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A Weed by Any Other Name: The Virtues of a Messy Lawn, or Learning to Love the Plants We Don't Plant
Is that a weed? This question, asked by anyone who has ever gardened or mowed a lawn, does not have an easy answer. After all, a weed, as suburban mother and professional weed scientist Nancy Gift reminds readers, is simply a plant out of place. In A Weed by Any Other Name , Gift offers a personal, unapologetic defense of clovers, dandelions, plantains, and more, chronicling her experience with these "enemy" plants season by season.
Rather than falling prey to pressures to achieve the perfect lawn and garden, Gift elucidates the many reasons to embrace an unconventional, weedy yard. She celebrates the spots of wildness that crop up in various corners of suburbia, redeeming many a plant's reputation by expounding on its positive qualities. She includes recipes for dandelion wine and garlic mustard pesto as well as sketches that show the natural beauty of flowers such as the morning glory, classified by the USDA as an invasive and noxious weed.
Although she is an advocate of weeds, Gift admits that some plants do require eradication-she happily digs out multiflora rose and resorts to chemical warfare on poison ivy. But she also demonstrates that weeds often carry a message for us about the land and our treatment of it, if we are willing to listen.
Rather than falling prey to pressures to achieve the perfect lawn and garden, Gift elucidates the many reasons to embrace an unconventional, weedy yard. She celebrates the spots of wildness that crop up in various corners of suburbia, redeeming many a plant's reputation by expounding on its positive qualities. She includes recipes for dandelion wine and garlic mustard pesto as well as sketches that show the natural beauty of flowers such as the morning glory, classified by the USDA as an invasive and noxious weed.
Although she is an advocate of weeds, Gift admits that some plants do require eradication-she happily digs out multiflora rose and resorts to chemical warfare on poison ivy. But she also demonstrates that weeds often carry a message for us about the land and our treatment of it, if we are willing to listen.
216 pages, Hardcover
First published March 1, 2009
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116 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
August 20, 2013
This is a collection of lovely essays combining science, personal stories about graduate school research on weeds, motherhood, and gardening and home (actually, yard) ownership. Gift makes many cogent points, and I wish her book were better known. If you liked Michael Pollan's essays on gardening ("Second Nature"), then you'll probably like this book.
Also, if Gift doesn't convince you to stop putting pesticides on your lawn, nothing will.
Also, if Gift doesn't convince you to stop putting pesticides on your lawn, nothing will.
January 22, 2023
I thought this book would be more informative. It’s more of a celebration of the author’s life. Which is fine but I was trying to learn about weeds. I also didn’t agree with some of her theology. She talked about finding a turtle on a trail and passing it around for a group of kindergartners to hold. Turtles stress extremely easily. I felt terrible for this turtle. She discussed her kids picking wild flowers and a naturalist disagreeing with allowing them to pick wildflowers. She was upset enough to call out this person in a book but the naturalist was right. Then there was a whole section about being upset with her elderly parents for using pesticides. I hate pesticides has well but damn I wouldn’t throw a temper tantrum. I hope I would have calming found a proper solution. If you’re more interested in autobiographies than plants; this book is for you.
May 29, 2021
Would have loved some visuals (at least for the plants highlighted in each chapter).
October 27, 2014
This wasn't really worth the effort.
The book is divided into four sections representing the different seasons, with each chapter discussing a weed that is prominent during the corresponding time of year.
Unfortunately, this was less about the weeds themselves and more about a) the author's opinion of weeds, b) musings about what her opinion about weeds says about herself and others, c) pesticide manufacturers and the inner turmoil she has endured for caving into the easy approach to poison ivy control* (aka Roundup), and d) the scientific accuracy of plant flowering and pollination as portrayed in the Seinfeld vehicle Bees. (Ok, that last one is kind of a throw-away, but it was at about that point that I realized this was a lost cause.)
