It’s spring and a young man is standing on my porch, enthusiastically explaining everything his crew can do for me: they can thatch my lawn and mow it and trim it and I’ll be thrilled with how nice it will look!
And I’m saying “No thanks.” “I don’t need that.”
He’s so cheerful. But he probably doesn’t actually know anything about gardening, so I don’t really want to get in to a discussion about lawn “thatching.” Thatching of lawns is one of those gimmicks where they offer a service, and the mere fact that they offer it suggests that you need it. But you don’t. Healthy lawns, with healthy soils, don’t have a build-up of dead grass. And if a lawn does have such a build up something is wrong with the life of the soil. The dead grass shouldn’t be removed. Rather, the soil needs to be brought back to life.
With this in mind, I am having a hard time dissuading this fellow that I really didn’t want his crew to come thatch my lawn.
“But we can clean up your whole yard!” and “We’ll do it for FREE!!!”
Say what? “Why would you clean up my yard and thatch my lawn for free?”
“Because we will use your yard for before-and-after photos!”
Oh, dear.
Still. “No. Thanks.”
Perhaps it’s time to tidy up. A bit. I’ve left the garden beds in their collapsed state since last fall. And every morning I watch the birds foraging for seeds and bugs in the beds. But spring is soon upon us and new food sources are waking up. Perhaps it is time. And I do want my neighbors to like what they see in my natural, pollinator and bird friendly garden.
But I’ll do it my way. And my before-and-after photos will be about a garden ecosystem coming to life. Not about lawn thatching.