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Why I Hate Yard Work and Why You Should Too!
I hate yard work. Why would any man, or perhaps a woman, subject themselves to the laborious experiences of doing yard work, or gardening, or toiling the soil on their beloved property is beyond me. And to you other people that say that you enjoy it? Well, I'm sorry to say, you're a bunch of liars!
I didn't have this attitude in the beginning. Well, maybe I did. But it wasn't because I owned the place. When I turned 12 years old, in addition to doing the dishes, my Dad made me start mowing our lawn in New Jersey. I also had to pull enough weeds out of the ground to fill a large 5 gallon bucket. I had to do all this work at least once a day every week! What a waste of time. I think my Dad's vision was to have his home on the cover of the Good Housekeeping magazine. I knew that wasn't going to happen because I was involved in doing the yard work. My heart just wasn't in it. I guess I hated to do yard work then because I was made to do it. Back then I'd rather have been going fishing or swimming or creating havoc with my friends.
But after leaving home when I turned 18 I didn't have to do anymore yard work for a number of years. Almost 20 years of blissful freedom. I was either living in a barracks, or in various apartments, or, after getting married, a condo.
But alas, the time came to make a decision about owning my own home. And this happened in 1991. That's the American dream, right? To own your own home? To have a family and a dog and a yard to play in.
A yard to play in?!?!
It started out well in 1991. I have a 1/3 acre lot with a 2000 square foot home almost in the middle of the property with a double wide driveway. That's leaves about 1,100 square feet of lawn space. If I had 20/20 hindsight then I would have gotten the option of a triple-wide driveway and eliminated another 300 square feet of lawn. You can kick me in the pants for not doing that.
But it did start out well. I actually enjoyed mowing the lawn, working the weeds out, and toiling in the flower beds. I even had flower boxes on the front steps and baskets of flowers hanging on the porch. The place almost looked good enough to get on the cover of Good Housekeeping magazine. Well, maybe it wasn't that nice. But you have to understand that this was my home and it was my yard and my flowers. I now had something that I could be proud of. This is America. I'm married. I have a daughter. A dog. And all is right with the world.
But over the years….well, no that's not right. I guess it was just a year or two - maybe it was 1992 - that I came to realize that this yard stuff was not so enjoyable after all. I found that I had to work in the yard and work the flower beds every week; and then week after week after week. It began to feel so familiar.
In New Jersey there are actually four seasons in the year. And winter snows may even start as early as November and last well into March. In New Jersey you might be working in your yard for only 4 or 5 months of the year.
But oh no! Not in North Carolina where I live now. No siree Bob! We only have two seasons here; hot and cold! Yard work starts in late February and can last well into November; depending when the real cold weather actually gets here and stops things from growing.
But allow me to list some opinions, comments and observations that I have experienced over the years in regards to yard work. To those who really love your yard work maybe now you will see that your time and efforts are being wasted and that you should place your energies in some other venture; like working in my yard. And to those, like me, who hate yard work? Well, I think you know who you are and you will certainly concur with my assessments:
1. How do you make a plush green, weed free lawn?
It's impossible.
But you do need two things: water and fertilizer. And there is the big problem; both of them.
Let's talk about water first. Where does water come from? Water only comes from three (count them, 3) places: the ground, your local city water resources or the sky.
If you happen to be one of the very few who has and uses a ground well with an unlimited water supply in your water table then, by all means, have at it. But be careful. Water makes grass grow; and more on that later. But if your ground well has a very limited water table then you too must be careful. If you water too much then you won't have enough water for the dirty dishes and a shower for your dirty body. It's a balancing act that has to be taken into consideration. Do you want a green lawn or a clean house? I vote for a clean house.
If you get your water from your local city water resources then you have two problems here too. The first problem is the expense. Use a lot of water and you'll pay for it; both from your wallet (yuck) and your back; did I mention that water makes grass grow? The only way to lower your water bill is to do at least one of two things:
1. Don't water your lawn; which I don't, or
2. Hook your hose up to your neighbor's house. (Ah…I don't do that either)
The second problem is the drought years and the water restrictions put in place by your local city water resources. It can get so bad that odd number houses water on every other day, I think. And you need to water by holding the garden hose. Yeah, right! But violate those restrictions and your neighbors will report you. Particularly the neighbor you had borrowed water from in the first place.
