While our water coffers are full, we should look at replacing more of the ornamental, non native plants that people have with natives grassss, flowers, shrubs, and trees. California is a botanical bounty and there's no reason why we need such an artificial monoculture when native plants support local wildlife, require fewer resources and less upkeep, and often look better as well. Not to mention that they often smell great, especially some of the native sage species that grow in the hills.
Fun fact: before the Spanish conquest and aggressive grazing agriculture, the native grasses in California were perennials, greatly reducing the severity of fires.
This won't fix the aggressive consumption of water by agriculture. I'm not sure what to do about that, except allocates strict water allotments and encourage more drought resistant crops with government programs.
The tall, dead yellow grass in California is non-native avena. A pesticide that selectively killed it (and actually succeeded in killing nothing else) would be an ecological miracle.
Having said that, people in the cities should plant natives and consider replacing lawns with native wildflower mix and paths. They attract beneficial insects, and those attract and support native birds. It’s also much lower maintenance.
Native insects and birds typically cannot survive on non-native plants. From animals’ perspective, your lush non-native garden may as well be asphalt.
You can find local natives for your neighborhood’s microclimate here:
For water, grass doesn’t matter. Golf courses don’t matter. Californians water “shortage”, like its housing crisis, is a political choice. In this case, it’s entirely a problem of agriculture.
(The other arguments against ornamental lawns are valid. As someone allergic to many grasses, I have no love lost for lawns.)
They could probably dramatically reduce the amount of water used by agriculture while still having plenty of agriculture.
Decades ago, I saw an article about making little basins to capture rain water in the right amount to sustain a tree in the desert to grow fruiting trees in places like the Middle East using natural rainfall in order to increase productivity of arid lands without stressing the environment. I don't believe this is standard practice anywhere in the world, much less a "developed" country like the US, but there's no reason it couldn't be a common practice someplace like California.
Pooled water is tightly restricted in California by law. The combination of the climate and the land continuity with Mexico and Central America makes them particularly vulnerable to mosquito-borne illness and those concerns have been built into the water-management system for many decades.
> They could probably dramatically reduce the amount of water used by agriculture...
Politically, "they" could not and that is the problem. Think about this. Who is "they?" Who could have the political power and will to do something like that without the support of the agriculture industry?
If you're talking about actual laborers, most of them aren't even citizens and this is not a priority for them.
If you're talking about the corporate boards who run the agriculture industry, this increases cost without increasing profit so this is not a priority for them.
I just can't think of how the agriculture industry could possibly get behind this.
As far as I know, they live on planet Earth along with the rest of us schmucks and if they burn the entire world to the ground for profit, fleeing to a compound in New Zealand won't actually save them -- unless "New Zealand" is really code for some off planet haven, which I very seriously doubt.
Something being a problem for someone doesn't mean it's a priority.
Poor people will never prioritize global warming. They will always have more urgent priorities. This is one reason why environmentalism under capitalism is absolutely doomed.
That's extremely funny. I'm dirt poor and gave up my car well over a decade ago, in part because I couldn't afford it anymore and in part because I'm an environmental studies major who takes environmental issues seriously.
I'm not rich enough to afford to smoke cocaine to fuel my delusions and then buy a compound in New Zealand and a personal jet for getting there if my greed helps rapidly burn the world down while I imagine there's someplace safe to go after all the billionaires have destroyed the world in search of their own selfish gratification.
So I make a LOT of pro environmental choices. I got no place to go and no money with which to go there.
It's also funny because it assumes the global poor are too stupid to realize that global warming means they'll become victims of war, refugees, or starve (choose one or more).
first world arrogance - global definition of extreme poverty is $1.90/day, around $700 per year, scratching the dirt for food and water rather than going to college and not having a car
Agreed. There are lots of arguments against the "ornamental grass lawn", but consumer water usage is a very weak one. Doubly so because consumers pay real rates for their water usage.
The water "shortage" in California is an "agribusiness water shortage". Shut down a bunch of farms and California has plenty of water.
We should first get rid of farms that take free water and export the goods out of the country. But politicians won't because these billionaires are great donors.
Can you report some numbers relative to total water use that justify that statement? Golf is a very popular sport and they often use reclaimed water not suitable for drinking. The grass also has a “function” as its the surface for the sport. Do they really account for that much water usage vs everyone having a lawn that does nothing?
San Francisco alone have 6 public golf courses. And some of them are loosing lots of money, primarily due to cost of upkeep. And they are literally used by a handful of people at a time, while every other patch of land is packed with visitors.
> Get rid of golf courses first. I saw many on my road trip from one side of the state to the other.
Do you know what the golfers would say? "How about you tech people stop playing games, so there would be less energy consumption and less manufacturing, obesity would be less of an issue; you stop traveling so there would be less CO2 emission. Golf is the only pastime hobby for me now and you want to get rid of it?"
There's a type of people that considers good living a sin and they invent 'solutions' like these. The solution to water shortages is to build desalination plants. They are surprisingly cheap - $0.28 per m³.
Great point. We should shut down all markets and grocery stores as well- if people can’t survive on their own, we shouldn’t be supporting that, it’s unnatural.
People having food to eat and people having green lawns aren't even remotely equivalent dude, come on.
Literally the whole point of "we should use less water on lawns" is so we'll have more water for food, for humans. Because lawns contribute nothing that humans want or need.
I mostly wanted to call attention to the lazy argument that we shouldn't do things that require human intervention.
"Use less water on lawns so we have more water for food, for humans".
That is a very one dimensional take. California's non-residential water usage doesn't just get used for human food, nor human food for Californians. Famously it gets bottled by Nestle, it gets used by Saudi Arabia to grow alfalfa for their cows, and it's used to grow almonds and other products that are exported outside of California.
So we have all these organizations using water in California, making a profit, exporting water from the state. (It's something like an 80/20 split for agriculture vs residential/urban water usage by the way).
So no, I don't agree that individual Californians should need to justify a patch of grass so that corporations and foreign nationals can continue exploiting our water resources. Sacramento should go fix literally all of that first.
You know there's other things to plant that use less water and still look nice aside from grass.
If your mental health depends on specifically grass and will not accept any substitute, then I'm just sad for you. Grass is the most boring plant to look at.
Fun fact: before the Spanish conquest and aggressive grazing agriculture, the native grasses in California were perennials, greatly reducing the severity of fires.
This won't fix the aggressive consumption of water by agriculture. I'm not sure what to do about that, except allocates strict water allotments and encourage more drought resistant crops with government programs.