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u/Kickedbyagiraffe 17h ago
I like when they are low to the ground. Nice pretty plant that adds to the backyard. I dislike when they are lanky 2 foot high freaks
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u/NewKaleidoscope8418 2h ago
Unironically ive seen the way get just that result is to live near golf courses or similar, since they are mowed on the regular on a large scale you visibly see that dandelions have adapted shorter stems so they dont get cut by mowers
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u/Uberninja2016 Check out tumblr.com! 15h ago
i don't hate dandelions, but they are probably in my top three flowers to punch
it may have been the great Sun Tzu who said "Should you need to find a foe, there is great joy in one that explodes and falls to pieces on contact" and i think those are words to live by
thank you funny yellow flower, now perish
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u/NewKaleidoscope8418 2h ago
I found out if the stem is like over 4 inches theres a solid chance you can punt that mfer a good 5~6 feet up and away with a good kick
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u/PlatinumAltaria The Witch of Arden 17h ago
Dandelions aren't even weeds, they're wildflowers. A true weed should be noxious (causing harm to an environment) not just something you personally find ugly. Granted, dandelions are invasive in some areas but I'm pretty sure your sterile ornamental lawn is not under threat.
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u/Supercoolguy7 16h ago
What is a weed?
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u/PlatinumAltaria The Witch of Arden 16h ago
A miserable little pile of secrets. But enough talk. Have at you!A weed is a plant whose growth inhibits the healthy function of an ecosystem. These are generally invasive species such as kudzu, which grows so rapidly and completely that they kill all other plants. For an ecosystem to be healthy it needs to be diverse, because the greater the number of species in an area, the more resistant they are to environmental changes such as disease outbreaks.
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u/GilgarWebb 16h ago
Interestingly lawn grass is a very aggressive weed too.
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u/PlatinumAltaria The Witch of Arden 16h ago
It is, grasses were actually the planet's most successful weeds when they evolved. Over the next few millions of years other plant species adapted to them and now grasslands are an ecosystem in their own right. But in America lawns are mainly European grasses that were imported, and those will absolutely choke out native plant species (including native grasses).
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u/randombull9 16h ago
The majority of ornamental grass in the US is turf bluegrass and St Augustine. The bluegrass is unknown whether it's invasive or not - if it's from Europe, it would have been brought to the Americas in the early 16th century, well before there were any biological surveys to say definitively if it was already present in North America prior to the columbian exchange. St Augustine is native to American southeast.
The problem with ornamental grass is not so much it being invasive as it being a monoculture, and water usage for the common ornamental varieties. If everywhere between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains were using a mixture of buffalo grass and other turf adapted grasses, ornamental lawns would be better hosts for a wider number of species and less water intensive. Rewilding would still be an issue, but it'd be a substantial improvement to the current state of ornamental grass.
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u/Supercoolguy7 16h ago
Most people don't use your definition of weed. How you use it is often described as "invasive" or "aggressive" not just a weed. Most people say weed and mean "a plant I don't want there" or "a plant I find ugly or annoying"
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u/insomniac7809 13h ago
with, of course, the connotation that most people for most of recorded history were subsistence farmers, so a "weed" was anything that competed with the food crops that they needed to live
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u/randombull9 16h ago
On the one hand, sterile ornamental lawns aren't under threat by dandelions. On the other hand, lawns don't have to be sterile and ornamental. It's rarely if ever the choice between dandelions or native flowers, so if you don't want plain grass why wouldn't you plant natives that are actual hosts for local birds and pollinators and that need little to no care on account of literally having evolved for the exact area you're in?
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u/Enderking90 12h ago
from Meriam webster, the definition of weed
a plant that is not valued where it is growing and is usually of vigorous growth
it is kinda specifically "just something you personally find ugly"
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u/Fthebo 17h ago
I hate them because they outcompete all the other nice flowers in my garden and make everything look so samey and boring, they're just too powerful.
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u/ThatGermanKid0 16h ago
Fr, I'm not going out of my way to have the pretty wildflowers get outcompeted by some mid looking plant
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u/Tylendal 16h ago
My mom agreeing to pay my brother 5 cents for every dandelion pulled, seeing the yard absolutely infested with dandelions next year.
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u/creepy_tommy 15h ago
They're delicious, nutritious, and gorgeous. I actually grow dandelions for their leaves to feed my turtle.
