Has anyone tried wood chippings in lieu of a plastic lawn? Would that work for children playing football etc?
Not sure that would be a hygienic alternative. With everyone's cat on the prowl, you'd end up with one giant cat convenience and I wouldn't let children play in that.
There are c.87 households in our village and I am reasonably certain only one of them has plastic grass. I would be quite confident in guessing that pattern is repeated in all the villages round here.
And yet I suspect in densely settled urban areas there are streets where plastic grass frequency considerably exceeds 1 in 10. Can anyone confirm that from personal experience?
When Arit Anderson made that assertion this evening I raised an eyebrow and thought that is a statement in need of testing on Radio 4’s ‘More or Less’.
I live in a small cul-de-sac in a large town. My opposite neighbours have it as their front lawn. My next door neighbour on one side, and next door but one on the other both have it in the back garden. Walking down the street the other day I noticed another neighbour getting it installed in the front. One of my work colleagues bought a new build house and immediately put in plastic grass - "I'm not spending time mowing grass" he said in a tone of disgust.
I agree with LG that perhaps plastic grass has now become derigueur for "low maintenance" set ups. Regular lawns are standard too - even though people find them a chore or are not particularly fond of them. Gravel, paving. I'm not sure many other options are considered.
A plastic grass business opened locally a few years ago with a small shop on the main shopping street. It only lasted a few months. I’ve only seen plastic grass in the front garden of a small property I walk past regularly, it’s got more weeds than my block paving!
From what I can see, the use of plastic grass has risen in line with the increase in Buy to Let … lots of those in the area we moved from… Norwich’s Golden Triangle … rented to uni students, hospital workers and young professionals.
Buy a scuzzy Victorian terraced house … sand the floorboards, strip and wax the doors .., enlarge the kitchen and make the garden ‘low maintenance’ by installing said plastic lawn … 🙄 It seems every landlord’s doing it.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
That's one mad statistic. More are lost to drives made over front garden. Mind blown.
Yep, very sad and somewhat hard to take in but probably true. The thing is it may look nice to some people (not me) and/or solve a temporary problem but 10 or 20 years down the line it becomes garbage. Nobody wants it, can't be recycled and is just junk. That's after millions of bits of micro plastic have been washed into the watercourse...Ban it IMO.
Based in Sussex, I garden to encourage as many birds to my garden as possible.
Posts
Buy a scuzzy Victorian terraced house … sand the floorboards, strip and wax the doors .., enlarge the kitchen and make the garden ‘low maintenance’ by installing said plastic lawn … 🙄 It seems every landlord’s doing it.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.