in place by a local
government there would be protests 24/7.

~~~
_red
You don't have to spend too much time wondering, since its prima facia self-
evident.

HOA's exist because they work out financially better than the alternatives.
HOA's may not be for you, but for those that like higher property values, they
are an acceptable trade-off.

~~~
Overtonwindow
Do they really? That's the line I kept hearing when I was searching for my
home but it seemed they were overly inflated, and buyers were drifting away
from the silly harassment and pain of HOAs.

Id say the evidence is clear: if you want to truly own your home, don't buy in
an HOA. If you want others to make decisions for you, dictate how your home
will look, and monitor you like a police force, then choose an HOA.

~~~
_red
"if you want to truly own your home"

Property tax?

I'm not here to extoll the joys of paying and dealing with an HOA, they can be
a hassle - I know it.

However, consider the alternatives: Move out to unincorporated land, build
your 5 acre dream home, swimming pools, tennis courts, etc. Watch as a dump
and trailer park open next door...consider what your options are.

~~~
BeetleB
>However, consider the alternatives: Move out to unincorporated land, build
your 5 acre dream home, swimming pools, tennis courts, etc. Watch as a dump
and trailer park open next door...consider what your options are.

Plenty of incorporated land in the US without HOAs. While some parts of the
country can't seem to exist without them, much of the country (including where
you have really nice homes) do not have them. No trailer parks next door -
they can't afford the land.

~~~
dawnerd
Hell up here in the PNW house prices will be high regardless of what's next
door. In Portland there could be a junkie house and your house still be valued
over 600k+

------
kefka
True that..

What we find many a time, is that townships and cities have an extraordinary
amount of power to cause problems for landowners. We all think only HoA's can
do this... and that's blatantly not true.

What exactly is a nuisance? Right now in this case is an untended yard. It's
also been "improper house paint color". Or too many vehicles. Or too much
traffic. Or harkening to older worse times, "wrong skin color" (just noticed
the photo... possible sigh).

But how much control should government have over private property? As long as
I'm not doing anything illegal, they shouldn't have any holding on my
affairs... But then that's the root of the issue, is with an Ohio law allowing
control to townships with an undefined term "nuisance".

~~~
II2II
> Right now in this case is an untended yard.

The article mentions that non-native species are removed. In other words, the
yard is tended to. It simply is not tended to in a way approved by the
township.

~~~
kefka
Ah, true that. But I'm looking at another probable reason..

Ohio, rural, ~400 people in county. Yeah, I'd be willing to bet money on
"Living while black". It's not common, especially in areas like SV and high-
tech areas. But the Appalachians and foothills are their own.. uniqueness. And
Other-ism is definitely a concern and issue.

------
oftenwrong
Leaf removal is similar and related. Instead of allowing the leaves to
decompose and nourish the land, we remove them in a process that is often
environmentally taxing and an actual nuisance. Big, diesel-burning trucks to
haul away the leaves, leaf blowers running for hours. People are normally
obsessed with living in a quiet neighbourhood, but I guess they hate leaves
enough to set that aside.

 _Don’t Bag Your Leaves: An Analysis of Nutrient Loss and Soil Depletion for
Leaf Removal_ [https://druidgarden.wordpress.com/2014/11/07/dont-bag-
your-l...](https://druidgarden.wordpress.com/2014/11/07/dont-bag-your-leaves-
an-analysis-of-nutrient-loss-and-soil-depletion-for-leaf-removal/)

~~~
dawnerd
If you're forced to take up at least set aside some to compost over the year.
It's amazing how must perfect fertilizer people throw away to only buy it back
later.

------
Fricken
A lawn is a little miniature farm, it yields a useless crop you maintain and
ritualistically harvest once a week. Do it, or else...

I mean, some yards are for kids to play in, but most lawns are for nobody 99%
of the time. I can look out the various windows of my home and spot about 50
yards and there's nobody in any of them. On a beautiful Sunday afternoon. When
I do see people, they're doing yard work. We're so weird.

------
itchyjunk
Article is from [2015].

When my friend found a baby bunny and decided to keep him, we found out it's
illegal to do so. Which was shocking. But looking further into it, it made
sense. These kind rabbits are nothing like the domesticated ones and almost
always dies in captivity. An article I read said it happened 4-6 weeks after
captivity and this one died in 7.

