Town Buys Livestock to Go Green, Save Dough

Want to cut back on grass-cutting costs and go green at the same time? Buy a few sheep and goats to chomp on your lawn. That's been the solution in one Vermont town that wanted to save money without letting its cemeteries become overgrown with grass and weeds, NPR reports. The chair of the Cemetery Commission in Charlotte, Vermont, figures the town is saving at least $2,000 annually on fuel costs.

The old-fashioned method for keeping grass trimmed seems popular with the locals. "I have ancestors that are buried in various cemeteries," says Charles Russell, a farmer who calls it a "great idea." There was just "one complaint from one person out of state who didn't like the fact that the sheep were urinating and defecating on the hallowed ground," he says, but "I'd say it's not very respectful to spray gasoline and spray fumes all over the gravestones either." (More livestock stories.)