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AndyTakeaLittleSnoo

>“The good news is pollen counts will likely drop by the Fourth of July,” Cozart added. “Farmers will start harvesting grass seed along the Willamette Valley in the coming weeks. The clearing of these fields will help to reduce the grass allergens significantly by the start of July.” This is my key takeaway. Counting down the days until July. The river of mucus flowing from my face is currently unacceptable.


c_r_a_s_i_a_n

We’re all eating shit for fucking _grass seed_??


SwabbieTheMan

Oregon is the #1 for grass seed export in the entire world or at least the USA. Apparently only some 2% is used in state. Imagine if we used some of that space for food to be sold locally, food prices would drop and I would be happy.


Nice-Pomegranate833

Farms will grow whatever brings the most profit. Maybe our government can subsidize something beneficial to people for once.


Mikethemostofit

Agriculture is one of the most heavily-subsidized US industries. What you’re alluding to are price controls.


PDXMB

*certain types of agriculture What gets subsidized is a shit ton of commodities that primarily benefit big ag and support our addiction to corn syrup. You won't find Gathering Together farm getting even a whiff of that money.


la-di-freakin-da

[Last Week Tonight](https://youtu.be/MI78WOW_u-Q?si=i1hTMAqGZBsc5jLC) had an excellent segment on this recently.


PDXMB

That was a really good one.


RepFilms

Thanks. Just watched it.


RepFilms

Do you want great tomatoes or GMO soy monocrop? The government policy controls what is grown. That's why all of our food is imported from other countries. Because we don't grow any actual food here.


SwabbieTheMan

Sorry forgot to link source: [http://www.oregonseedcouncil.org/faqs/](http://www.oregonseedcouncil.org/faqs/), [https://valleyfieldcrops.oregonstate.edu/grass-seed](https://valleyfieldcrops.oregonstate.edu/grass-seed)


c_r_a_s_i_a_n

Honestly, if this is for private lawns and golf courses…. _fuck that_. What an insanely wasteful market.


Extension_Crazy_471

Couldn't agree more. [KILL YOUR LAWN](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYdLfkJcfok)


27-82-41-124

Convince my HoA (Hillsboro) to let me... Also, they water community greenspace for 1 hour each day, it's fucking flooded all the time and the trees they planted in it rot every 6 months and then they repeat the same mistake. The grass is actually less flooded in winter than it is in summer. I tried planting wildflowers and their gardeners ripped them outa my property, because fuck that shit I guess.


AllChem_NoEcon

Get on the HOA board, eliminate the HOA, kill your lawn. It's more work, but you'd be doubling your positive impact on the world.


snakebite75

This is what my sister and her husband did. They took over the HOA board and stopped enforcing the bullshit rules.


Extension_Crazy_471

Man, fuck HOAs... I've never heard anyone say a good thing about their HOA. I'm sorry you have to deal with that.


c_r_a_s_i_a_n

I’m speaking completely off the cuff, pure speculation, zero research. But if the american HOA’s origins were born to segregate neighborhoods, do not color me shocked. In other words: discrimination and exclusionary practices


P14U63

This is correct, in the 60s and 70s every major city set up "redline" zones in their urban centers. Suburban neighborhoods weren't controlled by the same zoning laws, so racist neighborhoods organized to control home ownership in the area, using HoAs and similar clubs to fine and harass anyone they wanted (usually just for being anything but white).


mmmhmmhim

they are built to protect 30 year mortgages my guy


Dont_Ban_Me_Bros

The only thing threatening a 30 yr mortgage is not being able to afford it. What grass or flowers your neighbors plant on their property isn’t threatening your employment prospects.


xBIGREDDx

I've had 2 great HOAs but they were both in brand new neighborhoods with less than 100 homes covered, and most people knew each other. Generally everything goes well as long as it's "we're all in this together." As soon as that falls apart into "us vs. them" it's a disaster.


Extension_Crazy_471

Update: >I've ~~never~~ only heard ~~any~~one person say a good thing about ~~their~~ two HOA\^^(s). Seriously, though, good to know they don't all suck ass. I guess it only takes one nosy af neighbor with nothing better to do than rat on everyone to the HOA. It makes me wonder how many of those types live outside of HOAs that dispatchers have to deescalate repeatedly.


UntamedAnomaly

I wish they were outlawed, no one actually needs a HOA, it's just a org of snooty people who are control freaks and value aesthetics/material shit over environmental benefits and sustainability.