It's unfortunate the article doesn't explain what the 'nuisance' is in this
case. But what was the reason to have such strict laws in the first place? I
ask not because I don't like nature but one sided stories often appear
shocking but aren't that extreme when both sides are figured out.

------
jrobn
Why doesn't he put wrought iron fence along the sidewalk and a small sign next
the gate thats says "Smith's Flower Garden" and tell the local officials to
shove it and admire his beautiful garden.

------
rileymat2
I cannot speak to this case, but when our neighbor stopped mowing (out of
laziness and absence not some sort of viewpoint), it seems that the number of
mosquitos increased to nuisance level.

~~~
sevensor
That definitely happens, and the population of deer ticks goes way up too. I
tell you what, finding deer ticks on your kids is huge motivation for mowing.
I take a "mow the weeds" approach, I don't care what grows in my lawn, but I'm
not going to let it get long enough to harbor ticks.

------
eh78ssxv2f
> main point of growing a natural yard is to attract wildlife

Is there a consensus on attracting wildlife to places where humans live?
Having grown up in a place where every year at least one person in the village
died from snake bites, I do not think I personally want to go back to those
conditions.

~~~
mc32
Consensus? Not likely, but there are gardeners who want to attract kinds of
birds, butterflies, bees and perhaps other wildlife which from a city pov are
neutral (not seen as pests). Of course there can be outliers who look to
attract what others consider pests or nuisance animals like rodents, raccoons,
and other disease spreading animals.

------
dghughes
One of the problems with such a lawn in an urban or suburban environment is it
is the perfect environment for vermin such as mice and rats.

My neighbour has a small area behind their garage that has long weeds and
grass. It's about 5 meters square but it's got loads of mice in it.

Even all the neighbourhood cats combined can't catch all the mice since the
mice breed so fast. The mice have started to invade other barns and homes of
neighbours but at this point the amount is controllable.

It's an older couple who own the property so people are not going to say
anything. And it's out of sight but it's amazing how a little thing, grass
area I mean, can blow up into a problem with so many mice.

The previous owners were junk collectors and lived in the driveway in an RV
and only worked outside at night ever see The Burbs movie? Some people really
want or need or should be in a home in the country but they can't afford to
move.

------
rileymat2
Part of me wonders if the people who rail against picky over regulation have
ever had a really bad neighbor.

------
phy6
A municipality's zoning laws (variations of residential, agricultural and
commercial/industrial) usually preclude what you can do on that land. The
restrictions could be further defined by ordinances and covenants recorded
with the municipality. If neighbors are able to complain about her land usage,
I would assume she is not zoned agricultural. Anecdotal Sources: I own a dozen
or so acres on agricultural zoned land, surrounded by houses, which I keep as
a meadow.

On an emotional level, I am repulsed by bleeding hearts who start an article
with pathos for sliced sneks and grasshoppers.

------
dbg31415
Sounds like the author did something to piss off her neighbors. The city
wouldn't get involved without a complaint, right? Sounds like one of the
neighbors is a squeaky wheel...

To avoid situations like this either go to the city first and ask for an
exemption. This shows them that you aren't some slacker, you're intentionally
doing this. Offer to play wildflower seeds and such -- will sound nice. And
get to know your neighbors. Send them a basket of cookies on Christmas...
Tiff's Treats... they aren't very expensive.

~~~
Broken_Hippo
In some cities, folks do go around and look for this sort of thing,
unfortunately.

------
ourmandave
In the grassy area along the interchange where I-74 ends and curves into I-80
there's a sign that says "Prairie Restoration".

[https://www.google.com/maps/@41.597822,-90.5296289,166m/data...](https://www.google.com/maps/@41.597822,-90.5296289,166m/data=!3m1!1e3)

It's over grown with wild flowers and the like. I always wondered what it
would take to have my backyard designated that way.

------
rayiner
Lawns are a two-fold problem. First, they force you to waste a bunch of land
on lawns. In our county, the minimum lot size is about a quarter of an acre.
In our pre-zoning code neighborbood, lots are less than one third that size
and everything works just fine.

Second, municipal governments make it illegal to actually do anything with
that land other than wasting it as a lawn. Can't have chickens, can't plant
it, etc.

