Grass lawns are expensive, time-consuming, and environmentally harmful to maintain, so on the surface, covering your yard with fake grass instead might seem like an attractive solution. But as the comments on one recent Reddit thread show, it is not.
"Astro turf, astro turf everywhere...." wrote the original poster, sharing on the r/britishproblems subreddit. "Can we please just stop turning every other garden into something like a B grade Lego knock off. It looks s**** and it's f****** over the wildlife."
Turf lawns are a disaster for a number of reasons. Since they are made of plastic, they degrade as the sun beats down on them, releasing microplastics and other forever chemicals into the soil and waterways.
It also requires more maintenance than people are led to believe — as it does not break down organic material like real grass and soil would, it needs to be swept of debris and washed periodically.
And most disgustingly, it retains odors from pets or other animals doing their business on it. Almost everyone who has come into contact with artificial turf lawns complains about the horrible smells.
Other British Redditors were quick to agree.
"The guy next door to me covered his whole garden in astroturf and it looks like Teletubby Land. You can see all the creases and it looks shocking," wrote one commenter.
"What most people don't know astro turfs are actually more maintenance," wrote another poster, who got stuck with an astro turf lawn because of their landlord's decision. "To keep making it look okay it needs to be brushed and treated with expensive soap because it can't clean itself. To the point, we have a dog and pick up the poop instantly, and hose any pee. It still f****** stinks as soon as it starts getting warm outside."
"Not my garden," wrote another. "I only tame it for tenancy inspections and moving out. The amount of wildlife we get is incredible. Flowers spring up everywhere, we had a lawn made of bluebells this spring. So many bees and butterflies, horrid amount of spiders but I'm hoping the birds are enjoying them. The guinea pigs love it too, they can hide and gorge in foot high grass."
A great alternative to both traditional grass lawns and artificial turf is native plant lawns, which are easier to maintain and encourage local wildlife.
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