Integrated pest management

We don't have a lawn; we have a habitat. And I have chosen to care for it using principles of integrated pest management. This simply means a certain level of "pests" is tolerable and manageable through the controlled presence of competing species. So instead of saturating our green space with petrochemicals to maintain a narrow assortment of grass species, we are cultivating white clover and spreading milky spore. In addition, we have planted a hillside with red clover in order to build up the soil over the next few years. We are taking this approach because most problems with plant health and resilience are rooted (couldn't resist) in poor soil. Creating healthy soil takes time. Pouring fertilizer on weak soil doesn't improve it. It's at best a very short term fix, kind of like Viagra. Most lawns symbolize a triumph of chemicals and will power over the facts of nature. Integrated pest management accepts that the "lawn" is not happening in isolation, that the arbitrary space called "lawn" is a construct in someone's mind and value system separate and distinct from the natural world. Put another way, lawns don't happen in nature. They are the product of turfgrass science, which is a course of study at all land grant universities.
If we lived on a golf course, I'd be consulting daily with a turfgrass specialist. But we live in a clearing in the woods. The old ruins of former habitations on our land remind us of our own visitor status. We are stewards and we are just passing through. And to the moose and bears we may even be pests.