Ep. 210 No Mow May: What is it and does it work in Illinois | #GoodGrowing

Chris Enroth: 00:05

Welcome to the Good Growing podcast. I am Chris Enroth, horticulture educator with University of Illinois Extension coming at you from Macomb, Illinois, and we have got a great show for you today. Look at the calendar. The end of April means no mow May is right around the corner. But should we not be mowing our lawns or should we be mowing our lawns in the month of May?

Chris Enroth: 00:27

Well, we will figure that out on this week's episode, but you know I'm not doing this by myself. I am joined as always every single week by horticulture educator Ken Johnson and Jacksonville. Hey, Ken.

Ken Johnson: 00:37

Hello, Chris. I guess by the time people listen to this, it will be May. So I guess it will be time to continue no mowing or continue or start mowing.

Chris Enroth: 00:46

I Ken, am I the only one does this happen to you when you hear that the month is about to change, panic sets in, especially in the springtime.

Ken Johnson: 00:59

Yeah. Particularly this year. This year seemed to go by incredibly fast.

Chris Enroth: 01:03

Yeah. I I don't remember there being a spring. It was 80 some degrees yesterday. It was pushing 90. Not quite, but it was pushing that here in Macomb.

Chris Enroth: 01:12

Everyone was super hot, and now it's, like, 60 degrees, and I got a hoodie on. I'm cold now. It's it's it's it's ruined me. We're practically in summer.

Ken Johnson: 01:24

So I haven't gotten to build up my heat tolerance yet. Not that that's ever very high, but there's there's no gradual increase anymore.

Chris Enroth: 01:33

No. There's not. It's just straight into the furnace of the year. Oh, well, maybe this is a timely topic then. We talk about NoMoMay.

Chris Enroth: 01:42

You know, we NoMoMay is supposed to be a thing that occurs in the springtime. And I I've been marking spring weather by this annual event that I've been doing now since 2021. It's not a very long time, but it seems like every year this happens the May. It is our first great environmental day. Never fails.

Chris Enroth: 02:07

We hit 90 that week. It's so hot. Kids are miserable. The speakers are parched. You know, I'm going to each station giving water to everybody, and it looks to be like it's gonna be another hot one next week that when we're doing this.

Chris Enroth: 02:24

So I don't know, Ken. Is it getting hotter, or is it just me?

Ken Johnson: 02:29

Well, it seems like it's getting hotter. I don't I I mean, well, I guess last several years, we've it's been seems like we're getting warmer normal. Warmer earlier than, quote, unquote, normal, but maybe this is the new normal. Well,

Chris Enroth: 02:45

okay. I guess, well, let's see how this all plays into Novo May. So first off, we do have an article that you wrote, Ken. We can link that below. So folks, you know, prefer to read more about this as opposed to listening to us patter on for hours, you we will leave that link below in the show description.

Chris Enroth: 03:05

But, Ken, what is No Mo May? Is it as as I expect it to be?

Ken Johnson: 03:12

Yes. Yes. It's it's exactly what the name says. So no mow may. So the idea is, we don't mow our lawns in the month of May.

Ken Johnson: 03:20

The idea behind this so this started in, The United Kingdom in 2019 as the idea was to help pollinator populations because we as we've heard been hearing for for many years now, their populations are struggling, pollinator declines, all of that stuff. So if we don't mow our lawns in the month of May, that's supposed to increase the amount of, quote, unquote, weeds that are blooming, providing a food source for these pollinators. So kind of the kind of the two, I guess, main goal. I think the primary goal is providing those food sources. And then a secondary goal that I think has been kinda tagged on, over time is reducing that carbon footprint.

Ken Johnson: 03:56

Say majority of people are probably mowing their lawns with gas powered, lawn mowers. And even if you're using an electric one, that electricity is coming from somewhere. In a lot of places, that's gonna be, coal, gas, some fossil fuel, providing that electricity. So increased food for pollinators and with the secondary benefit of reducing carbon footprint, at least for that that month of May.