If you don't have a well and you don't want to use your local city water resources to water your lawn then you only have one other choice. And it's not a choice even for you to make. You would have to depend on the rain; if rain comes at all. If you live in the northwest you don't have a problem. But during the summer in North Carolina, which can begin in April, it may not rain for weeks, which is okay. With no rain you get no water. No water and your grass won't grow. Then you don't have to mow the lawn. You're free to do something else; like go grocery shopping.
Now, let me mention something about fertilizers. One thing you definitely should know about fertilizers is that they are very dangerous. Don't mix them with fuel oil and light a match.
Oh, but you want to use a fertilizer? Okay, now you got to figure how much fertilizer to get. But to do that you have to figure out how big your lawn is. Mine is 1,100 square feet so I buy 1,500 square feet of fertilizer. You can never have too much fertilizer. Fertilizer does come in bags small enough to feed 500 square feet. So I buy 3 bags. Don't buy any of the bags that cover 1,500 square feet. You might save money but you'll pull your back out trying to lift them they're so dang heavy. Make sure you get enough fertilizer or it won't do the job anyway. And in your mind you're convinced that the intent is to get a plush green, weed free lawn; right? No! Not me!
But what kind of fertilizer do you need? I have no idea. The fertilizer packaging says to take a sample of your soil to your local Agriculture Extension Service and have it tested. I never did that. You shouldn't either. The test might reveal that your house was built on a hazardous waste site and they'll make you move out of the school district you love so much.
Anyway, get a bag of fertilizer that has crabgrass preventer in it. That way you can brag to you neighbors what you did to make your lawn look nice. Does the stuff work? I don't know. I'm still waiting for results.
How often should you fertilize? Well, fertilizing should be proportional to the amount of water you intend to put on your lawn. Remember, grass grows fast and green when watered and fertilized. I fertilize once a year. March I think. Or is it April? Anyway I don't water at all so it doesn't make any difference.
Oh, by the way! Now there is another concern about using fertilizers. Recently commercials have been appearing on T.V. to discourage the use of fertilizers because eventually these chemicals reach our water sheds and reservoirs and thus are a hazard to our drinking water. I guess I won't be buying fertilizer next year. I have this liberal sense to protect the environment.
Okay, what's next? Oh yeah:
2. What kind of lawn mower do I need?
This could be a trick question. To answer fairly you need to ask yourself: Am I a very lazy person or do I want some exercise? If you're a very lazy person, or if you have a lawn bigger than a football field, then get a riding lawn mower. I never had a riding lawn mower so I can't give you any advice; you lazy bum.
Ah! So you want some exercise. Good. So the true question should be: What kind of walk-behind lawn mower do I need? Well, there are two types: the self-propelled model and the non-powered push-type lawn mower. And what is the difference between the two you may ask? There isn't any.
In theory the self-propelled model is suppose to do most of the "pushing" but all I found that it would do was crash into my fence and break the pickets. And you will find that the self-propelled function will break by the 3rd season. Then try to push that behemoth around the yard with the drive train ineffective. I had two of those beasts in the past and will never buy another one again.
So, it looks like the real deal is the non-powered push-type lawn mower. YOU do ALL the pushing. But do yourself a little favor. Buy one with the biggest motor you can find, nothing less than 6 horsepower, and get one that has at least a 24 inch cutting path. Why? You'll need that power to cut the grass (see #3). And the wider the cutting path the less trips you have to take going back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. You get the picture.
And the non-powered push-type lawn mower is an excellent source of exercise. You'll get your heart rate up in no time; particularly when it's 95º degrees outside. And why would you mow your lawn when it's 95º outside? Because tomorrow will be 98º and you want to mow your lawn when it's much cooler.
3. How often should I mow my lawn?
This could be interpreted as a dumb question. You really need to mow your lawn as less often as possible.
If you have been watering and fertilizing and have been doing that often then you'll have to mow your lawn every 1 or 2 days. If you don't water your lawn, like me, and use very limited fertilizer, you will not have to mow your lawn as often. And when the droughts of summer come, say around April, then you may not have to mow the lawn until October. But that's wishful thinking because it could rain needlessly….ah, I mean unexpectedly.
