Ah September

It’s September and summer is winding down.  Ripened fruits abound, stickseed collects on pant legs and tangles the dog’s hair, overripe tomatoes droop on the vine then plop to the ground.  In odd areas goldenrod, beggar-tick, and ironweed bloom. The Cornell Bird Lab monitors bird migrations in real time through their BirdCast project, and it forecasts 13 million birds in the sky over Indiana tonight.

It’s September and Election Day is less than two months away.  Many are saying the outcome is a toss of the coin.  Most have already made their decision and will not be swayed.  Information that goes contrary to our beliefs is deemed fake and ignored.  Our convictions are strong and have divided a nation and sometimes driven a wedge within families and between friends.  As elections go, it seems uglier than usual. It's nice to have a southbound squadron of gadwalls sit down on the pond for a few days, to see native bees working zinnias.  A few nights ago we were behind the house and saw a great horned owl fly across the face of a full moon.  There are things infinitely more therapeutic and comforting than politics. 

We sold our business eight years ago, and since it was at our home, it marked the end of daily activity around the place. Multiple vehicles in and out were no more. The pea graveled areas used for displaying container plants were now empty. Rotted sawdust, for years used to heal in field dug plants, had disintegrated and left behind rich organic matter with no planned purpose.  Ornamental plants remaining in the field were abandoned. With attitudes that embraced uncommitted time and few visitors, we were happy to put our energies toward things other than routine maintenance.

It’s rather remarkable, now, to look back at the changes, the sometimes subtle but consistent efforts by nature to cover herself, to reclaim all that we once regularly disturbed.  Of particular note are the graveled lanes and lots which are now reduced to two tracks of limestone marking the path of a single vehicle used sporadically.  Mixed, tough-site vegetation like plantain and chicory, yarrow, violets, and annual grasses, has taken root and is claiming the stone.  

Before this rewilding, before the mixed weeds and grasses became established, we would have periodic blowouts in the driveway, ruts and washes gouged during periods of heavy rain, and waterborne stone deposited in our yard and on our walkway like glacial outwash.  The roots of encroaching plants are binding stone to stone and knitting together a more resilient substrate, resistant to wash.  Over time, given continued protection from periodic disturbance, the crushed stone would one day support more substantial plants— brambles, shrubs, trees— and any hint of the lane would be well gone to the casual observer. 

Few things we do are not eventually undone by physical forces.  With the proliferation of plastics in our world we have greatly extended our impact, but they too, eventually break down.  The earth measures time in billions of years and from its perspective our collective activities will be short lived.

In our society there is a pervasive mindset towards land use that is focused on manicured neatness and has us mowing 40 million acres of lawn annually. It invites a huge chemical industry bent on selling lawn management plans with the goal of producing insect free monocultures of turfgrass.  The plan is perceived attractive and satisfying, viewed by many as a responsibility, a sign of good stewardship and decency, while everything about it runs contrary to the variety and community found in natural systems.

Many of us find a home in the woods appealing. Yet, the only thing separating an appealing wooded suburb from it’s sprawling, sterile counterpart built on repurposed cornfields are a few decades of relative neglect.  An interesting study would follow a Midwestern city block with routine mowing minimized for a period of 50 years, and changes in flora and fauna documented.  The study would be a hard sell, both for municipalities, that typically require properties be kept groomed, and by our own lack of appreciation for the adolescent plant communities that are part of the natural transition from open land to forest.  This is an unfortunate truth as early successional stages support a greater assortment of insects and wildlife than either manicured grassland or mature forest.  

Aldo Leopold wrote, “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community.  It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”  Incredibly, there are more US acres devoted to lawn than corn, and there is three times more irrigated turf than irrigated corn.  Our devotion to mowing and our preference for nonnative landscape plants deprives us of massive environmental wealth.  

Picture an office or industrial complex surrounded by acres of manicured lawn.  Now picture it as a September field with mowing restricted to select open spaces and meandering walking trails.  There are wild sunflowers, raspberry stems painted with glaucus bloom, blue cardinal flowers, ripened sumac. Which is more inviting?  Where will you more likely see songbirds, pollinators, hawks, or cottontails?  Which saves money, curtails pollution, and contributes more to the biotic community?

It's a great country, where we can choose to mow our lawns or mow our driveways, and in spite of our destructive and misguided tendencies, there are persistent ecological forces to heal and restore. It’s a great country, and in wild vegetation and migrating birds and the flowers of September is a hope for renewal.  It’s a great country, and in less than two months we have the privilege of choosing our next leader. Based on past performance only 40 percent of us will bother with indicating a preference. Only half will be satisfied.