Chris Enroth: 04:23

Well and I I can see how something like this would catch on and be popular because you are you're saying to folks, hey. Don't do something. Skip doing this thing to help. How attractive that would be? Like, hey.

Chris Enroth: 04:40

If I want to save the the pollinators, I just have to not do something. And, yeah, I guess I see the appeal behind that and maybe how that really did catch on. You know, we do get asked a lot this time of year about the concept of no may. Does it work? Is it something that is beneficial to pollinators?

Chris Enroth: 05:01

There actually have been studies that have been done. You know, one in particular, it's titled No Mow May Lawns Have Higher Pollinator Richness and Abundances. This is an engaged community or sorry, subtitle is An engaged community provides floral resources for pollinators. So there have been studies that have been done. Now interestingly, though, this study that I just read the title of, it has been retracted, finding out that there are probably some flaws here in some of that research or maybe methodology and how they went about that.

Chris Enroth: 05:33

And so where a lot of people used to point to this and say, hey. Look. This is helping. Nope. Not can't point to that anymore because that that is no longer a published article.

Chris Enroth: 05:44

You can still find it online, but it would have a big red letters of retracted above the title if you're getting it, accessing it from the actual publisher.

Ken Johnson: 05:54

Yeah. And basically, that retracted means, like, basically, this article never existed. Mhmm. That thing if I remember right, remember part of it was the the species of bees they were identifying were not found. This is done in Wisconsin.

Ken Johnson: 06:09

We're not found in Wisconsin. Never have been. I think there were some other pretty serious flaws that went along with it, which is why they ended up retracting it. So, you know, like you said, that that has had been kind of the the study people pointed to the most. You know, so that's not there.

Ken Johnson: 06:26

And I'd say just because it's not there doesn't mean necessarily bad, but there's just not necessarily any research here, at least in in The United States that I think that we know of, that points to it being a good thing.

Chris Enroth: 06:40

Yeah. Yeah. And I guess, yeah, we we should just let people know, like, the idea behind NoMoMae, it is it is a good thing. You know? We want to try to help pollinators.

Chris Enroth: 06:51

We want to to try to reduce our carbon footprint. So these are good things to strive for. And Nomome does have a couple issues with it, though. And one of them, as if I could look out my window right now, can see that peak bloom for a lot of the flowering plants in my lawn, the dandelions, most certainly, they've already gone to seed in my lawn, and it is the April. So bloom peak bloom has happened for dandelions in my lawn.

Chris Enroth: 07:22

Violets are blooming right now. I can see that creeping Charlie beginning to, build up its, energy to begin blooming here, so that won't be long. Clover will be, blooming here not not not too long. And so we have a lot of plants that have already hit that peak in my lawn, at least, here in Macomb, Illinois in April. So should it should we if this was a program that started in England with a different climate, maybe it's more better to say no more April, but I still have problems with that.

Chris Enroth: 08:02

I don't know. Ken, what do think? No more April? What what what else is there?

Ken Johnson: 08:05

Yeah. Think I think a lot of it will depend on on where you're at. So we're talking about Illinois here. Illinois is, what, 300 miles long. So we've got, what, three and a half growing zones we're covering.

Ken Johnson: 08:15

So Southern Illinois, I mean, lot of this stuff's done, you know, in Jacksonville. Dandelions, there's still some dandelions bloom. The other done, for the most part, creeping Charlie's blooming. You know, the henbit and all those other early spring things are are finishing up. So and clover, you know, depending on where you're at in the state, maybe May, late May, June before that starts moving.

Ken Johnson: 08:38

So you're missing that window for for when you're not mowing. So and while it may work, I don't know the timing, in The UK. I've never been there. Never, honestly, never looked to see when things bloom there. But so it may work in in The UK.

Ken Johnson: 08:53

The Nomo may, that timing may work for them. But it doesn't work here, in the Illinois and a lot of the Midwest where the timing is is off, I guess.

