This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Dec. 29, 2009 - The neighbors who weren't all that wild about Rick Allard's wild-looking yard in south St. Louis have a new vista outside their window.
Earlier this year, Allard worried that the city might cut down the vegetation without his permission, as it had twice before. So with the help of volunteers from a group known as Wild Ones, the property on Juniata was transformed -- not into a typical south side lawn, but into a fledgling woodland look that is far more manageable.
"We got back to a clean slate," said Scott Woodbury, a native landscaping adviser who helped design and oversee the new look.
"I know it was frustrating for him. We took it in the direction that I think a number of people in the community like and the city found acceptable."
Woodbury said the project started by identifying all of the original plants that Allard had put in, then pulling up all of the saplings that had sprouted in the yard in recent years -- "the kind of things any homeowner pulls on a regular basis."
With the sprouts plus the weeds gone, Woodbury said, a few truckloads of mulch and some low-maintenance, native evergreen ground cover were added. "If he can get through the first two years of maintaining the mulch and keeping the weeds out," he said. "it will be a solid carpet and it will look great."
In a nod to the more typical landscaping in the neighborhood near Tower Grove Park, Allard has added a three-foot strip of turf along the entryway to his front door. He even bought a lawn mower.
The result, Woodbury said, is something that Allard can enjoy and his neighbors can be more comfortable with as well. And he praised the city for giving Allard the chance to handle the situation on his own.
"It's not exactly like what the neighbors do," Woodbury said, "but he's come a long way toward a compromise between his original way of gardening and what the city wanted him to do. It's great that the city has patience with people. Some people can't do it all at once.
"It was a negative experience for him, but he probably feels like the city kind of met him halfway. I really think the city is willing to work with people. I was the intermediary, and I think everything worked out fine."
Read the original Beacon story below.
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Rick Allard thinks the native grasses and other hardy plants in his south St. Louis yard are beautiful.
His next-door neighbor says the yard is ridiculous and should be off in the wilderness somewhere, not on Juniata Street.
The city says the robust growth may be a health hazard.
And Allard, remembering how the vegetation was cut down by the city a few years back without any advance notice or permission -- twice -- fears that the plants may not be around much longer.
"I think of it as a work in progress," Allard said recently, sitting in a room in his sparsely furnished home that looks out onto the backyard. "If the city doesn't say another word, I hope it will be a work in progress until I'm not able to work on it."
Allard's tug of war with city officials began in 2004, when his home was built on a previously vacant lot. Designed by an architecture professor at Washington University, the house later won an award from the local chapter of the American Institute of Architects.
After moving in on Mother's Day, he began to implement his landscaping image -- two trees as required by the city, sumac, irises, a Japanese maple, an evergreen, and lots of prairie grass.
About a year later, he came home one day to find it all had been cut down without warning by St. Louis forestry division workers. In September of that year, it happened again. Allard later found out that though officials could find his house to cut the plants down, for some reason they did not know his address and had been sending notifications elsewhere.
"I was very upset," Allard said, recalling when his yard was cleared. "I was extremely upset. It was like my car was broken into or my house was broken into. It was worse. It was like they were ransacked."
He said officials were apologetic and said it wouldn't happen again. Some of the prairie grass came back on its own, and he replanted other growth, spending an estimated $2,000 altogether. A note in his door in 2006 from a forestry official said "we would like to work with you on your backyard," but Allard said he heard nothing more from the city until last month, when he received citations from the health department.
At that point, his yard saw a lawn mower for the first time ever -- he said he had used a scythe previously -- and he wrote seeking a coordinated response from city departments responsible for health and forestry as well as the city counselor.
He hasn't heard anything yet. But he wonders why the city appears to be singling him out, and he wonders why others can't see the majesty in what he considers to be so beautiful. He also bristles at the fact that complaints against him filed with the Citizens Service Bureau are anonymous.
Greg Hayes, the city's commissioner of forestry, acknowledges that the issue can involve a certain level of interpretation -- that what one eye beholds as beauty, others can see as an eyesore or a health hazard.
