"Killin' It": An online Class of Turf Murder

Water restrictions across Colorado. Some irrigation canals will be shut off mid-season here where I live in 2026. This feels appropriate.  

There is so much confusion about ways to kill one's lawn and a lot of folks are talking about it in Colorado now.

Colleagues and I have talked for years about what a problem this is. Some methods work great in some places, and terribly in others. Some have terrible side-effects, like damaging or killing your trees.  I've learned many of these things the hard way over the years, having the fortune (or misfortune?) of having killed dozens of lawns. Dozens.  

Well, my friend Maddie and I are taking a crack at de-mystifying it with "Killin' It" : a two-and a half hour online class. We're going to pin down all the essential details and provide the background information on why different methods fit in certain places. Maddie will give some illuminating lawn history and cultural background. And to be fair, we'll talk about when lawn makes sense and what that looks like as well as breeze by a few alternatives. But mostly we're talking about the killing. The murder of the turf. 

Most of all, we've developed a navigation tool to help homeowners and professionals alike navigate which method of removal makes the most sense for them. We're pretty proud of that. 

Anyhow, this is the information page here with a link to registration if you or someone you know has been making devious eyes at their lawn. 

A Bat Garden Mini-Plantlist

 I recently accidentally found a specimen of a rare bat; A spotted bat, outside my greenhouse (in Fruita, Colorado) one morning. I don't know what got her, but she had a wound on the back of her head. Dead samples of this species are uncommon and a bat expert actually came to retrieve her for science. (Bats have nipples in their armpits and this lass... well, she was definitely a lass. They were huge!)  Her wingspan was about a foot wide! The bats we see in our neighborhood are nowhere near that big. 

Euderma maculatum, submerged in alcohol for preservation. 

I had no idea we had such amazing things here. It opened my mind up to bats- kings and queens of the sky, of the dark time, the star-spangled other half of earth's time.  Humans are dum-dums and famously forget about life underground and at night and have shown our bias forever, but we're getting better. 

I'm not going to post my picture of her back- with a distinct "face" of white spots, since it's also a tad gory,  but here is a link to a nice photo  from when a specimen was found a few years ago.

Apparently, these massive ears help her locate moths and their very soft wingbeats. (Her top food). She raises one pup per year. The number of crevices in Colorado National Monument host a remarkable diversity of bat species, and the prevalence of widely-spaced roosting spots may be what has insulated them from the dreaded white-nose syndrome. Sometimes it pays to be a desert hermit. 

A short Bat-Loving plant list for a Colorado Garden.

Woodies (for moth larvae)

Gamble, Desert-live oaks.

Cercocarpus spp.

Amelanchier utahensis

Yucca sp. (harrimaniae, baccata, elata are best)

Forbs (to attract moths)

Datura wrightii

Nicotiana atennuata

Mirabilis multiflora

Mirabilis longituba

Oenothera spp.

Amsonia jonesii (there is white one sold at Chelsea Nursery; these are excellent landscape plants)