Chris Enroth: 09:03

I I would say, Ken, your complexion would lend well to a vacation in The UK, but you keep going down to the beach to Florida. So just keep that sunscreen on hand. And the the other the the big thing, at least from, like, a lawn care or a a plant health standpoint, is letting your turf grass grow and grow and grow. I mean, we're talking depending on your species, Kentucky bluegrass, your fescues, rye grout, any of that. I mean, we're talking anywhere it could get from, like, six inches tall, 10 inches tall, 12 inches tall, you know, some very vigorously grown, especially if you fertilize them, they grow up to fourteen, fifteen, 16, 18 inches tall.

Chris Enroth: 09:52

So you're talking almost two feet worth of of grass, long grass. And what is occurring at that point, these are cool season grasses that we grow in Illinois. They are preparing for summer, for stress, for hot, dry weather, and this is the canopy that they think that they will have. And then we come along and we cut it all down from, like, 15 inches tall down to, like, three to four inches tall. And that is incredibly stressful to the plant.

Chris Enroth: 10:28

It has lost a ton of photosynthetic ability when we do that. It's not able to generate as much food as it had had prior. It opens up that soil more, that that base of that plant, which was formally protected from kind of more harsher wind and and and sunlight. And when you and this happens to me a lot. Actually, it's happening to me right now.

Chris Enroth: 10:51

I have not been able to mow my grass for, like, a week, and it's, like, gone. It's a jungle out there right now. I know that when I mow it, it's going to look just puny, stunted. It's gonna get off color, and we we know that this is stressful to the plant. And so we have this what's called the one third rule.

Chris Enroth: 11:10

And the idea here is to not remove more than one third of the leaf blade at any one mowing. This is a long established, idea behind, you know, cutting vegetation, something that has been established since we started mowing hay fields, you know, with sites and knowing that, you know, how much that we needed to cut off that wouldn't stunt or affect the plant so that it could continue to produce, you know, forage for animals. And so we know that that this one third rule is sort of a well established fact to use in our lawn mowing care, in our lawn care practices. So, yeah, letting it grow way up high, chopping it down, very stressful through our lawns.

Ken Johnson: 11:55

Well, like you mentioned, though, this is peak grass growing time right now. So, you know, this time of year, when it's maybe not getting into the almost 90, but whenever or more typical temperatures and we're getting rain like we normally would in the spring fairly often, you may be mowing your grass two or three times a week if you're gonna do that rule of the third. So to go a whole month, again, like you said, it's gonna be some pretty drastic reductions to that. And if you've ever mowed a grass that's really tall, I mean, you're just gonna kinda patchy, when you cut it that low. You're you're gonna have to break up all those clippings, so that's gonna be extra work there.

Ken Johnson: 12:33

And, typically, we're recommending returning those clippings to the ground because that's gonna be, what, a pound of nitrogen per thousand square feet something like that by returning that throughout the year. So you're you're gonna have to remove those clippings because they're gonna be too long. They're not gonna break down. You're gonna smother, the turf you do have. You're removing that nitrogen.

Ken Johnson: 12:51

You're removing the some of that nutrition, that they're gonna need. So I guess on multiple levels, letting it get that long is probably not a good idea. And now you're gonna be slowly cutting it down, and that's gonna take some time to do that. Mhmm. If your mower can eve if you can even set your mower deck that high.

Chris Enroth: 13:13

I I know. You have to don't

Ken Johnson: 13:16

know if it's

Chris Enroth: 13:16

possible. Yeah. Oh, be careful, Ken. You're starting to sound like a turf grass person here. So might get asked to do a couple lawn talks here.

Ken Johnson: 13:28

You've rubbed off on me.

Chris Enroth: 13:32

Well, let's get back into your realm of things because let's talk pollinators. Let's talk about the if we want to leave some of these flowering plants go in our lawns, let's talk about dandelions. These are very common plants. I believe the common name for dandelion is the common dandelion. And so it's everywhere.

