Herb Lawn – what it is and why should you have one
Violets and dandelions thriving among the grass.
I once participated in a foraging program where a wonderful woman opened her home to a group of students and introduced us to countless plants we often overlook as weeds. She had a lovely property which backed onto a wooded area, and we were able to forage in those woods, but also in her lawn, and even more surprisingly, in what was once her swimming pool.
One year (if I remember her story correctly it was about four years before this class), she had decided her pool was just too much work. When summer came, she didn’t pull back the cover. This was in New England where there are long snowy winters. The next year, the cover which had not been removed the previous year was showing signs of wear, falling apart in places. She left the cover in place again for the second summer, and by the end of that summer, realized she was starting to hear a chorus of frogs from inside her pool. Another winter of snow passed, and the next spring something magic happened. The cover had completely collapsed and her pool had turned into a pond. Complete with frogs and plants galore (many of which were edible).
I always remember that yard as magical, not because she had a super green thumb (although I think she did), but because she had let nature lead the way. Instead of viewing everything that was not grass as a weed to be removed, she encouraged all manner of plants to grow in her yard (and pool). This was my first experience with a cultivated herb lawn.
Plantain – my go-to plant to get the itch out of a bug bite!
Ok, but what is an herb lawn
An herb lawn is exactly what it sounds like, it is a traditional lawn in which herbs (what you might have formerly viewed as weeds) are allowed and encouraged to grow. This is not a garden, it still contains grass and is something you can walk and play on. But it also is studded throughout with herbs which bring benefits to you and the entire ecosystem.
If you come from the school of a lawn that is created by killing everything and then laying down sod or sowing grass seeds, this will seem very foreign to you. However, if you are one of those people who looks out at your lawn and sees interspersed among the grass dandelions, violets, clovers and plantain, then you have an herb lawn!
Please note that you still mow an herb lawn, you are not growing a jungle or letting the entire yard turn into a garden. While it will not have a uniform manicured appearance you get from a grass only lawn, it will look still look neat and tidy after each mowing. Between mowings, the appearance will be a little less tidy than a grass only yard as each plant grows at a different rate so you will have an uneven topography to your yard.
Why would I want an herb lawn
Herb lawns are awesome for several reasons. Elaine Sheff, a clinical herbalist writes about her herb lawn: “I have extra room to grow more herbs. My lawn supports the health and diversity of my garden, yard and local ecosystem. The amazing diversity in my lawn supports my beehives, local insects, birds, squirrels and other wildlife. My herbal lawn does well with less water and no chemicals. I enjoy wandering out into the lawn to graze on a few edible ‘weeds’ or pick some to add to our salads, eggs or other dishes.”
Clover and violets – ready to add a wild touch to a salad (red clover is edible, white might not be depending on the species – make sure you have a positive id on any plants before consuming them).
Yup, if you have an herb lawn, you can actually create a salad from your lawn! A few dandelion greens, purslane, clover and top it off with some violets and you have a lovely spring salad right from your garden! If you are uncomfortable identifying your plants and/or verifying they are safe for human consumption, seek out guidance from a wild plants expert or herbalist in your area. You can also check with your local university extension office to get information on local plants. Please do not eat anything before verifying it is in fact safe for you to eat (this includes any questions you might have regarding the soil quality and potential contamination from run-off).
If you have pets who go to the bathroom in your yard, or if you chemically treat your yard, I strongly discourage you from eating out of the yard. However, even without being able to eat the bounty, there are still so many benefits of an herb lawn. And you may find that the more you cultivate this type of yard, you will not need to chemically treat any longer and will eventually be able to enjoy the produce growing in your lawn.
An herb lawn will also save you time and money – you won’t have to water the lawn as often (or at all), no more money spent on seed or sod, and forget about weeding (I saw a woman on a recent walk with a special tool she was using to pull dandelions out of her lawn – imagine the time she would save if she welcomed them into her yard).
And you will be creating an oasis for the birds and bees (literally) in your yard. Providing sources of food for all manner of local wildlife often displaced by manicured (and to them barren) lawns across your neighborhood.
