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Chapter 1: Introduction
Two
families live right next door to each
other, but their yards look like they exist in totally
different universes.
The Greenlawn family's grass is
lush, green, and has a well-manicured look to it. An oak
tree native to the region spreads a canopy of neatly trimmed
branches over a mulched* flowerbed with perennial flowers
blooming in it.
Underneath the living room window,
sculpted bushes with fragrant flowers thrive. Bordering the
sidewalk is another mulched bed, this one with freshly planted
annual flowers in pleasant shades of white, lavender, and
peach. As a member of Ann Greenlawn's book club put it, "I
love it when we meet at her house because she's always got
some new ornamental flower or landscaping touch she's added.
It's such a beautiful place."
Next door, the Brownmuds' lawn is
another story. The original San Augustine grass — planted
when the house was built — died years ago. A half-hearted
attempt to sod the yard by planting Bermuda grass seed went
astray when a flood washed most of the seed away, resulting in
four-foot-high grass in the low sections of the uneven yard
and bare dirt on the high parts. In what remains of the
original flowerbeds underneath the dining room window, thorny
thistles rear their spiky heads and weeds grow
unchecked.
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The Greenlawns’ front
yard
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On
a sunny afternoon in early spring, Bud Brownmud is standing
out at his mailbox staring at his third warning letter from
the GoodHomes Neighbourhood Association. "Clean up your yard
or we'll be forced to take legal action," it says.
 Whose yard do you want yours to look
like?
Bud crumples up the notice and clenches his jaw.
As he storms back toward his home, he catches sight of his
neighbour, Scott Greenlawn, fiddling with a lawnmower in the
driveway. Bud's never really talked to Scott much-he figures
the guy's some goody-two shoes who paid a fortune to have a
dream lawn put
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The Brownmuds’ front
yard
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maintained — but now he's peeved and wants to let off
some steam.
Bud holds up the wadded-up notice and waves
his arm. "Do you believe this? The Neighbourhood
Association is out to get me!"
Raising an
eyebrow, Scott leaves his lawnmower and wanders over. "Trying
to get you?"
"Yes." Bud frowned at the crumpled
notice. "I got a letter that said something about not keeping
up my yard. Can you believe it? What I do with my property
should be my own business."
Scott tried hard to stifle
a sigh and not let his eyes roll. The Brownbuds' yard was a
disaster, but they were still his neighbours. It was best to
stay on good terms. And besides, if he gave the other man a
few tips, perhaps Bud would do something about the weeds that
kept straying into the Greenlawns' yard...
Slowly,
with a friendly smile, he said, "Well, yes, it's your
business, but when you bought the house, didn't you sign some
kind of paperwork, some kind of agreement with the
Neighbourhood Association that you'd keep up your yard?"
A puzzled look came over
Bud's face. "I ... don't remember. There was a stack of
paperwork this high" — he put his palms a few inches
apart — "that my wife and I had to sign. I suppose I
should have read it all, but it would've taken all day, and I
was in a hurry to get back to my job."
"What do you do
for a living?" Scott asked.
"I'm a software developer
over at XG Micro. My wife, Sheila, you've probably seen her
out and about-she stays at home with our two
children."
Scott nodded and smiled. "You do well
then."
"I do all right. But not as well as you." Bud
waved a hand at the Greenlawn's yard. "It looks as if you've
spent a fortune on lawn care. How much does it cost to have a
lawn like that installed and maintained every month?"
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Did You Know?
The normal lawn has up to six individual grass plants
in each square inch, which comes out to 850 plants per
square foot! | Laughing,
Scott said, "I'm a tire salesman down at Dalton Tire. And my
wife teaches third grade. We're not wealthy, not by any means.
We couldn't afford to pay someone to install a lawn for us, so
we did it ourselves, and we maintain it ourselves."
The
look of astonishment on Bud's face prompted Scott to add, "And
that agreement you don't remember signing? It was a promise to
keep up your yard to a minimum standard."
With a
friendly smile, he added, "You see, Bud, the condition of your
yard affects my property value, your other neighbour's
property value, the people across the street's property
value...everyone's. And even if no one's planning to sell
anytime soon, having a nice lawn can give you a lot more pride
in your home. In fact, every time my friends come by to pick
me up for bowling, they compliment our yard, and I like
that."
Bud gave Scott a questioning look. "So...you
think Sheila and I could...we could fix this lawn
ourselves?"
