Do grass lawns help global warming?

Grass lawn?? Blahh... Multiunit housing in the city is the best way to go, then you don't have a lawn whatsoever to worry about. You people and your energy guzzling housing styles. <_<

 

Multi-unit housing...
No thanks.

Most are rentals, I own, which means I make money on my property instead of paying rent and getting nothing back.
Even townhomes and other "owned" multiunit housing are unappealing to me.
You have limited if any gardening space, Most have association fees and rules. Dogs are a pain in those where they are allowed, both for the owner and the neighbors. Your neighbors bed could literally be 8 inches away from yours.
Your neighbors could burn down/flood their (and hence your) house/possessions. They could just be an Ahole and make your life there miserable and resale goes down due to their own lack of caring or late night partying. Parking is always tougher.

Granted, some of these are true to a smaller degree with houseing, but you can better predict which homes will build value by the neighborhood than you can in a multihousing unit.

My first house, in an inner ring suburb, resold for 2.5 times what I payed for it (9 years, and a lot of remodeling later). Now I'm doing the same to a 2nd house that had been neglected.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dbermanmd @ Apr 4 2007, 12:12 PM) [snapback]417676[/snapback]</div>

DO you seriously believe that statement? Really? I suppose you grovel at al gores feet too! Really! Wow, that is mind boggling. Here, let me explain to you what causes global warming. THE SUN!!!!!!! I suppose you think we are also the cause of the ice caps shrinking on mars because we humans have a mars rover up there too! CO2, does not generate heat, it may help maintain heat, but it in NO WAY CAUSES HEAT! The sun has been brighter in the past few years than it has been in at least the past 100 years. We have contributed a small portion to CO2 output, that is a given, but so do Volcanoes, and forest fires, and guess what, those occure naturally. I am not denying that the earth may be a degree or two warmer than past records show, but then again, history has shown that warming and cooling of the planet in extreme degrees is natural, and has happened long before humans were here, and will happen long after we are gone.

BTW if global warming was such a big factor, then why the hell has it been so damn cold this week? THe daily temps havent even reached the normal lows! If you believe Gore, the biggest hypocrite of them all, then I have one thing to say to you. You are a FOOL. [/rant]

 

And it ain't the fall that kills you.

It's the sudden stop.

There's a difference between weather and climate.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ACD @ Apr 8 2007, 12:36 AM) [snapback]419722[/snapback]</div>

Gore is the deliverer of the GW message, not the source. The majority of climate scientists concur that the planet is warming as a result of human contribution.

In your end statement you declare that you also base your views on your local temperature. GW is not based on the temperature trends in one area.

You also attacked the wrong person. Dbermanmd rejects the theory of GW. His sarcasm abounds.

So, you exhibit obvious error on multiple fronts.

 

Who would have guessed the depth of ignorance was so great?

 

Well, So Cal is being forced into even more water conservation. We have to cut another 20%. Or I should say the "little people" will have to conserve probably about 80% to make up for those who will simply continue to overwater their huge lawns because "they can afford it".

I don't have lawn. I have brick with planter beds. I have a small patch of what I'm hoping will be dicondra in the front. The rest is trees and bushes. Roses, geraniums, a few ornamental grasses. I'm looking to put in three more trees but they will be dwarf fruit trees and on drippers. I'm going to espalier them up the garage wall. Except for the dicondra patch (about 10x14) everything else is on drippers. But my water consumption *is* going to go up. Because before I had dirt that I didn't water, now I have plants that I am going to water, even if I'm watering as conservatively as I can. Why should I have dirt and cactus for landscaping when I can go through every affluent neighborhood in the county and find huge lawns that use more water in a week than I use in a month? Why do those lower in the social order have to do without so those at the very top can have anything they want?

Call me spoiled or self-indulgent but I think I'm entitled to some trees and bushes. It also raises my property value to have trees and roses instead of dirt and rocks.

So....are roses and geraniums better than ornamental grass lawns?

 

we just killed our grass lawn and put in Rocks. It was costing us a fortune to keep it pretty, green, & Weedless. It was great for us too, the city gave us $200 back for switching 50% of our lawn to an environmentally friendly yard.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(h2photo @ Sep 1 2007, 10:45 AM) [snapback]505450[/snapback]</div>

Good on ya. Grass lawns in AZ make no sense. I used to live in Tucson and there's a neighborhood there (called Winterhaven) that has it's own water company. They REQUIRE you to have a green lawn. It's bizarre. I ran through there once and it was like I stepped through a portal to back east. Dumb asses. Such a waste of water. Do they still have those ridiculous fountains in Phoenix?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Godiva @ Sep 1 2007, 11:19 AM) [snapback]505440[/snapback]</div>

There are some trees native to your area that probably have a deep tap root and rarely need will rarely need supplemental watering. Around here, the Shagbark Hickory has a tap root about 20 feet deep at maturity (from what I last read). You can have your cake and eat it to. Then you can at least appear to be keeping up with the jonses.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(tripp @ Sep 1 2007, 09:02 PM) [snapback]505684[/snapback]</div>

Yep, there's still a ton of fountains in Phoenix, thankfully, most (if not all) use Greywater though, so at least that helps a bit. A lot of people who want a green yard now, also put in astroturf, which is funny! But there's still mostly rocks. We're happy with our yard, we just need to get some landscaping or something

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(h2photo @ Sep 2 2007, 10:27 AM) [snapback]505904[/snapback]</div>

California still takes more than half the Colorado water that you guys have a 50% claim to, don't they (er, "we"?) I seem to remember that Phoenix could have water running everywhere and not use their allotment.