Chris Enroth: 13:57

It's originally hails from Eurasia, Europe, Asia part of the world. It's pretty much established here in North America, all over the place, and frequents home lawns. It is probably the weed that most home lawn caregivers love to to hate. They love to battle dandelion. They make tools to kill dandelion.

Chris Enroth: 14:23

There's all there's a whole market for this thing, this plant. So our dandelions, if they're bad for lawns, which I don't think they necessarily are, but are they good for our bees?

Ken Johnson: 14:39

Let's say it it depends.

Chris Enroth: 14:41

So It depends.

Ken Johnson: 14:44

So when we think about our, I guess, our our stereotypical ideal lawn, which are no varies depending on who you are. When we think about our, you know, what we see in in movies and stuff, you know, nice green turf, no weeds. You know, in a situation like that where we've got dandelions blooming, that'd be good for pollinators because there's nothing else there for them to eat. That's a floral resource, the nectar and the pollen, where nothing else is available. That's an option for stuff.

Ken Johnson: 15:16

For dandelions, like you said, they're native to Europe and Asia, not to North America. So they may not be necessarily the best for for our native bee species. Think when we had, swirle axemi on a couple weeks ago. I remember if we talked about this in the recording or if this was before or after we were talking about it. But, you know, sometimes the honey bees and stuff, they are attracted to those European Asian flower species because that's what their their native range, not North America.

Ken Johnson: 15:44

So they're maybe preferentially go to those, compared to our native species of flowers, and vice versa. So while they can't provide the resources, they they may not be the best. And even think for honeybees, you know, the the amino acids, and the pollen, which is what they're going after, may not be the best, may not fit all their nutritional needs, for them. Looking before this, we came across a paper, and I'll just read read the abstractors. There's there's definitely more detail in the the article.

Ken Johnson: 16:17

So this is fitness costs and benefits of a non native floral resource for subalpine solitary bees. So this this study was done in Colorado in the Rocky Mountains, so different bee species than we would have here, but would still probably, I would imagine, hold true to some of our native bee species. So bees that used at least some of some non native teraxicum, which is the genus for dandelions, pollen produced more potentially viable offspring, but larval survival was significantly reduced for bee larvae experimentally fed provisions dominated by teraxacum pollen. Therefore, survival costs may indicate the potential fitness benefits of early nesting, indicating that non native floral resources non native floral resource use may act as an ecological trap for native bees. So, basically, these dandelions are blooming earlier, which allows the the bees to collect that pollen.

Ken Johnson: 17:12

They have more offspring. When the offspring are feeding on that pollen, it's it's, for whatever reason, not meeting that nutritional need, and they're not surviving as well. So while they it can't support them, it's not giving them what they need in the case of the bees in this study.

Chris Enroth: 17:31

Yeah. It it definitely you there are some some studies that do look at dandelion pollen. I came across this nineteen eighty seven one, so it's older. But it hasn't been retracted at least, you know, it's it's still current. Talking about how dandelion pollen is lacking certain amino acids.

Chris Enroth: 17:53

When it comes to specifically honeybee nutritional diets. So we're not necessarily looking at native bees. We're looking at honeybees for that particular study, that it lacks certain amino acids and and reported that they have poor brood rearing capability when just exposed to dandelion pollen because of this, amino acid deficiency. So it seems like it might maybe dandelions aren't the best thing to eat, but it is food for our our pollinators. And you'll see lots of insects on dandelion flowers.

Chris Enroth: 18:29

I will say that. When I'm walking through a field of dandelions, you know, if you look down, you see all manner, shape, size, species, you know, of of insects on those flowers.

Ken Johnson: 18:42

Yeah. I see, lady beetles, especially the the native pink spot lady beetle on them a lot, because those and a lot of lady beetles will supplement their diet. So they're feeding on insects and stuff, but they will supplement their diet especially early in the year with pollen when a lot of these what we would consider pest insects aren't out yet. The populations aren't very high, so they're supplementing with pollen until their, I guess, their preferred, food source is out. So it's not only pollinators, but other things.