Aside from the cover page for each season the book is devoid of any pictures or drawings, which would have been helpful in identifying which of the myriad plants in my yard she was talking about. Other than a recipe for dandelion wine and something she refers to as camp pesto, there is little information regarding the usefulness of any of the plants discussed. While there are some interesting tidbits sprinkled throughout, you really have to...dare I say it...weed them out (ba-doom, ching!)I gave up when I hit Fall and just skimmed the remaining chapters.
*To be clear, I have a yard full of weeds, I'm generally opposed to the use of the fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides necessary for the archetypal suburban lawn, and I'll be happy if I can get moss, clover and some other attractive (to me, at least) low-maintenance low-growing *weeds* to take over. BUT, when it comes to poison ivy my position is: spray the fucker and be done with it. I tried the pull-and-dispose method one season and while it resulted in a slightly thinner crop the following year mostly what I got for my efforts was a rash. I've got too many other home and yard maintenance challenges on the list for me to spend multiple seasons donning full hazmat gear in an attempt to eradicate this particular scourge.
October 6, 2009
This was clearly aimed at a much more mainstream audience than I'd like. I suppose it may be effective in getting set-in-their-ways suburbanites to open their minds just a little bit, to allow for the possibility that plants other than grass can exist in a lawn without the world coming to an end, but I'm rather past that point. (Have you seen my lawn?)
The book was arranged by season, with each season containing short chapters that discuss the author's personal experiences with weeds that cross her path that time of year, and I did like this organization. There's an interesting chapter on artificial turf, and a few things that had never occurred to me before (like that it's almost impossible to grow good lawns in new development, where people often want them the most, and how pesticide use tend to increase ragweed).
Unfortunately, almost every chapter included something that made me dislike the author. She buys a rooster, knowing she couldn't keep it once it started crowing, with no plans for disposing of it. She uses pesticides as her first line of defense against thistles and poison ivy before even considering other methods. She's too embarrassed to harvest wild edibles in public or to grow vegetables in her front yard. She gives up on making dandelion wine because she only owns a one-gallon pot. I was eager for more factual information, I realized, not just because I wanted to know more about botany but because I wanted to be less irritated by her wishy-washy value system.
One thing that would have made the book better would have been the inclusion of pictures, at least line drawings, of the plants discussed. I have a bit of a mental block when it comes to plant identification, but I still would have appreciated that on the off chance that I recognized them, and I imagine it would be extremely helpful for people who are more observant than I am.
The book was arranged by season, with each season containing short chapters that discuss the author's personal experiences with weeds that cross her path that time of year, and I did like this organization. There's an interesting chapter on artificial turf, and a few things that had never occurred to me before (like that it's almost impossible to grow good lawns in new development, where people often want them the most, and how pesticide use tend to increase ragweed).
Unfortunately, almost every chapter included something that made me dislike the author. She buys a rooster, knowing she couldn't keep it once it started crowing, with no plans for disposing of it. She uses pesticides as her first line of defense against thistles and poison ivy before even considering other methods. She's too embarrassed to harvest wild edibles in public or to grow vegetables in her front yard. She gives up on making dandelion wine because she only owns a one-gallon pot. I was eager for more factual information, I realized, not just because I wanted to know more about botany but because I wanted to be less irritated by her wishy-washy value system.
One thing that would have made the book better would have been the inclusion of pictures, at least line drawings, of the plants discussed. I have a bit of a mental block when it comes to plant identification, but I still would have appreciated that on the off chance that I recognized them, and I imagine it would be extremely helpful for people who are more observant than I am.
Want to read
May 2, 2010Local author too!
May 10, 2011
Enjoyable - no earthshattering revelations but interesting tidbits which my husband and I found useful.
August 25, 2011
3 stars for the book/5 stars for the idea of letting it grow. More of a book for those who aren't already converted.
Want to read
August 13, 2016I'm hoping this will give us lots of excuses to lock up the lawn mower!
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