"Got a military-industrial complex? The horror story reaches its climax after World War II, when the Cold War rhetoric was used to sell lawn care as a military operation. There were articles comparing crabgrass to Fifth Columnists. There was "Weed-a-Bomb" and "Weed Gun," and one pesticide was advertised, I kid you not, as "the atomic bomb of the insect world."
Baby-boomer suburban dads "were sold on the whole idea of power tools and chemicals and poisons and weapons of mass destruction," says Virginia Scott Jenkins, author of "The Lawn: A History of an American Obsession." Men were told, "They had the power of protecting their lawn from alien invaders and beating Mother Nature to a standstill."
Finally, do you prefer battles of the sexes? Lawnkeeping was and is mostly a guy thing. "Maybe riding around on lawnmowers," muses Yale environmental professor Gordon Geballe, "is like leaving pheromones around, marking your territory. It says my life is in order, my lawn is green, I'm the squire of the village."
Last weekend, millions of Americans went to the movies to see a father and fallen-away minister defend his family and recover his faith in a war of worlds. But every weekend, millions more rev up their lawnmowers, their weed-whackers and their edgers and spend hours defending their families from crab grass and the disapproval of the neighbors."
In one weekend, we spent $60 million on "Signs." But in one year we spend $25 billion on 20 million acres of a crop that we can't eat, wear or sell. We use 32 million pounds of pesticides, 580 million gallons of gasoline and more water than we shower on ourselves in order to color and keep the grass green.
posted on August 10, 2002 04:46:36 PM new
And the silly reason behind the whole obsession is having it look like a little piece of England. It ISN'T!! Why can't people be happy with native plants and eco systems?
They moved to Arizona to get away from their allergies and then planted all the shrubs and grasses that made them sick back home....Duh.
A lawn is natural when you have mild temperatures lots of rain and a herd of sheep.
posted on August 10, 2002 06:42:17 PM new
Four or five mornings every week a friend and I walk through different subdivisions nearby. Some houses are thirty years old and some are two. The lots range from two acres to about five acres. Most of the older homes have yards planted with a variety of trees and shrubs. The homeowners have tried to get away from the weekend ritual of being slave to a lawn. But the new homeowners are the ones to be pitied. Helen knows how bad the commute is around DC. People sit in traffic all week long and then spend the weekends doing chores and mowing the lawn. Ugh.
Builders clear alot of land to place drainfields and get their equipment on site. That leaves Harry Homeowner with alot of denuded yard when he moves in. Either he spends a substantial amount of money to landscape the yard or throws ten bucks worth of grass seed down for quick coverage.But he pays dearly in the long run.
posted on August 11, 2002 06:01:26 AM new
I am becoming increasely concerned with code red & orange (don't breathe & breathe once in awhile) days. The more we are notified we cannot breathe safely the more the stupid community ignores it!
We recently had a code red or orange day on the weekend. My neighbor was right out there with his big gas driven polluting mower! I guess the people doing this think the warnings apply to everyone but themselves.
The state transportation people are still out putting black covering on the roads and the builder's dump trucks still rumble through neighborhoods spewing thick black smoke from soot covered pipes.
We have used native plants, like ferns & flowers for years. The new houses going up around us seem to all have huge weedless lawns. All compliments of the chemical companies. They are hooked to the county water supply. We have not been offered that service yet. The chemicals they use to poison their children and pets are mixing into the ground water that we have to use.
I use bottled water because of it.
I have been worried about the new genetically altered Round-Up ready grass that Scotts has been working on for a few years, but it looks like someone is putting up a fight:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 1, 2002
CONTACT:
Joseph Mendelson, 202.547.9359, [email protected]
Peter T. Jenkins, 202.547.9359, [email protected]
LEGAL ACTION SEEKS TO BLOCK GENETICALLY ENGINEERED LAWN GRASS
MONSANTO AND SCOTTS PREPARED TO MARKET GENE ALTERED LAWN GRASS TO VAST HOME
AND COMMERCIAL RETAIL MARKETS
Washington, DC -- Today the International Center for Technology
Assessment (CTA), a non-profit public interest group, filed a formal legal petition asking the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to block the release of the first-ever genetically
engineered (GE) plant intended for use by homeowners and property managers. Biotechnology giant Monsanto Co. and Scotts Co., the leading lawn and garden product marketer, are seeking Federal approval to
commercialize a GE creeping bentgrass, the turfgrass preferred for golf course greens and used in countless lawns across the country.
The GE grass variety is resistant to the top-selling weedkiller Roundup(tm), a brand owned by Monsanto for which it has licensed
exclusive marketing rights to Scotts. Currently, use of the Roundup weedkiller is limited to spot spraying of weeds in that the herbicide kills any grass it comes in contact with. The new GE grass has been
altered to be resistant to the weedkiller so that users will be able to spray entire lawns, fields and golf courses with the chemical without fear of hurting the grass. Large scale planting of the GE grass would therefore massively increase the amounts of herbicide used in home lawns, sports fields, schools and golf courses around the country. <snip>
The link given was to the APHIS USDA website but when clicked it says it has been removed.
posted on August 11, 2002 06:40:07 AM new
The environment is going to hell in a handbasket....with the help of big corporations selling untested products like these toxic chemicals.