"Some things are discretionary calls in nature," he said. "If we walk up to a yard with seven or eight feet of weeds and grass, it obviously is not managed. We ask that citizens be reasonable with us, and we certainly try to be reasonable with them.
"The last thing we want to do is cite somebody when there really is no violation there. If we see a sidewalk that's clear, with no public right-of-way issues, that's just being picayune. We see something out of control, that is just left to grow, you can't do that. We can declare it a public nuisance if we so deem."
On the question of anonymous complaints, Hayes says the issue is the condition of the lot in question, not who finds it objectionable.
"We just concentrate on what's actually at the property," he said, "not who is complaining."
What the law says
11.04.040 Public nuisance--Vegetation designation.
Russian, Canadian, or common thistle, wild lettuce, wild mustard, wild parsley, ragweed, milkweed, ironweed, poisonous plants or shrubs, and all other unattended vegetation and noxious weeds which have attained a height of seven (7) inches or more growing or being upon any lot or lands within the City, and unattended growths of shrubs, trees, and seed-lings, which in the opinion of the Commissioner of Forestry, are unsightly and which may impede the clearing of any lot or lands within the City contrary to the general purpose of this chapter, are hereby declared a public nuisance. Every owner, occupant, or person in control of any lot or land within the City shall cause such lot or lands to be kept free from such noxious weeds and vegetation by destroying them, by cutting or spraying with a chemical compound approved by the United States Department of Agriculture and the United States Environmental Protection Agency for the destruction of weeds, or by digging under, or by any other method approved by the Commissioner of Forestry. (Ord. 59860 S 5, 1986.)
The discretion exercised by Hayes' department is governed in part by the legal definition of what is acceptable in St. Louis yards. Public nuisance plants are defined as "unattended vegetation and noxious weeds which have attained a height of seven (7) inches or more" on city land.
But what the law defines as noxious, one of Allard's neighbors deems as obnoxious.
"I think it's ridiculous," said David Montgomery, whose home is adjacent to Allard's, one lot to the west.
"I'm an artist, and I think I have probably a greater appreciation for individual expression than a lot of people. I think the house would be fine by itself off in the wilderness somewhere. It would be appropriate and unique. Here, it just doesn't fit."
He said he discussed the situation with their alderwoman, Jennifer Florida. Her response? "She said more or less that he's going to be your neighbor, and you're going to have to get along with him."
Montgomery, who said he has lived in his home for eight years, said he hasn't been one of the people who complained about Allard's yard. But that doesn't mean he wouldn't like to see it cleaned up.
"I'm all for individualistic expression and think people should have their own freedom," he said. "At the same time, it does harbor mosquitoes and varmints, as I understand it, and obviously I don't want that to next to me. You can have artistic grass that is decorative and you don't have to mow. This is not it.
"I've had people stop by when I am out working in my yard and ask, 'Is he for real? Does anyone live there?' I just wish he would trim it a little more; at least it would be presentable."
Striking a balance between a natural yard and a neighborly attitude is a key in such a situation, according to Scott Woodbury, a native landscaping adviser with the St. Louis chapter of Wild Ones, whose motto is:
"If nothing moves in your landscape but a lawn mower, it's time to think about designing a natural yard."
Not addressing the question of Allard's yard directly, he said that in general, people who want a natural yard still need to plan it like a garden, not just let it grow unattended.
"There are all kinds of humongous perennial plants and grasses you can buy," Woodbury said, "and if you do it inappropriately, it can be a mess. A lot of people think they can take their front yard, wipe it out with Roundup and plant a prairie in it without doing anything else. It's kind of shocking to the neighbors and not very friendly.
"On the other hand, some people talk to their neighbors, getting some acceptance and buy-in. That's as important as having something that looks nice. Neighborliness comes first, and starting small comes second. It's not worth anybody's time to hire a lawyer and fight the city. It's so much easier to plan in advance, take the time to talk to your neighbors. It's a wise thing to do."
That point may have passed for Allard, who talks about his situation with a definite degree of resignation. Asked if he thinks he will win the battle of the grasses with the city, he shakes his head and says:
"I don't have any idea whether I will or not."
Is he getting tired of fighting?
"Yes."