The rule of thumb here, and I'll be conservative about this, is to wait for your grass to grow at least 8 to 10 inches high then cut the grass at the lowest possible setting on your mower. That's why you need at least a 6 horsepower push-type lawn mower. You need that power to cut that tall grass. And mowing your lawn this way will assure yourself of longer periods of time between cuttings. Don't forget, its summer and its 95º outside. Why would you want to mow your lawn then?
4. What about weed eaters?
What about them?
These machines will set you off! You will snap! I mean if you're the most easiest going, laid back, no worries kind of person and you start using a weed eater for its intended purpose I will guarantee you that your attitude towards anything would be worse than an NFL middle linebacker having a free shot at a quarterback on a Sunday afternoon. Weed eaters should never have been invented! If Agent Orange wasn't banned I'd have barrels of the stuff in the garage.
Never ever, and I repeat, never ever get a weed eater that's an electric model. The problems you have with the electric ones are the same as the gas powered ones; except you have to drag a 200 foot long extension cord all over the yard! Don't do it!
What are the problems with weed eaters you may ask? Let's see, I've gone through 8 of the things since 1991 so I'm an expert. First, dress to kill. Wear goggles, head gear, ear protectors, a face mask, long pants, chaps if you have them, heavy socks and work boots with steel toes. Keep loved ones and pets and other persons away at least 4,000 yards. That way they won't hear you scream when that speeding rotating cutting cord cuts deeply into the flesh of your body and you begin to cuss like a drunken sailor.
But that's not all. Sometimes…..no that's not right, every time you use a weed eater you should expect that the cutting cord will not spool out as designed. You're supposed to gently tap the bottom on a hard surface and then the cutting cord should extract. Sometimes gentle tapping doesn't extract the cutting cord. It takes pounding. And when that doesn't work sometimes I take hold of the weed eater like an ax and raise it high above my head and slam it down on my concrete driveway. Sometimes that makes the cutting cord spool out. And sometimes there are not enough pieces left of the weed eater for it to work effectively at all. So then I'll go to the local home improvement store and get another one.
And don't forget, most weed eaters have little 2-cycle motors. That means you have to mix gasoline with 2-cycle oil. You will need to know math and have laboratory equipment for this. And then you have to store this mixture in a separately marked can so it doesn't get mixed up with a different gasoline/oil ratio mixture you have to use for the 2-cycle engine in the tiller machine you have to buy if you're so bent on having a vegetable garden. (see #5)
And watch those little 2-cycle motors on the weed eaters, they're hot! You will burn yourself when trying to twist and turn the weed eater to make a proper edge along your walkways. So get yourself some asbestos clothing. China may still have some.
Enough about weed eaters.
5. Should I plant a vegetable garden?
Aaahh…....no!
Having a vegetable garden to grow your own tasty vegetables to save money is a myth. Sometimes the vegetables don't taste good at all. And believe me, you do NOT save money. Yes, the labor is free but in theory if you pay me the minimum wage that it takes to keep a small 10 ft by 20 ft vegetable garden then over the past 5 years you owe me $36,456.92! You are better off using your money wisely and buy your vegetables at your local farmers market or grocery store or from an old man in a truck parked along side the road. Or better yet, pay off your mortgage.
And how did I get a 10 ft by 20 ft vegetable garden in my yard? Well I had to dig all that sod up and had to wheel-barrow 28 trips into the woods to get rid of the sod. Then I had to buy real top soil (I think it was a few tons) because vegetables don't grow in North Carolina red clay. That stuff turns to concrete when it doesn't rain. So dig the sod out of your vegetable garden when it's raining.
Then go buy a tiller. Tillers aerate the soil real good. It's easier than using a rake or a hoe because you'll get blisters using rakes and hoes. And make sure you wear steel-towed boots when using your tiller. Oh, and you're going to get very dirty. And take your boots off before you go into the house!
Also, buy some kind of fencing for your vegetable garden. You'll need to keep the rabbits out or they're going to eat your tasty vegetables before you do. Don't buy the plastic fence stuff either. The dog next door will just tear it apart, as this happened to me this year. Get some metal razor edged fencing. The type that prisons use. If that stuff can keep prisoners in then it should keep rabbits, and dogs, out.
