Do We Really Have More Acreage in Lawns Than in Corn?

A researcher with NASA has published a study that suggests that we now have more land area in the United States invested in growing grass than in growing food for humans to eat.

As part of her PhD work, Christina Milesi went looking for a national estimate of land area dedicated to lawns, but found that no data were available. She then got herself grant to study the problem and came up with a methodology, using a variety of satellite imagery and aerial photography data sources, to create "a national estimate of lawn area and the impact of those lawns on ecological factors like the carbon and water cycles."

"Even conservatively,"” Milesi says, "“I estimate there are three times more acres of lawns in the U.S. than irrigated corn."” This means lawns -- —including residential and commercial lawns, golf courses, etc -- could be considered the single largest irrigated crop in America in terms of surface area, covering about 128,000 square kilometers in all.

I find myself floored by that notion.

The entire article is fascinating on several levels.

First, it speaks to that tendency we have to carry with us as we migrate around the country an idealized notion of what our yards should look like, leading to the proliferation of created, non-native lawns in areas that are not meant to have open grasslands. Witness the irrigated oddities of lawns in subdivisions carved into the western deserts, or the patches of lovingly, painstakingly and horribly expensively maintained green alongside the sand dunes and salt marshes of the Atlantic coastline here in Delaware.

Second, the work Ms. Milesi and her team put in to find ways to deduce the amount of lawns around the nation from data sets that don't directly show lawns was instructive. I work in the world of spatial data and often am asked questions for which aerial photos, satellite imagery and GPS -- all now so popularly featured on TV and via Google -- don't provide ready answers. This story reminds us that sometimes we have to be creative; to mix different data sources and rely on intuition to find ways to calculate things that are not easy to measure.

On the issue of lawns, however, I'm proud to say that my otherwise abysmal record on lawn care means that I am, at least by default, maintaining a somewhat native habitat in my yard.

His Master's Dash

Christina and I found ourselves parking next to this vehicle on Saturday when I dragged her along while I got a haircut. I had to take this photo. In fact, at least one other person parked in that section of the lot had pulled out her camera as well. Her shot would be a bit more head-on to the truck.

I like the way the photo came out. The haircut will need a day or two more to grow into acceptableness.

Freudian Typo #469

Blogger New Alb Annie Googled herself the other day and was surprised to find her name in the minutes of the "Board of Pubic Works and Safety" of New Albany, Indiana. It got me thinking that this must be a fairly common typo, and one that most spell-checking software will politely ignore.

Apparently it does happen.

A quick set of searches found 149 mentions of a "Board of Pubic." There were only 44 mentions of "Pubic Accountancy," though we could probably use more of that.

I found 9,260 mentions of "Pubic Education" and 256 of "Pubic Ed," for those who like to get right down to it. I suppose that this is one area where it really does make life easier to proof-read very carefully and thus avoid protracted media investigations.

There were 695 mentions of "Pubic Utilities" but there were 16,900 mentions of "Pubic Works." While I'm tempted to be clever here about those two areas of endeavor, I'll leave it alone.

While Google in each case demurely suggested searching for the "Public" version instead of the "Pubic," it did dutifully perform the searches as I had typed them. The sponsored link ads, however, stayed stolidly in the public realm, ignoring the pubic entirely.

An Anachronism

An Anachronism
Originally uploaded by mmahaffie.

Visiting the New Castle County Government Center today, I had occasion to visit the Gent's. I was interested to note, as I looked around me, that the building's bathrooms (the Men's anyway) are still provided with individual, wall-mounted ashtrays.

We've had a ban on indoor smoking in Delaware for several years now. The building proudly proclaims itself smoke-free on signs posted at the entrance. And I am anti-smoking in the annoying way that only we ex-smokers have mastered.

And yet... I found the continued presence of these cute little shaped metal ashtrays somehow charming.

A Walk in the Park

Trees and a Walking Trail
Originally uploaded by mmahaffie.

Today at noon I put on my sneakers and, still in my khakis and (semi)dress shirt, I took a leisurely photo-stroll in Breck Nock Park. It was a warm, yet crisp, fall day.

Breck Nock is a Kent County Park just south of Dover. It was an historic farm that has recently become a park. There's a large playground, a football field, soccer fields, volleyball courts, a nature center, and a trail through woods and fields.

It was a nice way to spend an Indian Summer lunch hour.

A Pair of Prii

My car has a twin that also lives at my office building. Mine is on the left; it is the dirtier, more dented, beat-up looking car.

There's a third Prius whose driver works at my building. That one is that nice blue color. It doesn't rank as a twin. I think of it as my car's brother from another mother.

And there is an older cousin, a Honda Insight, that parks nearby.

I think the four of us should get a special parking area.

Outsiders, Indeed

I had a chuckle this morning when I read a story on the Washington Post web site about a group of modern-day "Minutemen" patrolling the US-Canada border in northern Vermont.

The article -- On Patrol in Vt., Minutemen Are the Outsiders (registration required, I'm afraid) -- details the story of a group of folks from Massachusetts who have taken to watching the northern border in the same way that a group of what appear to be vigilantes has begun "guarding" the US-Mexico border in Arizona.

It was amusing to read that they are not sure exactly where the border is, that they have at least once mistakenly wandered into Canada, and that they were reduced to sitting in lawn chairs and watching a field.

What struck me most, though, is how they are missing the fact that the real citizen guards on the northern border are the people who live on that border. Families and friendships in that region straddle the border. The local folks may at times treat the border as their own private passageway, but they also make sure that it is only locals who may pass.

We spend time in northern Vermont each year. I've gotten to know a few farmers and landowners on the border. They have ways of moving things across the border but they also know who and what should move across the border. If anyone not in the community tries to get across, they'll sound the alarm. They know how to contact the federal authorities. And there is no other group that knows the whole of that border as well as the people who live there.

I understand, of course, that the "Minutemen" are just trying to make a point about what they see as a failure of the federal government to secure the borders. But they are insulting the people who live there and who already take their stewardship of their border very seriously. And, to me, the Minutemen look silly.

Three Pumpkins

Three Pumpkins
Originally uploaded by mmahaffie.

Colleen's, mine, and Christina's. What you'll see at our house this evening.

Karl Rover

Karl Rover
Originally uploaded by mmahaffie.

Rehoboth Beach, Off Season

Christina is playing with the Youth Bell Choir at Epworth United Methodist Church, in Rehoboth Beach. As a result, I have about 45 minutes of free time in Rehoboth each Thursday evening and have started collecting off-season, beach at evening photos.