Yard Clippings In PLASTIC Bags?

I was out for a walk through West Branch on yet another beautiful Iowa spring afternoon when I came upon two people mowing a neighborhood lawn. I could tell by their peppiness and general conversation they were self employed. Gotta love entrepreneurship.

As I was thinking how great it was to see this man and woman working so hard for themselves, I was stopped in my tracks when the woman pulled the grass bag from the mower, reaches behind he back producing a black garbage bag and began putting the yard clippings into the bag!

Big deal? You see it all the time? What does it matter? Maybe I am being too sensitive? Sure, but let's look at what may have caused my "overreaction", shall we?

I can understand people like to bag their yard clippings. I can see when they stand on their front porch or look out the window admiring their yard they won't get any clippings stuck to their eyes. Wait, I guess I don't understand.

I do know too much excess of clippings cut and left on a yard can be damaging to the grass, cause dead spots leaving little windows of opportunity for weeds to sprout. Huh. Maybe I do understand. However, if properly maintained, the clippings can actually act as a natural weed killer as they fall in-between the grass blades, blocking sunlight from the weeds. Yep, I'm on the right track!

So, is it really necessary to bag your clippings? No, but to each their own. What causes me concern is what people do with these clippings, how they "dispose" of them.

When you bag your clippings, that being grass, something that would nurture and feed the very soil from which you cut it from in a PLASTIC garbage bag, you have done something rather, well, stupid. Garbage bags are PLASTIC, made from petroleum products. They do not degrade for hundreds, if not thousands of years!

What are their options? How else are they to dispose of such "heinous" waste? Well, there are many, like alternative yard waste bags, compost pile, mix them in with mulch or as mulch for a garden or flower bed, or just simply let the clippings fall back into the yard!

Iowa City has a program that uses bags made from recycled materials for yard waste; bags that actually biodegrade releasing the material back in to nature. Most communities have such programs and while the cost may be a little more than plastic, rest assured your clippings will not be in the land fill, still nestled in a plastic bag when your great-grandchildren die.

Creating a compost pile is another great ways to not only dispose of your clippings, but a great way to get relatively free fertilizer. Mix yard clippings with some dirt, occasional food waste, weeds and even small brush to generate rich, healthy fertilizer for your garden or flowers.

Depending on the size of your yard, you could use the clippings to stretch the effectiveness of existing mulch or even use it on its own as mulch. In a garden, place the clippings in piles in and around your plantings to help control weeds, or use in a flower bed for the same purpose.

And my favorite: let the clippings fall where they may. I don't like to weed my garden, so there is not much chance I will ever weed my lawn. Wait, maybe I should take my own advice and use the clippings in my wife's garden as it seems to grow more weeds than anything!

But it is also more than just that for me as I view my lawn is a wonder of nature, and I don't feel I need to have a perfectly manicured lawn to compensate for anything. I like to walk through my lawn, drive through my lawn when needed but mostly I enjoy it for the fact that is is not all just grass. I enjoy the tiny striped flowers, the bluebells and even the dandelions and the fact that my lawn is largely green.

Too often we try to control nature; when will we learn to live in harmony with nature?