In fairness to her, a) the areas I mowed were mostly dry grasses and weeds because b) I focused my seed distribution last fall around the trees and shrubs, therefore c) the few still surviving flowers were left alone. My objection to mowing is that I'm trying to leave the area undisturbed for insect life, which use dry grasses as habitat.

We continue to butt heads (goat joke!) over some of the more progressive (or traditional, if you think about it right) gardening philosophies. She's getting into the concept of no-till now, but it was kind of a hard sell to someone who was a very conventional western gardener. And I get that fire prevention and county laws require us to clear more land than I would if left to my own devices. But I was annoyed that my little quarter acre patch was subject to the same treatment as the rest of the acrage.