Answers to Everyday Questions : How is gardening harmful to our environment?

How is gardening harmful to our environment?

2 Responses to “How is gardening harmful to our environment?”

1. mickiinpodunk said :
   July 19th, 2010 at 4:56 am

   Using equipment like rototillers or lawn tractors to plow a garden add carbon to the atmosphere, to say nothing of noise pollution. Chemical herbicides can kill the life the soil long after it’s killed the weeds and, as well as chemical fertilizers, get into the water supply and cause other types of harm further away from the site of the garden itself, up to and including fish kill, frog kill and killing animals that drink it. Overworking the soil or improperly working it can cause erosion (think of the Dust Bowl of the 1930’s, which was primarily caused by poor agricultural practices). Traditional gardening was more organic, using mulches and adding natural fertilizers back into the soil, and hand tilling the soil disturbs it a lot less (with a lot less air pollution and noise). Most of us don’t tend to cause erosion in huge amounts, but we can add to it, as well as overusing water. Rain barrels were popular in my childhood still, and are coming back again to save water for the garden.
2. rmbrruffian said :
   July 19th, 2010 at 4:56 am

   Pesticides are the worst. Herbicides, insecticides, rodenticides, aquatic herbicides, etc…, all fall under pesticides. The chemicals used are detrimental to most forms of life. Insecticides make no distinction between good and bad insects. Look up Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). It affects honeybees. It is thought that insecticides are so overused, that the honeybees that are not killed outright have their immune systems suppressed, leaving them open to fungal and viral infections. A whole hive can be wiped out in just hours. The agricultural community is seriously worried. Honeybees pollinate most of our food. The biggest culprit of insecticide overuse is not farmers. Pesticide use is STRICTLY controlled in every state for professional use. This encompasses farms, and anyone who applies pesticides professionally. It’s the amateurs that cause the real problem – the homeowners that don’t read the directions on the bottle. They just go out and spray away. They have no idea how dangerous the stuff they’re using really is.
   And unfortunately, I am guilty of this as well. I did this once, but have since learned better. By going to school and learning about this, I realized what kind of damage I may have done to the honeybee population with just that one application. Not to mention the other beneficial insects that were killed by my stupidity.
   By adopting non chemical gardening, we can let nature work as intended. Everything will balance out.