One of the biggest recurring fights we had with our parents growing up in the 2010’s in Manheim Township was about converting our grass lawn to native garden. Yes, we were quite rebellious teenagers and we were definitely considered “cool” and not at all weird. We had a fairly large grass lawn we weren’t using (that took hours every week to mow) and we knew that it could be used to feed bees, butterflies, and fireflies – so why weren’t we doing anything?
Our parents had a few reasons for saying no, but their favorite objection was their concern about what the Township would think. They pointed to a news story that was circulating at the time about a homeowner in New York who stopped mowing her lawn and got fined by the local government. They were worried that doing something similar with their lawn would draw attention and get them in trouble with the Township – all that work and money for nothing.
A lot has changed since 2012. Homes & Gardens regularly lists planting with the environment in mind as one of their top gardening trends, focusing on saving resources (like time and money) and making your yard drought and flood resistant. The Pennsylvania State Department of Conservation and Natural Resources points to the ecological benefits and has tons of resources to help homeowners plan their native gardens. And even within our own county, a growing number of businesses, churches, and public parks are installing native gardens to help the pollinators. Native gardening is much more common now than it was 13 years ago.
Even with native gardening becoming more mainstream and actively encouraged, there are still occasionally stories of people who updated their lawn and got a fine in the mail from their town. We don’t want that to happen to you, so to put your mind at ease, we’ve made a list of every regulation on weeds in Lancaster County so you know exactly what to do to stay compliant. One note: Native plants aren’t weeds, but the weed ordinance is typically where property maintenance rules are found.
In the vast majority of cases, it takes a lot for a property to be out of compliance with local rules. As long as you have indicators that what you’re doing is intentional, you should be fine. This is called “Cues to Care” and a blog post about that is forthcoming!
Here’s how to use this tool:
Again, as long as you have cues to show you are actively maintaining your garden and are within your municipality guidelines, there’s little reason to think you will run into trouble converting more of your lawn to native garden. If you have any questions, concerns, or thoughts about this list or just have a question about your gardening project, my proverbial door is always open! You can email me at sophia@hickorytowngardens.com