"I think you could."
"But where would we
start?"
Af ter taking a closer look at the Brownmuds'
yard, Scott replied, with as much diplomacy as he could
muster, "Well, in the shape it's in, we'd probably need to
start over."
"We?" Hope bloomed on Bud's
face.
"Yeah, we. I'll help you. It's not that hard,
once you know what to do."
Bud shook his head
doubtfully. "I wouldn't know where to start."
Removing
his arm, Scott bent down and scooped up a handful of bare dirt
from Scott's yard. "The first thing to do, usually, is to
figure out what kind of soil you're dealing with. Fortunately
for you, that problem's already been solved."
"You
tested your soil?"
"I didn't have to. Since we're in a
neighbourhood, I was fairly sure that lots of other people had
already done that. So I took a trip down the street to Great
Hills Nursery and asked them about the soil in this
area."
"That's good."
"Actually, that's good
news about bad soil," Scott said. "Here in Austin, Texas, we
straddle two distinctly different geographic regions with two
totally different types of soil."
Bud laughed. "Yes,
your yard, and then mine, right?"
 With a grin, Scott replied, 'Not quite. Do
you know about the Balcones fault line that runs under
Interstate 35?"
"Oh, yes. Sheila and I took the
children down into that cave in Georgetown to see
it."
"Well, that old fault line-where the earth moved
about 20,000 years ago-is the dividing line between rich,
black, gumbo-like soil and chalky, alkaline pale
soil."
"Which one do we have?"
"Here on the west
side of I-35, we have the second one. It's poor soil, really;
best suited for ranch land, since the main things that want to
grow in it are native weeds and cedar. Now, east of I-35 is
the same geographic region as Houston and the gulf coast-to
grow tomatoes, all you have to do is throw some seeds out in
front of you and step on them to push them into the soil. You
can come back in a month and you'll have tomatoes. But that
isn't where we live. Where we live, if you want a backyard
garden, like the one Mrs. Leverett down the street has, you
have to put in a bunch of organic compost and other things and
fertilize it."
Shaking his head, Bud remarked, "That
sounds like a lot of work."
"It can be, at first. But
once you get it set up, all you have to do is maintain it. And
that can be a fun family activity that gets everybody
outdoors, out in the sunshine and all that."
Bud
thought about his own family life: his two girls usually
parked in front of the TV, Sheila online e-mailing gossip to
her friends...they could use a family activity. "OK, so we've
got poor alkaline soil around here. How do we fix that? And
how much is all this going to cost me?"
"Well, first,
we probably should make some sort of plan for what we're going
to do," Scott suggested. He tilted his head towards his open
garage door. "Come on into my workshop and let's write down a
few ideas so we can get a rough estimate on costs."
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Did You Know?
The average grass plant has 387 miles (623
kilometers) of
root. |
The two men
went in and sat down at Scott's workbench. On a white notepad,
Scott started making notes. "All right, since we know the soil
type, the next thing we have to do is pull out big weeds by
hand, and get your yard tilled up."
"I tried pulling
weeds," Bud explained, "but they just broke right off. I
couldn't get the root. Am I going to have to use a
shovel?"
"You can, or you can wait until it rains, or
water your yard thoroughly. When the ground's saturated, you
can pull those weeds up, root and all, with no
trouble."
"Tilling* sounds expensive."
Scott
shook his head. "It's not. We can borrow Mrs. Leverett's
five-horsepower rototiller.* She might want you to cut her
grass for her in return, or something, but you can do that,
right?"
"Um, yes...but this is starting to sound like a
lot of back-breaking work!"
"I wouldn't call it
'back-breaking' since I've been doing it and my back hasn't
broke yet, but in the beginning, it does take a fair amount of
physical work. But let me ask you this-do you pay money to
belong to a health club or gym?"
Flexing his bicep, Bud
answered, "I try to make it to the health club twice a week,
yes."
"How much does it cost?"
Bud told
him.
Smiling, Scott said, "Then that's some money that
you're going to save. Tell the club you're quitting to join
the Lawn Care Gym. Putting in and keeping up a nice lawn is
good exercise!"
The corners of Bud's mouth slowly
turned up. "Very well, I have to admit, this is sounding
better and better: a yard like yours, an activity that brings
my family together, and a good, hard workout for free. You've
got me sold. So what do we do after we pull out the weeds and
till up my yard? Plant corn or something?"
