Asklemmy

In many cities having a lawn is required. It may be the HOA, or the zoning code

I want to grow my own potatoes, bananas, and coffee once I get my own house in the tropics

Are you suggesting that we won't eat our Arborvitaes?

Canadian here, that's getting more and more common over here. There's a ton of HOA bullshit here too but I've been seeing more and more food gardening in Vancouver, but that might also be because food is expensive as fuuuck here.

Grass is nice. It's nice to lay on. It's nice to walk barefoot in. It's soft and cushiony. It's cool on a hot summer day.

I have zero grass though. Just rocks and fruit trees.

americans already do this i see it all the time

Some cities actually mandate lawns. My city has code enforcement officials who have to go around and make sure that lawns are kept to a certain standard. I live in California and at some point these codes were relaxed to deal with water shortages (go figure) so we don't actually have to maintain our lawn. It's part of practices focused around preserving high housing costs (which I think are absolutely terrible).

too busy eating avocado toast

Probably need a permit and license

Wait...

Because having a big yard of grass that you have to mow every week while using up gasoline is the American dream and a flex for some reason.

Littering your yard with food attracts things like rats, raccoons, squirrels, etc, which destroy property and infrastructure, spread disease, and cause injury to people and pets. I'm not saying I'm against fruit trees, but I do understand people who are. It's a legitimate concern. Some areas even have things like boars or bears which are extremely dangerous.

I'm also curious with the way you can sue people in the US what would happen if someone becomes sick after eating one of your fruits. I imagine it varies by state.

There is a pretty great website called Falling fruit to map trees and other plants that you can pick from freely.

Rodents mostly

We do? At least where I live I see mango trees all over, saw a longan the other day, there are loquats all over too, and until citrus canker there were orange trees in most backyards. At my old house we had loquat, tangelo, lemon, lime, carambola and bananas, and a papaya tree.

At this house we have lemon, lime, Valencia, and sugar bell citrus trees, a fig (all of these are dwarf trees) and a vegetable garden but all are in back. In front a small lawn, a few ornamental plants and sometimes I plant bulb fennel out there.

Grass lawns as a concept came from Europe as a symbol of wealth. If you could afford a large green lawn, you were likely rich.

Zoning laws in a lot of places.

That will depend on what type of Home Ownership Association the house is on. Some of them mandate a well kept grass lawn and you get fined for not moving.

There are places where they have trees all around their houses. Like in California, where they just had been more fuel to the fires.

Trees (e.g. apple trees or others) provide great shade and help lower the temperature. They are beneficial if you feel that summer heat is getting worse due to climate change. Additionally, if you have issues with heavy rainfall, trees can help by absorbing large amounts of water through their roots. This approach can be applied in most countries.