<snip>
Beyond the increase in chemical pollution, CTA also describes the major
"biological pollution" threat presented by the GE grass. Creeping
bentgrass itself is broadly recognized as a difficult to control weed.
It is a wind-pollinated species whose pollen blows easily for hundreds
of yards and it readily hybridizes with other grasses. The fact that the
leading weedkiller Roundup cannot kill the proposed GE variety will
significantly increase the effort, cost and environmental damage
necessary to get rid of it where it is unwanted. In many natural areas
and parks, where non-native creeping bentgrass already is a serious
invader, the herbicide resistant grass could become an almost impossible
to eradicate "superweed." The herbicide resistance genes could also
"jump" from the bentgrass to other weeds thereby making them dangerous
"superweeds." This potential environmental disaster could lead to
financial liability problems for Monsanto, Scotts and the retailers and
end users of the GE product.<snip>
posted on August 11, 2002 11:39:54 AM new
I wish someone would gene alter a hybrid grass to grow 2 inches high and then stop without bolting. If it never went to seed it would not spread as long as the seed growing stock was isolated.
posted on August 11, 2002 11:56:38 AM new
There's a golf course and "retirement community" near here that has a golf course with great big "water features", which to thirsty cattle look just like stock ponds. What these giant evaporation tanks are doing to the levels of the neighboring water table is another story, but they are also apparently soaking up lots of chemicals from sprinkler runoff on the golf course grass. The developers of this "community" have had to pay dearly for livestock which got into those water "features" and died or had to be destroyed because they were sick. This is open range country, and legally you are responsible for fencing OUT all livestock, or else you are legally responsible for their welfare.... If this stuff kills cattle, who in their right mind would want to play golf on it??
The drought has gotten so bad that the course managers have been forced to cut back on their watering, and it does my heart no end of good to drive by and see that grass brown and shriveling in the afternoon heat, doofuses in little carts still knocking their balls around, only with little clouds of good old desert dust coming up with each swing...
I meant to add..I read a figure recently that of all the various decorative and edible hybrid seeds that have been introduced in the last 20 years by the big seed companies, 95% are no longer available, due to constant genetic tinkering with popular seeds. The seed companies, in league with petrochemical companies, intend to control the world's useful plants.To my mind one of the scariest aspects of globalization is the fact that it is now possible to get a world wide patent on a particular seedstock. Whole cultures will lose their ability to grow local landraces that they have been adapting to their microclimate for generations, if a seed company or plant engineer takes a fancy to their crop.....
[ edited by profe51 on Aug 11, 2002 12:04 PM ]
posted on August 12, 2002 04:51:19 AM new
Another CODE RED day here. Very thick air that could be cut with a knife.
Gravid: If it never went to seed it would not spread as long as the seed growing stock was isolated.
Unfortunately, plants are not being isolated no matter what foreign thing (viruses, bacteria, heavy metals etc) they contain. Transgenic Farm frankenanimals have been accidently sold for people food, frankentrees have been planted in forests and frankenfish have already escaped into the sea.
But, would you want your pet to eat grass that contained who knows what? U.S. pets are already getting a heavy dose of transgenic food because everyone here has to consume it unless you can afford organic people & pet food. I can't buy organic pet food for multiple cats.
We are being warned by many scientists including the National Academy of Sciences and NO ONE is listening at the USDA or FDA. I have snipped a little from a newsletter that warns us. The website was down when I checked, but the newsletter said it was also posted on the site.
www.gefoodalert.org.
!P A N U P S
Pesticide Action Network Updates Service
=========
Biopharm Crops Will Contaminate Food Supply
July 12, 2002
More than 300 field trials of genetically engineered biopharmaceuticals
crops already conducted in secret locations nationwide.
Genetically Engineered Food Alert, a coalition of U.S. consumer and
environmental groups, called on the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to prohibit a new class of genetically engineered food crops that threatens to contaminate the food supply. In a letter to the USDA, the coalition called for an end to open air cultivation of crops engineered to produce
prescription drugs or industrial chemicals. The new crops, already planted in over 300 field trials at secret locations throughout the U.S., include plants that produce an abortion-inducing chemical, growth hormones, a blood clotter, and trypsin, an allergenic enzyme.<snip>
<snip>
For instance, a trial of alfalfa engineered with industrial enzymes was allowed to proceed despite the presence of non-engineered alfalfa "within 200 yards of the test site," less than the accepted isolation distance. The USDA approved the field trial plan over the objections of the
Wisconsin Dept. of Agriculture, even though it allowed open flowers, increasing the contamination risk.<snip>
<Snip>
An expert committee of the National Academy of Sciences strongly criticized the USDA for these and other regulatory lapses and deficiencies. The Academy also warns: "...it is possible that crops transformed to produce pharmaceutical or other industrial compounds might mate with plantations grown for human consumption, with the unanticipated result of novel chemicals in the human food supply."<snip>
[ edited by aposter on Aug 12, 2002 05:00 AM ]
