Monday, November 9, 2009

Replacing Lawn with a Garden


Yep, that's a giant piece of mowing strip...crazy projects are afoot at the BrownThumb house.

There's nothing like reading a classic garden book to get you feeling rebellious. I just finished reading Food Not Lawns, and proposed an idea to BrownThumbPapa that I was sure he would veto.

"What do you think about ripping out part of the front lawn?" I ventured. "The sun is better in the front yard and we could plant some artichokes and snapdragons." (An odd combination, but they're two of his favorites.) To my surprise, he quickly agreed. "Less lawn for me to mow? All riiiiight!"

This weekend, the project began. I'm doing sheet mulch by the fence to smother the lawn. It starts with a layer of wet cardboard topped with some leaves and compost. It decomposes over the winter and you can plant directly in the mulch.


The next step was to remove the mowing strip between the lawn and the rocks. The pickaxe was great for this, and the pieces came out in huge chunks--as you saw above.


That's all I had time for this weekend. I'm sketching out ideas and spending a lot of time with my Sunset Western Garden Book and graph paper. I'm thinking asparagus, strawberries, and an artichoke or two--what do you think?
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8 comments:

  1. LOVE it! We actually put garden boxes on every side of our house this summer - including one right smack in our front yard for strawberries. It was awesome! Can't wait to see your finished product. Maybe I'll take pictures and email them to you so you can see what I'm talking about...
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  2. I just ordered seeds for Purple Passion Spinach to add some color to the front yard border- that might be a nice spash of color for you? And look into some of the other artichokes out there- there are some pretty purple varieties!
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  3. A great person you may want to follow as well as read her blog showing her front yard transformation similar to what you're after is Shawna Coronado, Gardening In The Nude. You will get some super cool ideas from her project and how successful it's been!
    Good Luck!
    Christina
    The Personal Garden Coach
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  4. What an inspiring project. Can't wait to see the progress. I have a few clients who would love to do what you are doing, unfortunately their husbands are lawn worshippers.

    Regards,

    Scott Hokunson
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  5. Yaaaay! Another lawn bites the dust...love it! Be sure to mix in some lovely evergreen things to carry you through the times when your edibles aren't looking their best...dividing up the space (even adding some subtle terraces if you have any slope) can make things more interesting and will guide your plant placement. See my blog for some of my fav all-season plants, and goooood luck Mama AND Papa (nice that he's with you on this!!)
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  6. Love it! We are planning on re-doing our backyard in 2010 (starting demo this fall/winter and then will put it all back together in the spring) and are also considering doing the front too. Our lot is pretty tiny, so the front would be super easy & inexpensive to do. We've discussed getting rid of the grass with both of our neighbors and they're up for it (we share on both sides). Come spring/summer next year, hopefully our grass will be reduced to about 5 - 10% of the overall landscape (and that might end up being native grass vs. "lawn"). Looking forward to reading about your efforts!
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  7. There's a house near me that took out their whole front lawn and went with stones and smaller rocks. Too much of a Fresno look for me but they did incorporate quite a few planters in. A few with shrubs and flowers but many with vegetables. They have 1 with broccolli and one with cauliflower. I have been suprised how well the grayish blue green of those leaves looks incorporated with the natural rock.
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  8. Greetings from the other end of the country!

    I'm big into tearing up the yard to garden...I'd rather be a food farmer than a grass farmer. I can look out my back door, where there used to be grass and azaleas and see spinach, spring kale, swiss chard, and little peas headed for their trellises.

    Thanks for the inspiration.
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