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Comment by hn8788 | Hacker News Reader

I don't think it's as simple as feeling peer pressure to have a yard look the same. My backyard got out of control one year, and it quickly became a haven for mice, rabbits, snakes, turtles, crickets, mosquitoes, etc. All of that affects your neighbors as well. Since I've gotten better about keeping the grass cut, I haven't had to deal with any of those pests. I still don't fertilize or bother to keep weeds out, but keeping it short enough that it doesn't become a vermin sanctuary is part of being a good neighbor, IMO.

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I can empathize with NIMBYism if someone is trying to build a coal mine upstream of you, but for native plants and animals? Frankly these are the sentiments that take away my faith in the future of our species.

We are in the midst of a global ecological collapse driven by human activity. You could consider being a better neighbor to all the other complex life on the planet.

The mosquito issue mentioned in the parent is valid in many areas. After all, they kill more humans than any other animal. The good news is that there are biological controls like BTI that are effective.

Part of the reason mosquitos get so out of control is because we've killed off all the bats, birds, and predatory insects that keep them in check.

What explains the pervasive malaria that used to be in this country then?

Malaria isn't in the country because in the late 40s the US Public Health Service sprayed the interiors of five million southern homes with DDT, drained wetlands, and carpet bombed counties with pesticides. They did that until the mosquito population dropped enough that the transmission cycle was broken.

There are still tons of mosquitoes able to carry malaria in the US. They haven't been killed off - heck, my cat caught one in the laundry room a few days ago! But humans are the only relevant reservoir for malaria, so as long as we use good public health techniques like screening individuals from endemic areas, it's possible to let the US remain malaria free.

But we don't really screen travellers. It seems Zika and chikenguya are on the verge of becoming established in areas of FL and TX. Those have animal hosts too. Seems like it won't be long until it's all over (thanks again global travel).

Changing the species of plants growing in a yard has no impact on mosquitoes. I don't know why these things are being conflated. Mosquitoes need standing water to breed. Usually they come from old containers people leave out that fill up with rain, or gutters not being cleaned. Mosquitoes are the result of the lack of property maintenance, not the presence of native plants.

This hasn't been my experience. Once I let my lawn get quite tall (grass that was maybe 4-5 inches), and I had crazy mosquitoes. When I finally mowed that grass, they came up in swarms. I then learned, and have kept it short since then and voila, no mosquitoes.

They were talking about their yard getting out of control one year. The height of the vegetation can create an environment for mosquitoes and ticks to thrive.

It’s far more likely that the plants and animals moving in are invasive, not native. In my garden in California anything native is the exception.

Your "vermin" is someone else's healthy native ecosystem. I am letting my yard overgrow right now because it is providing homes for wild rabbits. Is that being a bad neighbor?

If we wanted native ecosystems we wouldn't live in tightly sealed homes in engineered neighborhoods, we'd have lean-tos in the woods.

Yes, it has to be one or the other. No other types of housing exist.

If the rabbits aren't just staying in your yard, then I'd say you're being a bad neighbor. In my experience, the rabbits dig a bunch of holes, and leave piles of poop everywhere, even on porches and sidewalks. If you want to have a wild animals living in your yard, you should move to a rural area.

It's also a nice home for mice. Unfortunately the mice population tends to grow large enough that they look for new homes. Your home and your neighbor's homes start to look very enticing and pretty soon you're hearing chewing the walls and power sockets stop working randomly.

One of my neighbors let their backyard run wild like that and a couple of years later exterminator trucks were a common sight in the driveways.

If your neighbor wants to reduce their dependency on the industrial food system by growing a edible garden in their backyard, yes, rabbits are vermin to them. Each time your rabbits eat your neighbor's lettuce, a head of lettuce from somewhere else in the world (hopefully a local farm but probably not) has to be trucked in to the food market to be purchased by the neighbor.

They’re animals. Not “pests”.

This state of mind is why we’ve killed off 60% of animal populations since 1970.

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/30/humanity...

This applies to native plants (AKA weeds) as well. Dandelions and clovers are basically harmless native species good for the soil and/or pollinators but are treated like hostile invaders by some homeowners.

Those are the displaced natives of our cities and suburbs. I get that no one wants mice around, but if that is the price for giving all the other species a home, I think it's worth it. I think it's fair to argue that this aspect of "being a good neighbour" is an attitude incompatible with living sustainably.

Imagining a backyard infested with turtles made my day :)

But I totally agree with you.

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