An eco-friendly lawn? You decide

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Raising eyebrows this morning: The Wall Street Journal has a love note to Scotts Miraclo-Gro about the company’s efforts to develop more environmentally friendly weed and pest killers. The piece makes an effort to get comments from skeptics, which is more than can be said for the accompanying video, in which a different reporter gleefully touts a Scotts sprayer as ‘green’ because it provides a more precise stream of herbicide. Theoretically, consumers will need to use less of it. My question: What will happen to the spent batteries that power the device?

The reality is that many gardeners are done with lawn. The water, the mowing, the mower pollution -- goodbye to it all. If you’re joining the movement, check out our how-to feature with strategies for killing your lawn. (Apologies for the pre-website-redesign layout. You’ll have to click ‘next page’ to get all of the text.)

Then check out our look at turf alternatives. We have a whole lineup of stories (more apologies for the funky post-redesign look -- we’re working on it). I’ll also point out one great gallery that went largely unnoticed last year. For a special issue on drought-tolerant gardening, The Times took a walk through Seaside Nursery, a Carpinteria spot with demonstration landscapes featuring plants not only from the Mediterranean, but also from South Africa and Australia, both similar in climate to Southern California. The photos are stunning; after just the first image, you’ll want to plant honeybush. And, of course, we couldn’t have this conversation without mentioning our weekly Emily Green column on low-water gardening.

-- Craig Nakano