~~~
crzwdjk
The ethos of suburbia is conspicuous consumption, especially conspicuous
consumption of land, and actually using it to produce something useful makes
it more of an investment. This is also why it's illegal to carve off part of
your house and rent it out, generally hard to keep boarders, illegal to
actually engage in any kind of business in your house, and so on. I guess the
ideal is to be like the landed gentry in their country manor, which also
explains the obsession with lawns.

------
jedberg
I've had my house in Northern California for 8.5 years, and I've mowed the
lawn perhaps five times, and I never water it. Normally I just let it do it's
thing.

In the winter and spring it's full and green with beautiful white and yellow
wildflowers, and in the summer and fall it's a nice desertscape with a few
small shrubs.

With all the rains this year the green is lasting a lot longer than usual.

~~~
bluedino
Come to the midwest. When it's warm, you have to mow almost every time it
rains.

~~~
Broken_Hippo
That's as long as you are lucky enough to have a break between rainy days. I
solved this by moving to Norway - shorter growing season.

------
Overtonwindow
As a relatively new homeowner I absolutely detest the government trying to
dictate these little things. There are many things a homeowner can do that
doesn't look right, but so long as it doesn't harm anyone else, does not
present a clear and absolute danger, I say leave them be. Another reason to
avoid HOA's at that.

------
bahmboo
In some climates the tall grass can become completely dry and a genuine fire
hazard. That's a good time to cut it.

------
Tempest1981
The closer together we live, the more we want laws to ensure quality of life.
But laws tend to be black-and-white, no grey area.

This couple wants an exemption from the law, and it may be reasonable in their
case. But that doesn't mean the law isn't for the greater good. Just that the
law isn't highly nuanced.

~~~
oftenwrong
In this case, the law is one big grey area. It forbids a lawn that
"constitutes a nuisance", but doesn't define what a "nuisance" is.

------
lstroud
I believe there was a supreme court ruling on nuisance laws....can't put my
fingers on it at the moment. However, my recollection is that, as applied to
noise, expect decibels had to be defined in the law for it to be legal. I
assume something similar would hold true for landscaping.

------
DoodleBuggy
Give people a tax credit to ditch their lawn. That with having a lawn tax (or
excess water use tax) would be an effective solution to reduce what is
generally a waste of water and a poor use of space, particularly in arid
regions.

~~~
rocqua
"Ditch" as in give away? (if so, how?) or "ditch" as in dig a ditch around it?

~~~
DoodleBuggy
Dig a big moat and fill it with alligators, each alligator gets a $5000 tax
credit so the more alligators the bigger the tax credit?

Anyway, "ditch" as in lose or remove, it's American slang.

------
madengr
No one has mentioned chiggers.

Those thing will eat you alive in tall grass. I have 18 acres I don't mow, and
don't live on. Though the house I do live in, in suburbia, I keep that lawn
mowed to keep the chiggers at bay.

------
beardicus
Semi-related to the article: how many people click 'like' on facebook 'save
the bees' articles in the morning, then poison their dandelions in the
afternoon? Here's the easiest/laziest thing you can do to 'save the bees':
when dandelions are out in the spring, maybe take a one week break from mowing
them down... and don't spray them with weed killer.

Dandelions are some of the first food available to bees in the spring after a
long hard winter of shivering. Please help them thrive!

------
jondubois
"The stigma that comes with the look of an unmowed lawn was hard to push
through (no pun intended)" \- Made me chuckle.

------
threepipeproblm
Our society basically worships grasses, for some odd reason.

------
aresant
Sounds like a great YC pitch - engineer a more "lush" crabgrass that looks 99%
as good but uses half the water, less fertilizer, and less care.

~~~
massysett
You just described turf-type tall fescue, which is the recommended low-
maintenance lawn for the mid-Atlantic. It might not do well in Ohio though
since it's a bit cooler.

If this woman weren't trying so hard to make a point, she would get the same
natural grass that is grown on the side of highways and then mow it high every
month or two. Highway departments don't spend a ton on maintenance, the grass
isn't irrigated, and it hosts a variety of wildflowers, birds, rodents, etc.
The grass on the side of the highway is planted like any other grass. They
typically select grasses native to the area because they require little
maintenance, so they will hold the soil down and prevent erosion.

~~~
grkvlt
How does one tend a lawn in the 'mid-Atlantic'?

