"Scott Aker is a horticulturist at the U.S. National Arboretum" reads the bio at the end of each of his Q&A columns in the Washington Post. Maybe that's why I've never found a mistake in his column - and believe me, I watch these garden writers like a hawk! But his vastly superior knowledge to mine serves the public well, as seen in this week's answer to the hot question: Can I turn my yard into a meadow? Ever so gently, Aker dishes the real dirt on the subject - that lawn eventually becomes scrubland, a word that evokes enough sheer ugliness to discourage most readers right there. And scrubland's only a way station before its final condition - forest. And don't forget all those tough, woody invasives that show up and need to be killed. And your local government probably won't let you do it, anyway. And even if they will, don't do it unless you have a 5-acre lot.
But after all the well-founded caveats Aker goes on to make a convincing case for those 5-acre lots being converted to meadow and I SO hope the owners of the obscene spreads of chemlawn in D.C.'s tonier suburbs take note - and their designers, too. (They'd still have plenty of room for a small lawn area near the house.) And Readers, it can now be revealed: I've infiltrated the local design group and am plotting to spread the revolution.
Link Scroll through holly matchmaking to the second question.
Comments