Everyone has a lawn, and the principles of regenerative agriculture work on it too
Ninety percent of the Earth’s precious topsoil is likely to be at risk by 2050, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. This is not 90 percent of farmland — this is 90 percent of all land, including home lawns. And practically everyone — even farmers themselves — has a patch of lawn they manage purely for aesthetic or leisure purposes.
At first glance, managing farmland and managing rural/suburban landscapes seem like completely different things. However, when you dig deeper, you will find that the core values of regenerative farmers and regenerative landscapers are closely aligned.
Ten years ago, when I set out to update our home landscape, there was one widely known process to create a beautiful weed-free landscape: cover the ground with weed fabric, cover that with a thick layer of mulch, and spray chemicals routinely. I knew this had to be wrong. The more I researched, the more it became clear just how damaging conventional practices are to all the living organisms in the soil. I found myself buying old, out-of-print books because they had the most valuable information to manage the land without chemicals. I started piecing together the best approaches, which eventually led me to regenerative agriculture.
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