Writer Alison Rood knew where to turn when she wondered about pulling out her lawn and decided to write about it. Her column in the San Francisco Chronicle included expert advice from a UCCE master gardener and a UCCE horticulture advisor.
The picture of her backyard looked quite nice to me, but she lamented that the lawn no longer served a useful purpose. Rood contacted master gardener Sandy Metzger.
Metzger told Rood she replaced most of her own lawn with drought-tolerant perennials and ornamental grasses. "The hummingbirds, bees and other insects go crazy in the garden practically all year long," Metzger is quoted.
Horticulture advisor Katherine Jones also expressed misgivings about the wisdom of too much lawn.
"My opinion is that big lawns are great where water is plentiful, and small lawns are great where it isn't," Jones is quoted. "The kind of thing that I don't like to see in California and other dry locations is great expanses of lawn upon which no one treads except the mower."