It seemed that everywhere I looked there were press vent promoting the kick - off outcome for an organic lawn organization – on the Mall in Washington ! You bed , just like the Million Man March and countless other events that made history . Trouble is , the Mall ’s a pretty freehanded situation , so as I rag the subway downtown I was wondering if I ’d ever find the event . And sure enough , it take some sleuthing but I finally spied a likely group on the Capitol grounds — observe , not the Mall — but by then I was pretty cranky and not at all eager to shill for an formation that looked suspiciously like a book promotion dick for a well known TV personality – the Blond One himself , Paul Tukey .
So you see my material body of mind – annoyance blend with ’ 60 - mode skepticism . But when faced withSafeLawns.org , the coalition of lefty nonprofits and others whose mission is organic lawn care , how could I NOT come down in line ? Speakers included , in addition to the tv set - cute Tukey himself , tribe from the Rachel Carson Council , the Chesapeake Bay Foundation , the National Botanic Gardens – see , all good guys . ( Even Newman ’s Own Organics is a partner – beyond goggle box cute to movie star dreamy . )
So here ’s what they ’re up to : challenging universities and industries to reject the use of chemical on their lawn , lobby nation legislatures to excrete pesticide on school grounds , and encouraging Realtor to create Safe Lawn certification programs for rest home on the market . That ’s just for entrant .
And here ’s some scary crap I learned in their handouts :
The lean go miserably on and I ’ll stop there because by now you ’ve gotten the detail . But how about the extent of the problem ? More than one-half of the 104 million home with lawns exercise insecticides ; 40 million enjoyment herbicides . The New York Board of Pesticide Control found that 80 % of homeowner do n’t even read the Caution labels on pesticide product . Then there ’s a crowd of studies that show the effect of celluloid lawn care product on water system , on melodic line , and on grunge itself ( lose weight microbial activity by 75 to 80 % ) .
Had enough ? I think that ’s the point .
I did have a nice chat with Safe Lawn ’s executive director , Shep Ogden , anotherBoomer Boy of Gardening . Actually it was n’t so much a Old World chat as him expounding passionately about genetically modified plants ( against , great - metre ) and deviant figure of “ scientism ” while I tried to keep up , scribbling furiously and forebode urgently on my meager grasp of botany to just get his point . And I could endeavor to sum it for you but I ’d rather corral him into get a guest appearance right here to speak for himself . How about it , Shep ?