Ken Johnson: 19:12

And, like, idea, something's better than nothing.

Chris Enroth: 19:15

That's right. Well, I guess speaking of providing something, what can we do then to provide these early season pollen resources? Because that's really the concept of of no mow may is it's early in in the the growing season. There's not well, it there's not as much blooming as, say, later on in the summer. And, we just wanna provide some resources for our pollinators.

Chris Enroth: 19:43

And our lawns, we so many people have lawns. We have so much lawn in The United States. I I've heard all manner of estimates. You know, some people say it's as big as the state of California. I think the one that I've used, it's as big as the state of New York.

Chris Enroth: 20:00

I've heard it's as big as the region of New England. I don't know what to believe anymore, other than there's a lot. It's big. And every time I read one of these, ideas of our estimate of the size of lawn, there's they're saying this is a conservative estimate. We're not we're only taking into an account, you know you know, certain areas of land.

Chris Enroth: 20:23

But we know that when we go out into the rural parts of the country, roadsides are being mowed, you know, large swaths, large pasture areas are being mowed or kept as lawns and not necessarily as pasture. And so there's a lot of mowing going on. There's a lot of lawns that probably aren't being accounted for. So let's just say there's a lot. And then the numbers vary on what a lot is.

Ken Johnson: 20:49

Isn't it the the largest crop in The US?

Chris Enroth: 20:52

It's the largest irrigated irrigated crop in The US. Yes. We dedicate more resources, water resources to our lawns than any other crop.

Ken Johnson: 21:06

So It's a nice It's a big deal. Yeah. So yeah. So there's, you know, there's a lot of things we can and we think about it, you know, if so say we're we're gonna do no mow may because we're we want the pollinators. So June 1 comes around, we cut their ass.

Ken Johnson: 21:20

Cut all the flowers off. Now what? If you don't have any other flowers, why'd you do it? Because they're not gonna stick around. You don't have no food.

Ken Johnson: 21:27

So you've, you know, you've you've potentially drawn them in to some extent, but then you get rid of all their food, and they're gone. So I get yeah. So not only early in the season for this, but then continuing it throughout the year. So we have those resources. So it's, you know, creating pollinator gardens, and there's all kinds of resources out there.

Ken Johnson: 21:51

And you got the Illinois pollinator website, which has got that plant selector tool, you can go and select stuff for bloom color, bloom time, sun exposure, solar requirements, all that fun stuff. But for, like, early blooming stuff so if if we wanna provide this stuff when we would be doing no Mow May or or even before. So, you know, earlier this year, we did a spring ephemeral podcast, all of that stuff, you know, spring bluebells, trilliums, you name it all. Those those ephemerals, would fit the bill there. We get start getting more prairie plants.

Ken Johnson: 22:28

I've got golden Alexander's, in my yard. It's starting to bloom, now, so that's an an earlier one. I'm trying to think some other real early, not necessarily ephemerals.

Chris Enroth: 22:43

I think Prairie Smoke is one of them that I see advocated for a lot. Early bloomer for, like, Prairie or a full sun setting. And there's shooting star. That's also an ephemeral, though. So, but, yeah, there's there there are some early blooming plants out there, resources.

Chris Enroth: 23:06

And and we we can no. Yeah. Trees. Yeah. We didn't even talk about trees.

Ken Johnson: 23:10

Or look.

Chris Enroth: 23:11

Yeah. Look up.

Ken Johnson: 23:12

The woody stuff, the trees and shrubs. I mean, we've got all kinds of spring blooming trees. Those are bread buds, dogwood, magnolias, maples. We're real early in the year. Shrubs and then my spice bush.

Ken Johnson: 23:28

Mhmm. I think it's probably done by now blooming. But but there's, I guess, a lot of other things that are blooming. They're not herbaceous. Again, and as I just demonstrated, I'm guilty all the time of not thinking of the the woody stuff.