"We could,
if you want a stand of six-foot-high (2-meter-high) corn for a
yard." Scott chuckled. "Seriously, though, we need to start
thinking about what kind of landscaping you're going to
want."
"Oh, no-landscaping-I don't have that kind of
money," Bud protested as he put up his hands.
"No, no, no.
I'm not talking about having a commercial crew come out with
their big trailer, fancy uniforms, loud leaf-blowers, and
king-sized bill. I'm talking do-it-yourself
landscaping."
Bud gave Scott an appraising look. "You
know about that stuff?"
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towards his lush, well-cared-for lawn, Scott said, "The
proof's in the pudding. My wife, Ann, and I planned this, and
my sons and I put it in."
"Wow," Bud exhaled heavily.
"Landscaping. It sounds overwhelming. I don't even know where
to start."
In a helpful tone, Scott suggested, "Well, what
kinds of things would you like to have in your yard? For
instance, does Sheila like to cook?"
"Oh, yeah, she's
got all these recipes she's always trying. Fresh herbs and all
that."
"Great! So you might want to have a little herb
garden right outside the front door. That way, she can get the
freshest herbs possible just by stepping outside her front
door and picking a little basil, some cilantro, maybe a sprig
of rosemary or thyme ... whatever her recipe calls
for."
"Ye
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Helpful Hints
If you notice mushrooms sprouting up
through your new, lush lawn, pick them before you mow.
Chopping them down with the mower will only end up
spreading them. | s-she'd
love that," Bud said enthusiastically. "And you know another
thing she'd like? She's said how she likes seeing all those
flowers you have in your yard. Could we do a flowerbed,
too?"
"We certainly could."
A frown stole onto
Bud's face. "But ... wait a minute ... all of this is going to
drive up my water bill, isn't it? And I'll have to stand
outside holding a hose, or keep running out to turn a
sprinkler off and on, won't I?"
"It might," Scott
admitted. "But if the Neighbourhood Association comes after
you" — he indicated the balled-up notice Bud had set on
the workbench-"it's going to cost a lot more to hire a lawyer,
don't you think?"
Bud swallowed. "Yes."
"And
besides; as long as we have to till up your yard, we might as
well put in a sprinkler system to irrigate and water it. We
can do that ourselves with some PVC pipe and a timer. Then you
won't have to waste time with hoses or sprinkers."
"All
right," Bud agreed. "You've convinced me. But once we do this,
how do I keep the weeds and the bugs out?"
"Slow
down — let's take this one step at a time. The first
thing we have to do is figure out what kind of grass you want.
Then we'll measure your yard and make a scaled-down
sketch — nothing too fancy, just a working map of
what goes where. This isn't rocket science, but we do
need a plan. Then we'll pull up the weeds, till your yard,
maybe get your soil tested to see if it's been treated with
anything harmful, fertilize it if we need to, till it up again
to mix in the fertilizer, dig some trenches, lay in the
sprinkler system, outline the flower and herb beds, sod or
seed the lawn, plant the beds, and mulch them." He stopped to
catch his breath.
Bud's eyes opened wider. "That's a
lot of work."
"It is, so you might as well go cancel
that gym membership right now," Scott said with a
laugh.
"All right, I will," Bud agreed. He stood up to
leave, then turned back to face Scott. "Say, I know I haven't
always been the best neighbour or anything even close to it.
So...I really appreciate your help."
"It's all
right," Scott replied. "So when do you want to get started on
planning your new yard?"
Glancing at his watch, Bud
said, "Well, dinner's not for another hour...do you have time
now?"
"I have time now. Let me grab my tape measure and
we'll get some numbers, then we'll sit down with the
sketchpad."
"It's a deal." Bud stuck out his hand.
"Thanks."
"Sure."
They shook hands.
Just
then, a car pulled up to the curb and Scott's teen-aged son,
Adam, stepped out.
"Thanks for the ride, Mrs. Haynes,"
he called back over his shoulder as he walked up the driveway
with his spiked track shoes slung over his shoulder. "Hey
Dad," he said to Scott, "do you want me to aerate the yard
today, or should I put my spikes up?"
Bud looked back
and forth between Scott and Adam with a look of disbelief.
"What do track spikes have to do with aerating your
yard?"
With a smile, Scott replied, "You may as well
sit down. You've got a lot to learn about lawn care."
Read on, and you'll learn how
to achieve your dream lawn.
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