Not mowing this month? Some say it's the way to go, others not sure

Hannah Rudderham · CBC News

· Posted: May 11, 2025 5:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: 10 minutes ago

To mow oregon not to mow — that is the question, starting in May.

And a Moncton researcher hopes that for the involvement of biodiversity, the reply for galore homeowners volition beryllium not to mow.  

The yearly "No-Mow May" inaugural has gained popularity implicit the past respective years arsenic a mode to summation the nutrient proviso for pollinators, specified arsenic bees and butterflies.

But determination are critics arsenic well. They mention concerns astir weed growth, imaginable pest problems and tract health. 

Gaétan Moreau, a prof of insectology astatine the Université de Moncton, is simply a No-Mow May protagonist and has helped 1 New Brunswick metropolis enactment the movement's claims to the test. Now he's written a study connected what effects not mowing has connected biodiversity. 

"I've been talking for a fewer years present astir No-Mow May each implicit the place, and Alexandre Truchon-Savard from Dieppe called maine 1 time … and said, 'Would you similar to trial No-Mow May present successful Dieppe?'" Moreau said.

Truchon-Savard, the City of Dieppe's manager of environment, said the thought came aft a alteration to the municipal bylaw connected tract height. 

As of past year, helium said, determination is nary longer a request that lawns connected backstage spot not transcend a certain height, arsenic agelong arsenic the writer doesn't interfere with nationalist spaces oregon signage. 

To trial the No-Mow May rationale, Dieppe identified immoderate municipal areas that person ever been mowed but aren't needfully utilized a lot.

They picked six spots and applied 3 antithetic treatments. They fto 1 conception grow, kept one conception mowed and replaced 1 section with a premix of wildflowers.

This is wherever Moreau came in. He said due to the fact that they would request to trap pollinators successful bid to number them, they alternatively chose to study resident organisms specified arsenic crushed beetles, which unrecorded supra ground, and invertebrates that were nether the ground.

Testing the abundance of these organisms allowed Moreau to place whether the country was a bully habitat, which would successful crook assistance pollinators.

Over the summer, helium said, the unmowed country had a affirmative interaction connected below-ground organisms.

But the country replaced by flowers showed the biggest improvement, with beetles adjacent moving to those areas.

For Moreau, this proved that No-Mow May tin beryllium beneficial.

"When you halt mowing, you're giving a interruption to this ecosystem," helium said.

But not everyone is thrilled astir the catchy conception of No-Mow May. For Sara Stricker of the Guelph Turfgrass Institute, the enlargement of No-Mow May passim North America was a reddish emblem for chap writer experts.

She would alternatively not pin the effort to a peculiar month, fixed however upwind and different factors impact the maturation of lawns.

"We don't bash thing based connected a calendar," she said. "We don't clip our absorption based connected what period it is."

For the past fewer years, she's been doing a probe task based connected No-Mow May, letting a crippled of onshore turn for the period unrestricted.

Two years ago, determination was vigor but not overmuch rainfall, which led to the writer increasing 35 centimetres tall. The adjacent year, determination was overmuch more rain and much heat, starring to 108-centimetre grass, on with ticks.

Eric Lyons, an subordinate prof of works agriculture astatine the University of Guelph, said astir of the taxon that marque for bully lawns necessitate changeless tract mowing. 

"If you privation to usage your tract successful June and July, it's important to mow it successful May, truthful that those taxon bash not get anemic and bash not fundamentally shadiness each different out, get precise bladed and past not beryllium capable to withstand the usage that we privation to usage our lawns for," helium said.

Lyons agreed that tract attraction isn't conscionable astir picking a circumstantial month. Every tract is antithetic each year.

For example, helium said, some New Brunswick springs person a acold and bedewed May, leading to astir nary growth. In this case, helium said, you astir apt won't beryllium mowing your tract until mid-May anyway, but flowers besides apt won't bloom yet.

"It's important to wage attraction to what's happening connected your tract oregon successful your gardens to supply what you privation to bash with that area."

Jordan Phelps, a Bee City Canada co-ordinator based successful Ontario, said No-Mow May has go rather polarizing implicit the years, but his presumption connected the taxable falls determination successful the middle.

He said some concerns with No-Mow May and letting your tract tally chaotic include the imaginable dispersed of invasive species. 

Phelps said it's important to see that No-Mow May originated successful the United Kingdom, wherever a batch of plants that hap people connected yards are native, but successful North America, this isn't needfully the case. 

He said it's besides important to beryllium reasoning extracurricular May, due to the fact that a batch of pollinators look successful April, and are truly progressive successful June. 

But helium believes that having the inaugural is an important mode to dispersed consciousness and promote enactment for pollinators successful the longer term.  

"It's benignant of a mode to get radical successful the doorway truthful that they're funny successful learning much and much astir pollinators,"  Phelps said. 

"They tin past benignant of instrumentality further enactment and ideally conscionable person little writer wide and usage immoderate of that abstraction for planting autochthonal plants."

At the Université de Moncton, Moreau hopes for the same. He wants to spot radical rethink the request to mow respective acres week aft week.

"There's a batch of elemental things we tin bash to bring backmost biodiversity successful your backyard, and immoderate things that radical don't deliberation about," helium said.

"For example, conscionable keeping your feline inside. It's already a beauteous large mode to bring backmost vertebrate biodiversity astir your place. So there's small steps, and I deliberation this is 1 of them: rethink this model. Do we request that overmuch onshore mowed?"