Ken Johnson: 23:45

But, like, when you think about the trees and stuff, those are big plants. They produce a lot of flowers, a lot of resources. One, you know, one redbud tree, which is an Ontario big tree, is gonna provide a whole heck of a lot more floor resources than, you know, thirty, forty bluebells. Mhmm.

Chris Enroth: 24:04

Oh, I agree. Oh, I can't believe we almost skipped over trees there. Thank goodness, Ken. Interesting. So before the show, we were talking about, you know, looking at some of the research, and also I told a story about the two entomologists having an argument at a program I was at about the the use of pollinators in wind pollinated plants.

Chris Enroth: 24:31

Specifically, they're talking about shade trees, and it was just really interesting watching two very smart people argue with each other. You can go on YouTube and find two dumb people argue all the time, but watching two smart people, that's quite a show. It's hard to find sometimes. I don't know. Can you find it on here, Ken?

Chris Enroth: 24:51

I'm not sure. You one smart person talking to a dumb guy in Macomb. I

Ken Johnson: 24:57

don't know if we've really ever argued on the show.

Chris Enroth: 24:59

Oh, let's get to it.

Ken Johnson: 25:01

Maybe that'll be next week.

Chris Enroth: 25:02

Next week. I'll let I'll find something that you disagree with, and I'll I'll argue the counterpoint even if I agree with you. Make it interesting. But, anyway, these these two etymologists, they're talking about, you know, in a lack where where there is lacking pollen resources that are typical that a pollinator would visit. When those are lacking, especially in, like, an urban or developed area, you know, if there are shade trees nearby that are flowering in bloom, even if they are wind pollinated, pollinators will go to those flowers and collect that pollen because it's still pollen.

Chris Enroth: 25:39

It's still protein. It's still food for them. And it was just interesting listening to the repertoire because the other one was just saying, like, we don't have enough research to say this explicitly, like, these trees are important for pollinators because we don't we just don't know. Like, we need to do more looking into this before we can go out and start shouting to the world, you know, you know, our wind pollinated shade trees are important to bees, and and butterflies and moths and all the other pollinators out there. Even though I'm sure you can eye a red maple.

Chris Enroth: 26:18

And I have heard the the tree itself just buzzing or not a red maple. I'm sorry. An ash tree. I don't know what I'm saying. Been underneath a green ash.

Chris Enroth: 26:26

That's what I'm trying to say. And the tree itself has just been buzzing. Like, there's, like, a And you

Ken Johnson: 26:33

just

Chris Enroth: 26:33

know that there's insects up there doing their thing. And that's just there's just a lack of pollen and resources. They're turning to what they can't.

Ken Johnson: 26:43

Yeah. You know, anecdotally, I have, in my backyard, a sweet corn. Mhmm. I always you now I usually see several bees on that. I mean, I've still got quite a few flowers in my yard, but they're still visiting that and collect I can see them collecting pollen off of those plants.

Ken Johnson: 26:59

So, like I said, you can't necessarily and I've never really searched for this, but don't think there's a whole lot of studies, if any, that really looks at those wind pollinated plants and and their utilization for pollen.

Chris Enroth: 27:13

Yeah. And I think that was the big debate. You know? Some someone just the going back and forth on things they kind of know already, but nothing that we can back up with that scientific evidence. So maybe they went off and did the research.

Chris Enroth: 27:30

Let's hope they didn't hear me. Haven't published it yet. Oh, oh, there's there is one thing that I I do this every year because I I have my my patches in my lawn where I know I'm going to have a lot of violets. So there's a part of my lawn. There's gonna be a there a ton of violets there.

Chris Enroth: 27:52

I have my clover area. I've I've got my creeping Charlie area. So I have these different patches. And when they are in full bloom so, like, right now, the violets are in full bloom, I just don't mow them. And it's April, so we're not in May.

