Why do people bag grass these days?

[David Weaver]

This is just a side comment of mine, coming from a long line of farmers I guess -

Why do people bag grass? Unless you don't have a mulching mower, I can't imagine a good reason to do it unless your grass is so tall that the mower can't make it through on a mulching cut.

My neighbor bags his grass and has been doing it for years. His yard looks like it's starving for nutrients, and on the opposite side down the street I have neighbors who bag their grass and then resort to fertilizing their yards to make up for it.

It's more work, it takes longer, why bother?

[Brian Elfert]

My father catches the grass almost all the time. My mother has a large garden that he dumps the grass on to use as mulch. He won't put the grass on the garden if he has recently applied weed killer. My mother will compost some of the grass if the garden is well covered in grass. I mulch when I mow. I am currently looking at a used riding mower that has a mulching deck and no option not to mulch.

[Mark Patoka]

From observing the neighbors on my block that bag grass, they don't want any of the clippings to distract from their perfectly manicured lawn. They are the same ones that also blow the grass clippings from the yard and driveway into the street or their neighbors lawn (so it becomes someone else's problem) and then spray or dump more chemical on the lawn, all in the sake of having the perfect green lawn. I know they are the fastidious type as they also wash and wax their cars at least once a week, apparently having much more time on their hands then I do.

My wife gardens organically so we don't use chemical weed killers. I will either mulch the clippings back into the lawn or bag them and mix them with sawdust in my compost tumbler or compost pile.

[Andrew Pitonyak]

I was lead to believe (I did not verify) that if you "mulch" in too much too quickly, you can get some sort of build-up (or even thatch), which can then inhibit growth. I am of the opinion that done properly, thatch will not be a problem from mulching.

I think that you have trouble if you let the grass grow too long then your mower cannot mulch it properly (make it small enough) and you may just have too much of it even if you can.

I am one of the few in my neighborhood that does not bother to bag unless I have a particular use for the clippings. When I want clippings, however, I usually just get them from my neighbors who do bag.

[Mike Ontko]

I'll bag on some weeks during the summer, just to keep down on the amount of clippings I'm leaving behind. If they don't break down properly they can contribute to thatch buildup. Or if the grass was too long to mulch thoroughly, the unmulched clippings that are left to sit on top of the lawn (often in clumps) can burn the grass as they breakdown. When I do bag though, I either add the clippings to my own compost bin or put them in my green yard & food waste recycling container.

Ditto what Mark mentioned about adding sawdust (depends on the wood type) into the compost mix.

[David Weaver]

We no longer use weed killers, either, with the exception of that I will use a small amount of 2-4D and triclopyr because I haven't found any other way to control ground ivy, but only once a year and only sprayed directly on the ground ivy.

When I first moved into the neighborhood, I treated the yard three times a year and then I realized that it just made my weekly mowing take longer. Couple that with the fact that a single plant type of uniform lawn with no bugs in it or under it and no weeds being a "healthy lawn" is a farce, and having kids that are in the yard often, and it smites me a little bit to even use 2-4D and triclopyr on the ground ivy.

I understand why people like their yard to look artificially healthy, I'm just out of that as being an all appearance and no substance kind of thing. (even then, I didn't bag the grass).

I don't know what the value of grass clippings is for gardening, but there's plenty else available (leaves, etc) to compost in my yard, so it never crossed my mind.

Most of the people in the neighborhood who bag put it out for the trash.

The other thing we used to do semi-religiously when I was a kid was roll the lawn with a drum filled with sand.

[David Weaver]

I was lead to believe (I did not verify) that if you "mulch" in too much too quickly, you can get some sort of build-up (or even thatch), which can then inhibit growth. I am of the opinion that done properly, thatch will not be a problem from mulching.

I think that you have trouble if you let the grass grow too long then your mower cannot mulch it properly (make it small enough) and you may just have too much of it even if you can.

I am one of the few in my neighborhood that does not bother to bag unless I have a particular use for the clippings. When I want clippings, however, I usually just get them from my neighbors who do bag.

Yeah, from experience as a kid in a heavy wet yard with a non-mulching mower, thatch was an issue. But it was sort of one of those things that was an issue if you were standing right over the grass where it was thatched. If you were viewing across the grass, you couldn't see it. I guess if it got thick enough, it could be a bigger problem. The grass that comes out of the honda mulcher is bits no longer than about 3/4" and no matter how heavy, I've never had a buildup of it - the mulching feature is a good one, even though it's power hungry.

[Mark Bolton]

We use to bag a lot for the mulch factor. True the leaves and other sources are there but your already mowing so it's easy to bag and pile them. Some of our best garden beds were mulched heavily with grass and fall leaves mowed from the yard. That said when I didn't have time to garden the mower went into mulching mode and done.

I have never seen the logic in a manicured lawn. Seems like an utter waste of time and resources to me not to mention the devastating effects of the runoff. If it's green and I can walk on it with bare feet im fine.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

I'm a farmer, and I'm ashamed to admit that I use a bagger mower. The chickens get some of the clippings so it doesn't all go to waste, but I still know better. I do it because I'm too cheap to buy the different deck that it would take to make the mower mulch properly.

[Ole Anderson]

I bag primarily because I get a lot of litter from my trees which are mostly cottonwoods and maples. I wish I didn't have to bag, but I value the look of my lawn. Most of the neighbors don't have my problem though, and they have a lawn service which rarely bag, nor do they "mulch", they just blow it out over the previously cut strip using big zero turn mowers. My pet peeve question would be "why do people insist on driving in the left lane?", but I will save that for another time.

[James Tibbetts]

I bag simply because it keeps it from all coming back in the house on the dog.

[David Weaver]

I'm a farmer, and I'm ashamed to admit that I use a bagger mower. The chickens get some of the clippings so it doesn't all go to waste, but I still know better. I do it because I'm too cheap to buy the different deck that it would take to make the mower mulch properly.

well, if you remove too much organic material from the yard, you can put some chicken poop on it and the grass will grow like a rocket. I knew a guy (before I lived in the burbs - he was a chicken farmer) who put chicken poop on his lawn sparsely because he didn't want to pay for nitrogen. He only did that once - the grass grew way too fast for him once it was feeding on the chicken poop.

[Bruce Page]

I tried mulching several years ago without much success. Our climate is so dry that the clippings just build up. After a few weeks I had no choice but to bag it. (pun intended)

[Ryan Mooney]

We no longer use weed killers, either, with the exception of that I will use a small amount of 2-4D and triclopyr because I haven't found any other way to control ground ivy, but only once a year and only sprayed directly on the ground ivy.

Just plant some walnuts A buddy has a big old walnut tree in his yard and you can clearly see where the drip line on it is because that's where the ivy stops and the grass starts (there are some grasses that do quite well under walnuts - although not all are "lawn" quality).

On the chicken side - I helped the same friend put together a chicken tractor and we ran it around one of the more barren stretches of his yard for a few months (meat chickens). This was really BAD soil where only a few spindly unnattracitve weeds had ever grown since he'd had the place. For a good 3+ years after that there were lush strips of grass popping up where ever the tractor had gone through. I think it was also that the chickens had dug up and eaten all of the weed seeds as well (although where the grass came from I have no idea - it wasn't seeded by humans anyway).

[David Weaver]

Chicken tractors!!

I'd like to have a new fireside chat...we'll make sure there's a chicken tractor in every yard!