GIMME GREEN, a documentary that examines the American obsession with the residential lawn, was created by two students at the University of Florida in Gainesville in 2006.
Here are some of the lawn facts shared on their website:
-Lawns are America's most irrigated crop.
-Every day, more than 5,000 acres of land are converted to lawns in America.
-Americans spend more than 40 Billion dollars a year on their yards.
-Lawns cover 41 million acres.
-Americans apply more than 30,000 tons of pesticides to their yards every year.
-Of the 30 most used lawn pesticides, 17 are routinely detected in groundwater.
-The EPA finds that nearly half of these 30 pesticides are possible or probable carcinogens.
-The National Cancer Institute finds that children in households using lawn pesticides have a 6.5 times greater risk of developing leukemia.
-In the Southwest, lawn owners use more than 75% of their water on their yards.
-In an effort to save water, Las Vegas lawn owners are paid a dollar per sq. ft. to remove their grass.
-In 1989 more than 500,000 people made their living directly from the turf care and maintenance, and turf grass was a $25 billion industry.
-Once groundwater is polluted, it can stay that way for several thousand years.
-Families turn on water faucets an average of 70 times daily.
-If present consumption patterns continue, two out of every three people on Earth will live in water-stressed conditions by the year 2025.
-On average, Americans use 40 to 60 percent of their water on their landscapes.
-In order to maintain all the lawns in America, it would take approximately 200 gallons per person per day.
For more information and to view a preview of this film see: www.gimmegreen.com/
Posted by Ginny Stibolt www.greengardeningmatters.com
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