‘Leaves of Grass’: who needs ’em?

“And limitless are leaves stiff or drooping in the fields / And brown ants in the little wells beneath them, / And mossy scabs of the worm fence, heaped stones, elder mullein and pokeweed,” writes Walt Whitman.

“The American lawn uses more resources than any other agricultural industry in the world. It uses more phosphates than [all of] India, and Americans put more poisons on their lawns than [are used in] any other form of agriculture. The American lawn could feed continents of people [if it was grown as wheat or other grains],” according to Howard Yana-Shapiro and John Harrisson, authors of “Gardening for the Future of the Earth.”

The fantasy of lush turf stretching to the horizon is a cultural phenomenon. The concept of lawn, write Yana-Shapiro and Harrison, began with the country estates of England, where a multitude of servants cut and trimmed by hand.

Since the lawn is the largest agricultural sector, it is the major user of water. We do not have a water problem right now, but a few years back there was a drought in the northeast that is now plaguing the southwest. Like oil, water is a diminishing resource. Reforestation is a way of conserving water. On the other hand, a lawn is a threat to the water supply.

The poisonous run off from lawns finds its way into waterways and kills fish and other aquatic species. Herbicides used on lawns and tracked into the carpeting of homes remain active for at least three years. Herbicides mimic estrogen and have been found to bring on early puberty in girls, alter sexual characteristics and promote sterility. Carcinogenic herbicides, often used on neat suburban lawns surrounding each house, may be correlated to the rise of breast cancer in such communities.

The lawn was a salute to wealth and power, as is the gated community today. On my road, the sound and smell of lawn mowers and weed whackers is almost as constant as the traffic during the summer. Some neighbors are so obsessed, they mow every day. Woe is me.

Bob has an ancient ride-on mower, named Whitey, which breaks down every spring (it’s guaranteed), but we are brainwashed and keep fixing him and keep mowing. However, our original three acres of grass has been reduced to grassy paths and one open area that I hope someday to convert into meadow.

Meadow means Bob doesn’t have to mow it. The wildflowers take over and the grass goes to seed, which provides food and shelter for ground- eating, seed-devouring birds (but what will the neighbors think?).

If you are willing to divest yourself of grass, there are several techniques suggested by the pros.

• Use black plastic to cover the grass and bake it. This method is costly and a trifle unsightly.

• Cover the unwanted grass with newspaper and mulch it, throwing wildflower seeds and bulbs hither and yon. However, blankety-blank grass roots form a dense mat under newspaper (I think they thrive on it), and grass appears as soon as your back is turned.

• My approach involves a little elbow grease (but who said gardening is just fun?). I dig up one-quarter of the area to be eliminated. I put the turned over clods on the next quarter and wait a week. (Don’t worry, turned over sod is almost as attractive as mowed grass.)

I then shake out the dried clods by banging them against the shovel or a rock and compost them. The next week, I dig up the area of weakened grass, which turns easily, and I move these clods to the third quarter and so on.

Within a couple of weeks, I’ll have a new planting area, and grass makes great compost. Now I’m going to plant onions and make scallion pancakes.

If you have any questions or comments write asknanny@riverreporter.com.

Scallion Pancakes

Two cups whole wheat or garbanzo flour

One-quarter cup toasted sesame oil

One cup chopped scallions

Tamari sauce to taste

Place flour in a bowl. Make a concavity and pour in one-half of the sesame oil and allow to absorb. Add three-quarters of a cup of cold water and allow to absorb while stirring. Make dough into a ball and knead by hand on floured board. Refrigerate dough for a day. Pinch off small balls of dough and roll out into four-inch disks. Brush with sesame oil and sprinkle with scallions. Lay another disk on top, brush with oil, sprinkle with scallions and fold in half like a sandwich. Roll out again (about one-quarter inch thick). Use up all the dough in this fashion, making four to six pancakes . Use remainder of oil to fry up pancakes till golden brown. Turn and brown the other side. Keep turning till pancakes are dark and crisp. Sprinkle with tamari sauce.