Chris Enroth: 28:09

It's going to get mowed in May because the violets the blooms are going to start waning, but also the grass is gonna start growing over it and and choking out those those violets. And I kind of want that foliage to be open more to the sunlight so that it can photosynthesize and give me more violets. So in a way, I'm kind of making it so that the grass is not as competitive to the violets. If I would let it grow a little bit taller, I might be able to choke out those violets. So hint, hint, people wanting to control these plants in their lawn, just mow higher, and you'll create a more competitive grass plant to something like a dandelion or a violet.

Chris Enroth: 28:51

But anyway, I I do what I call selective mowing. I used to call it drunken mowing because it looks like like what kind of pattern is this guy following. But I don't say that anymore because I don't want people to think that I'm, like like, belligerently drunk mowing the lawn in random patterns. So, yeah, I I mow selectively. I avoid some of those patches when they're in full bloom except for well, creeping Charlie, I'll hit that one because you can be mean to creeping Charlie, and it doesn't care.

Chris Enroth: 29:22

It's it's okay with it. It'll just bloom again and keep spreading.

Ken Johnson: 29:26

He'll be back. And another thing, you know, so you got so, like, if you could also look at mowing less frequently. So maybe not going a whole month, going a week or a couple weeks, in between mowing. So there's some research done in Massachusetts where they cut lawns at, one week, two week, and three week intervals just to see and look at, the number of flowers and the number of pollinators visiting those. They found that lawns mowed every two weeks, had more bees present, than those mowed every week.

Ken Johnson: 29:59

And then the lawns that were mowed every three weeks had more flowers, but fewer bees, and there could be several reasons for that. One could have been grasses are getting taller, obstructing some of the flowers. They're collecting these bees by pan traps. So their pans are painted yellow or blue. They stick them out there.

Ken Johnson: 30:17

Well, good when there's so many flowers, they weren't going to those pan traps. So there there's a couple reasons why there could have been fewer bees, at least bees that they collected and stuff. So but, again, mowing it less frequently, you let some of those flowers bloom and you got those resources for those those bees potentially.

Chris Enroth: 30:39

You know, come to think of it, I did a a program the other day. The idea of no mow make came up. A question was asked, and this person wanted to do it. And so I said, well, do you have any weeds in your lawn? And they said, no.

Chris Enroth: 30:59

I don't have any weeds. Like, well, then there's no reason to do it because the weeds are the flowers that the bees and pollinators will come in and visit. So if your lawn is immaculate, there's no reason to skip mowing the lawn. Like Ken said, just carve out lawn and put in some pollinator gardens.

Ken Johnson: 31:20

Yeah. We don't have to get rid of the whole lawn. We've talked about it before on the show. There's there's purposes for lawns, you know, especially if you wanna recreate in your your backyard or front yard, depending if you're a front yard or backyard person. You know, a lot of our other ground covers are not gonna have the wear tolerance that turf is gonna have.

Ken Johnson: 31:38

So there's there's nothing wrong with having some turf. Do we need as much turf as we have in a lot of our lawns? Probably not. But you don't have to rip everything out and do all pollinator stuff.

Chris Enroth: 31:51

There you go. That's the message. Drive it home. Mow high, mow often, keep those blades sharp. Every time we're talking about lawns, we have to say that.

Chris Enroth: 31:59

It's, in our contract that we don't have.

Ken Johnson: 32:04

Richard made us promise before he He did.

Chris Enroth: 32:07

He did. He said, if you promise, promise it. So we do.

Ken Johnson: 32:12

I guess so. You know, we talk about, you know, providing flowers. But, again, you know, going a little further, you know, we get into garden cleanup and and maintaining those our pollinator plantings or or what have you. So not being in a real big hurry to clean up, leaving stuff away in the fall or the winter, for that overwintering habitat, not being in too big of a hurry to clean up, in the spring. And, ideally, we're waiting until and most of the guidelines are mid May.