While there are other environmental concerns, if GW trumps all others, then the greening of Phoenix can only be seen as a good thing. The water source isn't a concern, as it just flows to the gulf of Mexico anyway, and the extra carbon-sequestering plant material is a net positive.

That is, if GW trumps all other environmental concerns.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(SSimon @ Apr 8 2007, 08:46 AM) [snapback]419786[/snapback]</div>

Actually I have done more research on this subject. There is further proof that what is occurring is a natural cycle of the planet. We as humans on this planet have little to do with how the planet is warming. CO2 occurs naturally from the oceans, when they warm they emit more CO2, what is warming the oceans is the earth. Nature emits 97% of the CO2, humans and animals contribute 3%. If we were to stop everything that produces CO2 save for breathing, it would make no difference in the climate. When the oceans warm, temperatures rise globally. Ice melts faster in water than air. More precipitation occurs more snow is produced, heat is reflected away and eventually an ice age begins. It has happened before and will happen again and no matter what WE do, it will happen. If you want to do something, reduce pollution! You will get no argument from me that we are spoiling the air we breath, but when someone brings up that we are causing GW, I get a bug up my butt. WE are not causing GW, WE are polluting though. In fact no matter how hard we try, Nature can out produce us. CFC's occur naturally, CO2 occurs naturally, other gases occur naturally. However, we do put out pollutants that we can control and by reducing those emissions, we can clean up the air, water and earth.

If you want to dispute this go ahead, but keep in mind, water heats faster when the flame is under the pot than when it is above it. Think about how the planet exists. What is it, A huge ball spinning around orbiting a star that puts out tremendous amounts of heat. What happens when you compress something? It heats up, heat rises. The core of the earth is under tremendous amounts of heat, and is fluid, constantly in motion. I think a lot of people forget that fact. At the bottom of most of the worlds oceans there are mini volcanoes constantly spewing hot gases, and lava. That heat has to go somewhere. Eventually that heat reaches the surface, and the water evaporates, more CO2 is released, ice melts faster, etc.

This is all backed by scientific proof. Another thing that gets overlooked is the fact that CO2 can only absorb so much radiation per meter, no matter how dense the gas. It is like a plastic sheet, no matter how thick or thin it is, the amount it absorbs is the same. What is failed to be mentioned is the amount of water vapor in the air. Water absorbs a far greater amount of heat than CO2 ever could. More water vapor=more heat=higher temps. Where does the water vapor come from? Warming oceans. What came first, the chicken or the egg? So did the air raise the water temps? I doubt it, a degree or two rise in surface temps would take a very very long time to warm the oceans enough to make any difference. The air temps have been shown to rise over a very short time, too short to have any effect on the oceans. BUT Ocean temps rising to the point where it could affect the air temps makes more sense.

Now, as this thread has started off with grass, lawns can be a contributer of water vapor being released, and for that you wont find an argument from me, it is a valid statement, lawns can contribute to GW, but not in the ways mentioned. In fact studies have shown that Phoenix temperatures are rising slightly and there is now measurable amounts of humidity mainly due to lawns and swimming pools. Now is all that enough to cause GW by itself? I doubt it, in fact the amount of water vapor released world wide by swimming pools, water fountains and lawns is minuscule compared to what the oceans can put out.

 

Back when I was a kid in Southern California, I lived in Hemet.
The Art Linkletter Mobile Home Park was/is? close to our neighborhood.
Driving through there, I was always bemused by all the painted concrete "lawns"... yup. Cement. Painted green. Of course, that conserves water, even if it does contribute to run-off. And the heat island effect.

Where I live now, our "lawn" is becoming more and more clover. Clover is a deep-root plant, that digs down very deep, and conserves moisture, while putting nitrogen into the soil. Requires no fertilizer, no watering, and doesn't grow that tall (the variety we have, anyway).
The natural ground cover here is, I think, moss, but no one wants that in their lawn

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Rae Vynn @ Sep 11 2007, 11:35 AM) [snapback]510625[/snapback]</div>

ACK! That's the crap that's all over my native garden. I spend 2 full days pulling the crap in the Spring and then periodic pulls resume throughout the year. I think a prior owner actually planted this stuff around our house. My husband, who had resided at the house for 10 years prior to my arrival, never thought to pull any weeds. My nice person hurt from falling down whilst pulling the 8 foot thistle from the backyard. There is an end in sight. I'm only pulling the clover until the garden becomes established as it seeds in. Once that hits a critical mass, the clover will hopefully perish of it's own accord.

On the other hand, moss can hang around anytime.