If you drove by the house in this picture, you couldn’t help but be curious about the very lumpy grass in the front yard. It’s unusual and eye-catching. How did it grow that way? Is the grass covering a lawn full of rocks? It’s beautiful, but how did it happen? We passed by it regularly when we were visiting our son in Hawaii and slowed down every time we approached the house to admire and wonder about the grass. How could I not eventually ask about it?
Dora and Charlie Sakamoto welcomed our interest and told us it’s temple grass, a popular grass in Japan, the land of their heritage. Charlie’s father planted it when he built his home 80 years ago. He chose that variety because the grass blades are short, they form a tight mat which keeps out weeds, and best of all, it never needs to be mowed. Hard to imagine grass that is alive and green but doesn’t grow! A maintenance-free lawn.
Charlie said it was a flat lawn at first, no rocks, but over time as the grass spread, it uplifted and created small mounds. His father could have kept it flat by just stepping on the mounds, but he liked the look of it and let the grass continue to spread and the mounds pushed up into hundreds of little hills.
He welcomed me to walk on it, he said it doesn’t hurt the grass at all. So I did, very carefully. It certainly isn’t a lawn you can walk on easily because with one step you sink in and on the next you may not; it’s kind of spongy and throws you off balance. Also, the grass blades are hard and a bit prickly.
The experience motivated me to research grass when I got home, and I found an amazing amount of information! You’d have to be a genius to know about all the species – there are around 11,500 kinds of grass. It’s found everywhere from dry deserts to cold mountains and on all the continents, even Antarctica.
It’s plentiful and important. 70% of grass crops are grown for food. Rice is grass, a food staple in many societies, as well as wheat, rye, barley, oats and corn. And don’t forget about millet crops, which are grown for so many food products, including bread, cereal, pharmaceutical products and even beer.
I was surprised to learn that sugarcane and bamboo are grasses. Sugarcane is used for more purposes than we could have imagined. The juice from the sugarcane is extracted to make the sugar crystals we use in our everyday lives to satisfy our sweet desires. The strong crystals left from the extracting process make molasses, and, when fermented, it is used to make rum. The exterior, woody part of the plant, the cane, has uses too – it can be used to make cardboard, insulation and textiles. Bamboo is important for its varied uses – flooring, fabric, paper, furniture and construction in many countries.
Another grass surprise was learning that marijuana, which is often called “grass” is not actually grass. It’s an herb.
The uses of grass go on and on – hay and grains for animal feed, straw for garden mulch and bedding for animals, reeds for baskets and for musical instruments.
Grasses also have conservation purposes. Grass prevents erosion in wetlands and bales of hay are used to protect the environment from residues from construction projects.
Grass surfaces are important for many sport activities – such as golf, baseball, football and tennis. Kentucky bluegrass is the preferred kind on a baseball diamond; football fields use bluegrass, however, but almost half of the football fields use fake grass; golf greens use Bermuda grass which is smooth and velvety for putting (and interestingly, that grass is not native to Bermuda), the fairways use ryegrass or bluegrass; tennis courts use ryegrass because it tolerates the traffic well and provides high ball bounce.
Grass benefits industry. Think of all the lawn mowers, weed zappers and machinery that are made for keeping our lawns groomed, our playing fields in shape, and for harvesting hay and grains for food for us and farm animals.
And finally, grasses are beautiful. We all admire a lovely lawn. Picture farm fields in full bloom, ready to be harvested, with a little breeze that gently moves the tall seeded crop to make waves in the fields.
Grass serves many purposes; some are underfoot, some overhead, some on our plates, some for the economy, some for recreation, some for wellness, some for beauty. Maybe as we mow and weed, we can think about one more purpose – grass giving us exercise, a benefit to our health.
I enjoyed the temple grass experience. It was an adventure, and I’m thankful how the story about it led me to learn more about grass. I thought about the proverb, “Don’t let the grass grow under your feet,” meaning: don’t hesitate, keep moving ahead, keep learning.