How often have you admired your neighbor's beautiful garden and wished to have one of your own? One way to accomplish this is the adoption of environmentally friendly lawn care and gardening practices. Manual push mowers are still manufactured today, and many people extol their virtues...among those are:

• environmentally friendly, quiet, better for the health of the lawn and they provide a good workout for the operator.

You can find push mowers in most local hardware stores, as well as big department and discount stores.

Environment

Garden equipment engines emit high levels of carbon monoxide, volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides, producing up to 5% of the nation's air pollution and a good deal more in many large metropolitan areas. Incidentally, the relatively high lead emissions associated with battery powered mowers present an interesting trade-off (similar to that associated with the mercury content of compact fluorescent light bulbs) relative to gas mowers is:

• the environmental 'cost' of battery powered lawn mowers, in terms of relatively higher lead emissions, offset by their environmental 'benefit' of lower greenhouse gas emissions.

Push/Reel

These retro favorites are making a comeback as yards get smaller and protecting the environment becomes more of a concern. If your lawn is fairly level and small, a push mower may be for you. Push lawn mowers use blades on a revolving cylinder and are easy to maintain and last for a long time making them less complex than self-propelled mowers, so they break down less often. Yard sales may yield a fine old push mower, which can be reconditioned and sharpened for about $30. Choosing one depends vastly on the type and size of yard you have and how you want to approach lawn maintenance. Adding to the list of benefits: no stopping to fill up the mower with gas, considerably reducing the amount of trips to your dumping area, cheaper cost in tool maintenance, great looking lawns, reducing by 40% the amount of fertilizer needed over the season and last but certainly not least...in the case of an electric mower... running over the cord.

Lawn

Lawns were usually cut with scythes until an English engineer, Edwin Budding, invented the first reel mower in 1830. Push mowers do a good job of grasscycling (leaving their clippings on the lawn). If your lawn is fairly level and small, a push mower may be for you. Reel mowers are sometimes used on golf courses because as they can cut grass shorter. They promote the health of the lawn by minimizing the impact on the grass plant and allowing it to maximize its own inherent properties.

Grass

Today's version of the push/reel mower you may remember hanging in your granddad's shed is now a pleasure to use and trims grass with a precision never possible before. Rotary mowers are powered by combustion or electric motors and typically tear rather than cut grass with a blade spinning horizontally at high speed. In contrast, reel or push mowers cut grass cleanly with a scissor-like action. It's important to cut your grass to its recommended cutting height and as different types of grasses have different cutting height requirements, it is best to stay within the cutting range recommended for your type of grass. If you're not sure what type of grass you have set your front wheels to a medium- short cutting height. A simple squeeze of the lever by the right front wheel adjusts the mower height and in minutes the lawn is cut, all the clippings are out of sight, blown as tiny pieces into the lawn where they will break down and nourish the grass. Another advantage is that the manual mower spreads the grass evenly, not in big clumps like some power mowers. The grass simply disintegrates into the lawn, so you can avoid raking and even cut down on fertilizing. The clippings will be pulled into the soil and decomposed by soil organisms, so you will need much less fertilizer. In addition to encouraging people to grasscycle, the popular 'Go Green' program also promotes cutting down on watering, and cutting out chemical fertilizers and pesticides.

These mowers are not only environmentally unimpeachable, but proponents claim they cut the grass better, with their clean scissors-like snip. It may be said that lawns are here to stay, and for some people it is a non-negotiable issue (they just love them). Reel push mowers are a better bet, with no electricity costs, non-site emissions and a much lower price tag. For today's urban homeowner with a small yard, the benefits and cost savings of manual lawnmowers make it a green choice for lawn maintenance. Consumer demand for green products is bringing more lawn mower options than ever to market, so there's plenty of opportunity to upgrade to greener mowing. Bottom line...my advice is to drink a leisurely cup of latte to the roar of your neighbors' mowers while your grass just gets healthier.