~~~
massysett
We're in what they call the "transition zone," meaning we have moderately cold
winters and moderately hot summers. So the climate is not optimal for cool-
season grass because the summer is too hot, and not optimal for warm-season
grass because the winter is too cold. Generally the experts recommend tall
fescue, which is a cool-season grass bred to withstand drought and hot
summers. Unlike Kentucky bluegrass, which spreads with rhizomes, tall fescue
tends to grow in bunches so it requires occasional overseeding to keep it
thick. However, it is deeper rooted than bluegrass, gets fewer diseases, and
needs less water.

~~~
grkvlt
I think you mean something different by 'mid Atlantic' to me; probably not the
middle of a cold, northern ocean...?

~~~
massysett
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-
Atlantic_states](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-Atlantic_states)

By the definition there, much of the mid-atlantic states are not in the grass
transition zone though.

------
goodJobWalrus
Their garden looks beautiful!

------
andrewclunn
Where this piece loses me is when it starts advocating for a science based
approach to setting standards for our lawns. I don't want to replace the
suburban housewife lawn police with a new eco-centric version. Can't we just
couch the argument in live and let live individual property rights? That way
you can have your tall grass, they can have their trimmed shrubs, and we set
out values at an individual and personal level rather than as a community.

~~~
zdragnar
If your lawn is unkempt, it may become a breeding ground for vermin and make
weed and invasive species control all the more difficult.

If I want to sell my house, the value is somewhat diminished by your presence.
Ergo, peer pressure and government ordinance arise to settle the dispute.

Otoh, if you want to live somewhere without those things, get a home in the
country where you can get more acres for your buck.

Normally, I would agree that individuals should be able to do as they please
with their property; I'm typically a libertarian fellow. In this case, though,
it's fairly obvious that "proper maintenance" is established to prevent harm
to others, and that harm can be objectively measured.

With all of that said, I definitely wouldn't live anywhere with a housing
association; there are limits to the above argument that I find they
frequently cross.

~~~
DanBC
> get a home in the country where you can get more acres for your buck.

> In this case

S/he is living in the country.

~~~
zdragnar
I got that bit, though it's far less common to have problems out there like
this. Being in the country isn't enough, of course, but it's a first step for
the people most commonly afflicted with onerous (or seemingly onerous)
regulations.

------
madphrodite
In [https://www.amazon.com/Homo-Deus-Brief-History-
Tomorrow/dp/0...](https://www.amazon.com/Homo-Deus-Brief-History-
Tomorrow/dp/0062464310) there is an interesting|amusing diversion into the
history of the lawn iirc.

------
kapauldo
The housing code was there before she was. The Me generation is alive and
well.

~~~
dang
Please don't do generational flamewars on HN. If you have a substantive point
to make (e.g. about respecting tradition), please do so thoughtfully; if not,
please don't comment until you do.

------
jimmytucson
> I was afraid of what people would think, because Americans have been deeply
> conditioned to see their manicured lawns as status symbols.

I don't think insulting people who mow their lawns helps get her point across.
I mow my lawn for obvious reasons: I like the way it looks, I like my
neighbors, I don't like rats or hornet nests, etc. She'd be better served by
trying to persuade me to reexamine the values that lead to not wanting big
honking rats in my yard but she lost that chance when she implied I'm a zapped
cow.

~~~
PhasmaFelis
I'd like to see some evidence that an unmowed lawn leads directly to nuisance
levels of hornets and "big honking rats". It sounds like your real concern is
that you want your neighbors to conform, and you're looking for justification
after the fact.

~~~
Tempest1981
I saw it as giving some reasons that people like maintained yards. Not sure
that warrants a downvote. Maybe he exaggerated a bit about the rat size.

Are you arguing that obeying laws is conforming, and conforming is bad? Or
that the law is so obviously flawed that nobody should conform to it?

~~~
M_Grey
He didn't argue anything, he asked for evidence to support a claim, which is
totally reasonable, unlike your reply.

