Filed under: Your Home, Projects, Gardening
A fake lawn can be just as lush and lovely as a real one. Photo: Flickr user kingdesmond1337
Artificial grass is becoming a popular lawn choice, but would you roll in it?
Does the thought of grassy-green indoor/outdoor carpet make you cringe? Me too. "If you haven't seen the new generation of synthetic grass, then the stigma is still there," says Heard Smith, CEO of SYNLawn, sister company of AstroTurf.
Well, get ready to get mowed over. Artificial grass is becoming a more acceptable option for homeowners looking to reclaim all the time and energy spent they've spent on maintaining a lush lawn. Smith says that fake grass is in demand for children's residential play areas, and for homes with small landscape needs where sweating over lawn care just doesn't make sense. Artificial lawns are also becoming increasingly popular in areas with a strained water supply or environmental concerns. As you'd expect, fake grass eliminates the need for water, chemical fertilizers and mowing.
And it's actually soft to the touch. Older versions of artificial turf were tough on knees and hard to walk on. Today, the manufacturing process of the blades and thatch are advanced to mimic the silky look and feel of natural lawn.
Installation is a breeze, but better handled by professionals who know how to seam and groom the product because it's much like installing carpeting, says Smith. Though the product can perform well on contoured yards, a compact and flat surface will help the product to hold up better. While you can say good-bye to lawn service bills, there is a hefty upfront cost that may not make sense for everyone. Sod is less than half the price of synthetic grass per square foot. Still, says Smith, "the product pays for itself in about three years."
Artificial lawns last about eight years or more, according to Artificial Grass, Ltd, but that doesn't mean a maintenance-free time period. SYNLawn's Smith says that the grass is like a carpet, and any type of seed can drop in and germinate, so some intermittent weeding may be necessary. Some good news: synthetic grass acts as a heavy-duty weed barrier so time spent weeding will likely be less than time spent on real grass.
There are other perks: A dog can't dig a hole in fake grass and thanks to some organic additives, if a dog urinates on the turf, it won't smell.
With lots of kids and pets likely to play on the turf, I asked if artificial grass is safe. While we at ShelterPop haven't undertaken an investigation into synthetic turf, Smith, not surprisingly, says it's completely healthy for pets and kids to spend time rolling around in it. He points to documented research proving that polypropylene and polyethylene materials in synthetic grass are inert. "At one time there was a negative stigma over lead used for the coloration in synthetic turf, but there is no more lead or heavy metals used to make these products," he says.
Pets can't dig up synthetic grass. Photo: SYNLawn