Garden stress

Wednesday I wrote about the emphasis on personal responsibility being destructive when collective efforts -- often focused on governments and corporations -- are necessary.

Understanding that does not mean that I don't take my personal responsibility seriously. In fact, the extent to which I worry about it may be pathological.

That may be more clear from tomorrow's post, but for today I want to focus on one specific problem:

I feel like an utter failure and bad person every time our yard guy comes.

Lawns are bad, and I know they are bad. They are bad for water use and fossil fuel use, but they are also bad for local wildlife. That doesn't mean just adorable (or less adorable) mammals; it also means birds, insects, and arachnids. 

I am soft-hearted, so that does bother me. I also find nature beautiful so I care about that balance. 

Beyond that, we need pollinators. Even animals that don't transport pollen may be an important part of food webs that include pollinators.

We need the creatures that help move matter into soil. The most organic nutritious diet in the world is less effective when grown in nutrient-poor soil.

I know all that, and I have seen it. Back when it was still grass in the front, even just getting longer I would start seeing different species in the yard. We had never had a Wilson's warbler before, and there it was, perching on a stalk of grass.

It is still grass in the backyard, but I did get rid of it in the front. Volunteer clover took over better than I could have hoped.

Except there are still strong ideas about an appropriate way for a yard to look. We have had people come and mow without asking. (We're just really lucky there is not an HOA.)

Now we pay someone to come every two weeks, so that's when I have those feelings of being bad and a failure, especially when they do the front.

I know, I need to put something else there, to fill up the space. I am getting closer to knowing what to do, but there are obstacles in the way.

Obviously the biggest is money, but an unfortunate runner-up is a sad lack of energy. 

Well, the weather didn't help. The clover was delightfully springy underfoot, but the heat dome was pretty hard on it.

The hard part is how far we have strayed as a culture from even thinking about nature. 

For example, we had three butterfly bushes. The grew way too well, not being native to the area and so not balancing here, but in a thriving kind of way.

They did in fact attract butterflies, which seems like a good thing. 

They did not provide a place for the laying of butterfly eggs, and food for when the caterpillars hatch. Supporting life needs to allow for multiple aspects of life. Feeding adults is only a small part of it.

Most of my plans for this year have fallen through, though I may still do something destined for failure, just to feel like I tried. 

There is one thing that was recently encouraging. 

I have felt this fear of getting a wrong start, that then everything will go wrong. I recently read The One-Straw Revolution by Masanobu Fukuoka. When he decided to immediately switch to natural methods, he killed an entire orchard. He later was able to get to thriving fields and orchards, but there is something to be said for gradual adaptations. 

Fukuoka simultaneously shows me that recovery from disaster is possible, and that it's okay to start small.

So if this fall I put down some cardboard and mulch in the NorthWest and SouthEast corners of the front yard, then get two native plants in the ground to act as anchors (probably one ocean spray and one mock orange, but it's also dependent on what I can find), then that will still be a start.

I believe the clover will come back to fill in.

And then, if the back yard is more complicated because of needing to allow space for the dog and it being larger, well, right now any success will be meaningful.