Successfully using science to get out of chores

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I grew up in the city so doing yard work was never something I had to deal with. My fiance grew up in the suburbs on a 1/4 acre lot with a couple trees so yard work (specifically raking) was something he got used to at an early age.
When we first moved in together, we lived in a condo so we didn’t have to do any yard work at all.
When we moved to our current house (on a .9 acre lot which is at least 2/3 wooded), he immediately got back into the raking groove. Every single weekend in the fall for 2 years I’d be forced to help him rake up close to 100 bags of leaves which then had to be picked up by Casella or delivered to the yard waste drop off. Every single weekend I’d be nagged by the thought that this was all wrong and not how to spend a life.
Last year I successfully came up with an argument which got me out of the stupid task.
I started using a very wide rake as a shovel to push massive quantities of leaves off the side of the driveway and down the wooded hill (which is still our property). My fiance saw me doing this and actually got annoyed because he said that we’d eventually have to deal with it down there too.

So I put my plan into action. I went down the hill and dug up some dirt from about 6" down. Then I went to our front lawn (which had been raked every fall for at least the past 60 years) and dug up some more dirt from about 6" down. I showed him both dirt samples, had him smell them and feel them. The dirt from the lawn was dry, cold, practically scentless, and tan colored. The dirt from the wooded are was damp, warm, incredibly fragrant, and almost black. I explained to him that the soil on our lawn was dying because all the energy that went into growing the leaves and grass ended up in a yard waste bag 3 miles from our house. The soil in the wooded area is alive and thriving because it has never been developed, mown or raked. The leaves that don’t fall on the lawn or driveway would decompose and add their energy back to that dirt which allows more and more life to thrive.
I couldn’t convince him with my logic (he’s an engineer but the closest he got to biology or life science was 1 semester of geology and he leaves the “squishy” things to me).
This past spring I planted things in the lawn soil, potting soil, and wooded area soil. The stuff in the lawn soil struggled to grow. The stuff in the potting soil grew. The stuff in the wooded area soil flourished.
I won.
I don’t have to rake any more. Instead of 2 or 3 hours every weekend for 6 weeks packing up leaves, I just push them off the side of the hill. He also stopped bagging up the lawn clippings.

I am so lazy. :smiley:

2

You rock! :smiley:

3

now you can go down the hill and bring up loads of good healthy soil to amend flower beds, gardens and lawn.

4

I actually have been doing that. When I planted to Lilacs in my front yard, I dug big deep holes and filled them with hill soil. I almost did that for my hosta garden too but when I realized you can cut one in half with a spade and leave it in a garage for the winter and still have it grow, good soil probably isn’t a requirement.
Unfortunately between being a full-time student and having a part-time job, I don’t have much time for gardening. I will in two years though. I’m gonna have a full vegetable garden by 2016 dammit!!
There’s so much stuff living down there. I occasionally go walking through there just to see how many snakes, frogs, salamanders, and different bugs I can find without actually hunting for them. I will do whatever it takes to prevent my fiance from ever “dealing” with that wooded hill.
The guy who owns the at least 2 acres of never developed woods next to us is selling and moving away. I hope he sells that lot with his own (which is behind us) and that the new owner uses it as a privacy shield. I’d hate for all those trees to be cut down to build a new house.

5

Hear hear! Leaves, at worst, should be mulched and spread, or just driven over with a mulching mower attachment.