New Las Vegas residents from the east- do you miss the green trees? (house, buy)

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http://home.earthlink.net/~joshweltmer/images/605_4.jpg (broken link)

This is the gorgeous fig tree in my backyard in Huntridge. I ended up converting 1400 feet of lawn in my front and side yards to xeriscape, because it seemed like the right thing to do (the $3000 rebate didnt' hurt either!) You are right, though, the lush old Vegas landscapes are something to behold. They just don't make for good environmentalism.

I don't miss those trees at all. An occasional vacation is enough for me. I don't miss raking the billions of leaves(took ALL my spare time all fall), cleaning up after the pollen, or swatting the insects that come with them. I might like the trees better if I didn't have to rake any leaves. But I like the brown desert. Xeriscape suits me just fine. No mowing, no shoveling. A couple gallons of Roundup is my yardwork for the year.

What is xeriscape? is that the fake grass in yards? When I looked at houses in Las Vegas, a few of them had that. I liked it--looked very real, but didn't have to water it or mow it lol

Yes, tell me about it. Can anyone explain why Las Vegas is so in love with these ass-ugly cinderblock walls? They make the whole damned city feel like a prison compound. Whose bright idea was that?

Here is what Wikopedia says about it.

Xeriscaping refers to landscaping in ways that do not require supplemental irrigation. It is promoted in areas that do not have easily accessible supplies of fresh water. The word Xeriscaping was coined by combining xeros (Greek for "dry") with landscape. Plants whose natural requirements are appropriate to the local climate are emphasized, and care is taken to avoid losing water to evaporation and run-off. XeriscapeTM and the xeriscape logo are registered trademarks of Denver Water, the City of Denver's Water Department. They were created by the Front Range Xeriscape Task Force of Denver Department in 1978.

Some common plants used in xeriscaping are agave, cactus, lavender, juniper, sedum and thyme.

In some areas, terms such as drought-tolerant landscaping and smart scaping are used instead.

Xeriscaping - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I didn't know that it was a registered trademark belonging to Denver. I think all the cities of the southwest use the word.

Personally I like the block walls. Adobe walls have long been used in other parts of the southwest and I'd like to see more of that here. Maybe originally, since so many back yards in Las Vegas have pools, they were thought to give more privacy and help keep the neighborhood kids from sneaking in and drowning.

Several years ago at Channel 3 we did a lot of research on what made Las Vegans tick. Our studies along with some that UNLV had done led us to conclude that the people here are rugged individualists like the pioneers. Almost all of us had packed up and moved here from somewhere else, leaving behind large families, lifelong friends, and familiar neighborhoods (where everyone knows your name, like Cheers). We noted that those walls around all the homes were like small forts, and when people came home they closed themselves up in their forts and hardly ever spoke to their neighbors. Then the MGM and Hilton fires led a lot of people to notice that when disaster struck, Las Vegans came out of their little forts to help, and then disappeared inside again. It was analogous to the old west in which the pioneers relied on the forts for protection and when under attack would all band together to fight off the attackers. We theorized that people who had given up their close ties, especially in the tight-knit neighborhoods of cities back east, to come here where hardly anyone knew them, must be homesick for that support system that didn't exist here. We were looking for a promotional theme that would resonate with our viewers, and we found one that did more for our own image than anything ever done in the history Las Vegas television. All of our advertising, and every project we took on began to reflect our theme of, "You've got a friend, turn to 3." We also knew that the theme couldn't just be a hollow promise, so we started doing things for the community that reflected that we meant the slogan. The turn around from being ranked last in the market, to the #1 station was almost over night.

So those walls are really hiding a lot of loneliness I'd say.

I read somewhere that the large walls were built to protect homes from dust storms, or am I wrong?

I never heard that one before but back in the day we really would have sand storms that made you think of Lawrence of Arabia and crawling under your camel for protection. Haven't seen a good sand storm in several years now that they paved over everything. I don't miss them either.

I believe the walls are simply a Spanish custom that prevails throughout the SW. Certainly very common in CA as well as here. We are actually a hybrid...we are not quite as up tight as the Spanish about the front of our places but keep the back to that custom.

The newer codes require that the walls be landscaped...a big victory for esthetics in my opinion. Some of the walls really get oppresive when you have block after block of wall.

Another reason why you now pretty much have to have an HOA to develp a tract. Have to have some mechanism to maintain the landscaped walls.

Yeah, if they can't stucco them they can at least paint them and replace the broken blocks.