Enough said about vegetable gardens.
6. How do I get rid of leaves?
If you have trees in your yard cut them down. If your neighbors have trees cut those down too. That way you're assured you won't have any leaves to remove come fall.
But if you have leaves to remove then unfortunately you can't do to leaves what my Dad did to them when I was a kid, burn them. That was a blast. My Dad burned the leaves in the curb like everybody else. The leftovers of burned leaves are nothing but gray soft powdery ash. Then us kids would stomp on the ash with our Buster Brown white sneakers and track a mess in the house. And when it rained, man that was fun stuff. Ah…the good ‘ol days.
Well, you can't burn leaves anymore, or at least you shouldn't, but you have to do either one of two things:
1. Rake them to the curb, when they'll be picked up by the city sometime in the spring, or
2. Bag them up.
If you decide to rake your leaves you will get blisters. So use a leaf blower. Leaf blowers are very dependable, powerful, and generally don't break at all. I use mine to blow my leaves into my neighbor's yard.
By using a leave blower you can maneuver your leaves very effectively into a pile and then bag the leaves. Make sure you have lots of leaf bags. For example, for the two pear trees I had in my front lawn the leaves that fell were stuffed into 26 bags. Then I had to drag those heavy bags to the curb. Later, to save time and energy in the fall, I had those pear trees cut down. No lie.
7. Should I aerate my lawn in the fall?
Why would you want to do that? You should know by now that you have labored way too much as it is. Why aerate your lawn when such activity will encourage grass growth and then you'll be just as busy next year? But if you really want to aerate your lawn then rent one of those big hulking powered walk-behind aerating machines. They're real easy to work with if you can bench press 500 pounds.
And if you have a dog he'll help with the clean-up too. You'll find that your dog will eat the dirt plugs left behind from the aerating machine.
8. What kind of grass seed should I use?
I use crab grass myself. It seems it's the only variety that grows in the neighborhood anyway. Don't waste time with tall fescue, Kentucky Bluegrass, Canada Green, or Zoysa. If your neighbor has a lousy looking lawn you too will have a lousy looking lawn. Seeds are carried by the winds and those seeds next door will land in your yard and start to grow. There's no civil way to stop this process. If you tell your neighbor to fix up his lawn and you don't even fix up your own what's the point.
Even if your next door neighbor has a nice looking lawn, forget it. There'll be a lousy looking lawn somewhere down the street and birds will turn your nice looking lawn into a lousy looking lawn. Birds eat seeds, right? And then birds poop. End of discussion.
9. Should I hire someone to do my yard work?
Well, I certainly wouldn't. It takes a very crazy person to enjoy doing his own yard work so much that he's actually willing to hire himself out to do your own yard work. This doesn't make sense to me. If you have a neighbor that is willing to do your yard work for free, well then, this person is a psychological mess. I wouldn't do your yard work if you paid me an exuberant amount of money and gave me your wife and your dog.
If you end up hiring, or allowing, a very crazy person like this to do your yard work, then make sure you protect yourself by keeping the doors locked…..and get the guns out.
To come to a conclusion, a good friend of mine once said, "If it's green, I let it grow". Makes sense to me. Even from 500 feet my yard looks just as green as the neighbor's. I confirmed this recently with Google Earth.
And when it doesn't rain and everybody's lawn turns brown, like mine most of the time, I certainly don't feel bad for any of them. In fact, I'm laughing. After all, I used no effort at all to accomplish the look of my lawn while those neighbors may have spent a large fortune for chemicals, seed, and such, and they exerted very extreme physical labor to get that Good Housekeeping magazine look and then it all goes to pot when it doesn't rain.
So, as you can obviously see I hate yard work. I hope my observations have changed your mind if you happened to be one of the few who likes to work in your own lawn or garden. But if we remain homeowners with a yard we must expect to do these things we don't like to do. Does this build character? Not on your life. Do we end up with a great sense of appreciation for a job well done? Certainly not.
But it is my hope, or maybe it should be my plan, that some day in the future that all and any yard work would be eliminated from my repertoire.
I hope to live in a condo again.
About the Author
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