April 6, 2007
Spring gardening savings begin with Northwest Natural Yard Days
Local partnership promotes natural yard care product discounts, April 15- May 15
Beginning Sunday, April 15 everyone from Bellingham to Olympia
can take advantage of savings of up to 25 percent on natural yard
care products such as mulch mowers, bagged compost, bark mulch
and water wands as part of the ninth-annual Northwest Natural Yard
Days campaign.
The partnership between King County, the City of Seattle, the
Puget Sound Clean Air Agency and 23 other agency members promotes
environmentally friendly yard care by offering discounts on
gardening products at 86 participating retail locations throughout
the Puget Sound region.
“We continue to support the Northwest Natural Yard Days
discounts every year because the reduced pricing encourages more
people to practice natural yard care,” said Gerty Coville,
of the King County Solid Waste Division.
Natural yard care products such as electric mulching lawnmowers
save work, reduce air pollution and add nutrients to the lawn.
“A typical city lot lawn produces about 1,200 pounds of
clippings a year. Using an electric mulching lawnmower eliminates
the need to bag and haul all of that grass away,” Coville
said.
While emissions from diesel sources and wood smoke remain the
primary sources for harmful air pollutants in the Puget Sound region,
gas-powered lawn mowers are far from guilt free, said Katherine
Himes, Criteria and Toxic Pollutants Team Lead for the Puget Sound
Clean Air Agency.
“The good news is that affordable and powerful zero-emission
electric lawn mowers are available and on sale through the Northwest
Natural Yard Days program,” Himes said.
Northwest Natural Yard Days endorses the regional five steps of natural
yard care:
For more information about natural yard care, contact the Natural
Lawn and Garden hotline, 206-633-0224, or info@lawnandgardenhotline.org.
King County and Seattle have a variety of educational materials
about natural landscaping available at no cost. The natural landscaping
brochures and a full list of participating Northwest Natural Yard
Days retailers are available at www.yarddays.com.