Ken Johnson: 32:44

You know, stuff may still be coming out throughout the year, but majority of stuff is gonna probably be out by mid May. We are cleaning it up. If you are cleaning it up early, putting it in an out of the way area, not shredding it or composting it in case there is still something overwintering in stems on leaf material, what have you. So, again Mhmm. It's it's it's great to provide the flowers, but we need to provide that other habitat too.

Ken Johnson: 33:12

I guess that's I guess that's the next level, is providing that other habitat, the overwintering areas, nesting habitat, not eliminating those places from our landscapes.

Chris Enroth: 33:24

Yeah. I I would say in the most visible spots in my yard, I I cut the the stems from last year, and I just drop them on the ground right next to where I I cut them. You know? It'll break down eventually. Free compost.

Chris Enroth: 33:37

And if there are any insects in there, hopefully, they'll, you know, utilize those stems. Maybe someone can come back and utilize them even still. You know, you can even cut your stuff a little higher so you have, like, twelve, eighteen inch cut stems that usually gets masked by that foliage that grows up then that year. Yeah. There there's no one way to do all of this.

Chris Enroth: 33:59

It's your yard. It's you have permission to to do things that make you happy so long as it doesn't harm other people. So that's important. Or or the the greater environment. So, yeah, the old adage of do no harm.

Chris Enroth: 34:16

Yes.

Ken Johnson: 34:17

Yes. Just keep it maintained well enough at the city or township or whoever's not gonna come after you.

Chris Enroth: 34:22

So you don't have to pay any legal fees. Mhmm. That's the goal. But still pushing a lot of that sedges and violets. I love violets.

Chris Enroth: 34:35

It's probably that is one of my favorite plants. People hate that plant too, but I love it in the lawn. I love it in my garden bed. I love it in, like, landscape beds as a ground cover. The whole yard can be covered in violets, and I would be fine with it.

Ken Johnson: 34:51

Yeah. Good good chunk of my yard is is violets.

Chris Enroth: 34:54

Mhmm. You have a favorite a favorite lawn plant?

Ken Johnson: 34:58

Favorite lawn? Yeah. Long as it's green.

Chris Enroth: 35:03

There you go.

Ken Johnson: 35:04

And and not nimble well for whatever reason. I don't I don't like that one for whatever reason. I don't know.

Chris Enroth: 35:10

I'm coming around on nimble Will. It's everywhere in my lawn, and it's just it's taking over

Ken Johnson: 35:16

so much. It's getting to that point where I'm gonna have to start liking it because I don't dislike it enough to do anything about it.

Chris Enroth: 35:23

Mhmm. There you go. Yes. Well, that was a lot of great information about NoMoMay. Well, the GoodVrying podcast is a production of University of Illinois Extension edited this week by Ken Johnson.

Chris Enroth: 35:37

Ken, thank you for both editing and hanging out with me today discussing the the virtues of No Mow Me, but also pointing out a lot of the flaws that are associated with this idea. And again, maybe we just need to bump it back to like mid March to mid April. Mo. But that doesn't roll off the tongue so easily as No Mow May does.

Ken Johnson: 36:03

Yeah. I'd say, yeah, just be be lazy much longer. You know, cut it before you get in trouble, but it's okay to let it grow a little bit longer. And you don't have to have the perfect life you want, if you don't want to. If you don't wanna have it.

Chris Enroth: 36:17

That's right. If it's green, it's good as Ken said.

Ken Johnson: 36:21

Yes. And thank you as always and let's do this again next week.

Chris Enroth: 36:26

Oh, we shall do this again next week. The horticultural hijinks continues the summer of twenty twenty five. I say summer because it's so hot or has been so warm. It's still spring folks, but my mind is already propelled to tomatoes and peppers and all the goodies that are are just around the corner. So listeners, thank you for doing what you do best and that is listening or if you're watching this on YouTube, watching.

Chris Enroth: 36:49

And as always, keep on growing. Well, we'll figure that out this week. Okay.