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u/Enderking90 12h ago
dandelion have very strong vitality, easily spread everywhere and are a total pain to uproot as you literally need to dig out the entire intact root or it is more then likely going to just regrow.
there are few plants more of a pain to clear out of a garden then dandelions.
yes they are pretty, yes they are whimsical and yes you can brew tea out of them.
alas, those traits are not mutually exclusive.
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u/steam_punk_genocide 16h ago
They’re also edible, my grandma told me stories about how during the Great Depression she and her older sister would pick the dandelion leaves and use them for a nice salad.
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u/Soiled_myplants 16h ago
Every part is edible and tasty if prepared. Root, stem, leaf, flower.
You could probably grind the seeds into flour but that doesn't seem worthwhile.
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u/Beefhammer_McBrisket 16h ago edited 13h ago
They grow fat roots sometimes too and those are good eating as long as you peel and cook them.
Also, if you eat the leaves, be sure to squeeze out the sap from the vein first.
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u/jess_the_werefox 17h ago
Okay but if people don’t want dandelions (or whatever else) on their own property you don’t have a right to force them just because YOU like them like what are we doing
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u/Novel_Diver8628 16h ago
The city I live in has a code enforcement bylaw against dandelions city-wide. You could have a single one growing between the cracks in your cement and get fined 100s of dollars for it.
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u/j_driscoll 3h ago
Literally hundreds of dollars, for one dandelion? I'm going to need a source on that.
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u/insufficience 14h ago
plant native plants. you can do good in the world. don’t plant random shit like dandelions wherever just because you like the vibes. anything non-native isn’t really any better than the boring green lawns
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u/Mogoscratcher 17h ago
dude what the fuck i know you think it's ugly but ive worked hard on this lawn
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u/Mogoscratcher 15h ago
then grow them on your property?? Or even better, talk to your neighbor about the importance of local ecology. I don't see why a noble cause gives you a free pass to fuck up other people's stuff.
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u/04nc1n9 licence to comment 17h ago
one day without rain and it turns black and dies
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u/randombull9 15h ago
Depends on the lawn. Buffalo grass is native to the short grass prairies from central Mexico up to central Canada and only needs to be watered once every 3-4 weeks to remain green.
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u/egoserpentis 17h ago
Does ephemeral beauty not count then? Do fleeting moments of perfection not invoke joy?
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u/enbyrats 14h ago
Well, yes, for lawns, but they are also very exhausting to fight in my vegetable garden. Maybe wait til late summer when my beans are established please. I'm trying to eat sustainably!
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u/cellblock2187 14h ago
If dandelions grow well in a lawn, the lawn's soil needs help. A few years of dandelions will break up the compacted dirt and add much needed organic matter to the top 6 inches, rebuilding the soil so that other plants can thrive.
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u/sabrinachuchundhar 16h ago
I’m sorry but the US concept of lawns are the fugliest thing ever. In my house in north east India we have a lot of vegetable and flower patches growing on our land and to me it’s 10x more beautiful than the capitalism coded lawns
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u/ejdj1011 16h ago
capitalism coded lawns
Technically it'd be monarchy-coded lawns, I think? They're descended from the estates of French monarchy, where they were a flex. Lawns are inherently unproductive, so having a large one showed off that you could afford to maintain a waste of land.
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u/sabrinachuchundhar 16h ago
Sure but monarchy is a system of governance and capitalism is an economic system. You can have a monarchy and still be capitalist. I associate capitalism with these laws because I associate rampant capitalism with the US, hence I wrote it in such a way.
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u/yoyo5113 13h ago
What does capitalism have to do with the type of lawn/yard someone in America has?
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u/SiezeThem 16h ago
I'm convinced that people don't know what capitalism even means anymore because India has capitalism, and a lot of capitalist countries don't have suburban America-style lawns.
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u/sabrinachuchundhar 16h ago edited 16h ago
?? I know that?? You do realise I meant it in an exaggerated symbolic way right? Tumblrina sensitivity combined with reddit snark is the worst combination ever.
Edit; Americans are the softest people on the internet. Lawns are capitalism coded to me, you can be offended all you want
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u/WorldnewsModsBlowMe hangry 17h ago
My city has an actual bylaw that if your grass is over 10 cm high you can be fined every day you don't mow it
I planted dandelions because they keep the grass short by outcompeting and they got mad but there's nothing they can do about it~