I’m sold, how do I get one of these herb lawns?
If you are starting with a lawn that already has some herbs (again these are things we used to think of as weeds) mixed in, you are well on your way! Mother Earth Living notes that “getting started with an herbal lawn may be as simple as changing your definitions and attitudes. Instead of targeting them as lawn weeds, try thinking of clover, yarrow, and potentilla as unacknowledged, unappreciated herbs. You can encourage existing herbs by doing just the opposite of what lawn care specialists recommend: don’t water, don’t fertilize, and wait a few extra days between mowings so that you’re cutting back the grass by more than half its height. This strategy gradually weakens the grass and favors the herbs. I call it creative neglect.”
If you are starting with a grass only lawn, you may need to encourage the herbs to start growing. You can buy seeds or young plants and intersperse them in your lawn. You can also look around your yard and/or neighborhood to see if there are existing plants you can relocate to your lawn. And the biggest step is to stop applying weed killers and pulling out these herbs from your lawn as they appear. Once your lawn has herbs appearing, follow the steps above to encourage them to thrive.
The process of creating an herb lawn takes time. While most of the herbs you will be looking to add to your lawn are self seeding and will spread with time, you are still looking at these plants gradually increasing each year. However, once started, the process will not require much hands on work from you.
What exactly is growing in my lawn and how do I use it?
Depending on where you live, you will have different plants which will thrive in your herb lawn. If you are totally new to plant identification, start with a google image search for “native plants in ____” or “common weeds in ____” and fill in your geographic location in the blank. Look at the photos and compare them to what you are finding in your lawn.
Once you have identified what is growing in your lawn, you can learn how to use those plants. Again, if you are new to wild herbs, you might want to keep a list of what you have growing so you can quickly reference it when looking for something for a salad or to make a cup of tea. Again, google will be your friend, research each of the plants you have growing. Remember that there may be different uses for the flower, leaves and roots. And only some parts of plants may be edible. If you are unsure, please err on the side of caution and do not consume anything you are not able to positively identify as safe for human consumption.
If you are just starting to cultivate your herb lawn, I would suggest you wait a little while before using roots of most plants. At least give them a chance to flower and go to seed before digging them up for the roots. You want to encourage the herbs to continue to grow, pulling the roots before the flowers have gone to seed is the equivalent of weeding!
My herb lawn experiment
When we moved into our current house, we were lucky to have an herb lawn already in progress. I look out my window and see violets and dandelions in bloom throughout the yard. Clovers are flourishing and spring is moving along enough that I am excited to go out and start searching for plantain.
Luckily, although Adam is not as passionate about having an herb lawn as I am, his lawn care habits are exactly those that will cultivate an herb lawn. He is also incredibly patient with me, and my experiments.
There is a large patch of essentially clay next to the house. It does get some sun, but as it is north facing, it is mostly shaded throughout the day. Adam wanted to spread grass seed over this section of the yard this spring. After an empassioned argument in favor of herb lawns, he agreed to let me seed it with yarrow instead! The seeds are on their way and we appear to be almost past the time of year when a killing frost will arrive.
I am going to sow the yarrow seeds directly into the yard in keeping with the low maintenance quality of an herb lawn. Since the initial planting will be in a section which does not currently have grass growing in it, we should be able to avoid this area with the mower until the plants have established themselves. I will keep you posted throughout the season on the progress of my yarrow experiment, but I am hopeful that instead of looking down on a clay patch, in a few months I will be smiling at my newly expanded herb lawn!
Hoping your lawn becomes an oasis for not only you, but also your local ecosystem.
How long should you wait to harvest lawn herbs if you’ve been using chemicals on your lawn?
This is going to depend on your comfort level. In the US federal laws covering organic crops require that no conventional chemicals be used on the land for at least three years before the crops can be certified organic. If you had minimal chemical exposure on your lawn and you live in an area that receives a lot of rain and/or snow which flushes out your soil, I might feel comfortable after a full year had passed. However, if you want to err on the safe side, based on the organic standard, three years should hopefully be long enough to move most of the chemicals out of the soil.