Family Life
Yard cleaning

Maggie spends a great deal of time "cleaning the yard" around her house.
The yard surrounding my place is cleaned by hired help. This does not mean of
litter, but of green growing things. Very hard work jabbing/scraping with a
shovel or other tool to try to get below the roots, then raking up plants, carting
them off, raking and smoothing the ground again. (Peoples' personal yards are
usually kept free of litter but the public areas, especially along the roads, are sadly
full of bags, bottles, cans, paper...). Inevitably just after the yard has been
cleaned, the wind begins to blow so all the loose dirt gets blown into the house.

There are reasons for all this cleaning...
1) some of the creeping ground cover has a stickiness and sharp hooks
that baby chicks get caught in, and they die if not found and released in time
2) some of the burrs are really wicked and hard on all the bare-footed
children and they stick to your shoes and get tracked into the house
3) snakes apparently slither into houses through grasses.