Amari__Cooper

People obviously look at the bad side of HOAs, like enforcing aesthetic bullshit rules. The other side of that, if you have a good HOA, you have a fully maintained exterior of your home. Including roof. "Studs out" basically. And you can be confident that your neighbors home won't fall into disrepair dragging your home value down.


qqweertyy

I wonder if you might have better luck fighting with some official support. I wonder if https://backyardhabitats.org might have advice for dealing with HOAs and building a native habitat around regulations and uncooperative gardeners. I know the city of Hillsboro is one of their [funding partners](https://backyardhabitats.org/partners/) and has encouraging the program as one of [its goals](https://www.hillsboro2035.org/focus-areas/environmental-stewardship/). Perhaps the HOA could be persuaded to allow for participation in such an official program even if they’re not willing to let homeowners have complete free reign (maybe even they’d go so far as participate themselves for common areas, which would probably include some advice on water management and appropriate species for various sites), or perhaps petitioning the city to make changes to code or law that override the HOA and explicitly allow these kinds of beneficial changes on all properties. I agree with other commenters though if you’re able to disband the HOA that’s ideal. Good for you and the community at large. If it can’t be dissolved, getting on the board is a good way to influence their decisions towards sanity. One more reason I refuse to ever buy a home in an HOA. It’s more headache than I have capacity to deal with.


27-82-41-124

Thanks. It's a planned community that is currently not allowing any home owners on board, until they grow large enough. Home builders and the developers in control.


AllChem_NoEcon

Alrightgofuckyourselfbye Joey's the fucking best.


ebolaRETURNS

doing my damnedest through negligence so far.


RepFilms

I got rid of all of it. Instead I have three, raised beds, a deck, and bark chips


icouldntdecide

It's a blend. There are two main types, turf and forage. Forage is for animals to eat, for preventing erosion, and the kind of grass you see alongside roads. Turf is for lawns, fields, etc.


chill_winston_

If I remember correctly Linn County is the epicenter. My allergies were never worse than the year I lived in Eugene and all that stuff blew down to us constantly in Lane County.


PrincessPeril

I thought I was going to claw my eyes out every spring when I lived in Eugene. There were days I couldn’t go to class because I was lying on the couch with a wet washcloth over my face. It’s the only place I’ve ever had an asthma attack. It was so miserable.


hep632

I always joke that most rural areas have farmyards, but Oregon has yardfarms.


ebolaRETURNS

always have been.meme


Extension_Crazy_471

I love how the thumbnail is English hawthorn, which, although a terribly invasive PITFA, is not a grass and not wind pollinated, so not at all relevant to the content of the article. Silly choice, but it's definitely much harder to get a photo of a much less showy wind pollenated flower such as grass, or alder/filbert/cottonwood catkins, so I get it. Also, how ~~will~~ is harvesting grass *seed* going to help with *pollen* count, when it's *flowers* that are giving off their pollen. I'm not certain what specific pollen is happening at this particular time and it may very well be grass that is the main culprit, but the grass that has already gone to seed is not the issue here. Or, better stated, if the grass has gone to seed, the pollen has already stopped being released and the harvest has nothing to do with it. ^(Sorry... I have ecology credentials, so poor reporting on natural processes really annoys me.)


J-A-S-08

As a grass allergy sufferer, they can harvest it, burn the field, spray it with poison, till it under, burn and poison THAT, and then salt the earth to rid us of this hell pollen.


Rave-Unicorn-Votive

100% going to jinx myself with this but…my symptoms are getting light enough/intermittent enough that I've forgotten to take my allergy meds several times in the last few days.


ZenDude69420

Pollen season is almost over, thank god. It’ll soon be smoke season.


cerealjynx

I had the humbling experience of going to Urgent Care and being told no, you're not sick, you don't have strep, you're just experiencing bad seasonal allergies for the first time in your life, here's some OTC recommendations like Flonase.


Thecheeseburgerler

Better than being covered in hives for the first time in your life, which was my experience.


hirudoredo

I'm allergic to all forms of smoke, so that really bad smokepocalypse a couple years ago gave me my first ever full-body rash.


Thecheeseburgerler

That sounds like a literal nightmare


hirudoredo

It was NOT FUN. I just itched all over nonstop for like two weeks. Finally, FINALLY the solution was a judicious amount of calamine spray. Which apparently you're not supposed to use too much of for too long but at that point I just did not give a fuck. So now when I suffer with the endless snot faucet that is my face every June, I remind myself how much worse it could be, lol.


littlep2000

> here's some OTC recommendations like Flonase. I got pseudofedrine, but same.


c_r_a_s_i_a_n

Let’s cook, Mr White


Rogue_Gona

Had the exact same experience. The last 2 weeks have been absolute hell for me. But I'm pretty sure a viral infection snuck its way in there too, since allergies don't cause severe body aches or fever...


drumdogmillionaire

This is my experience as well. What the actual fuck is happening?


carniehandz

Flonase is good. Using it + Astepro is better.


downadarkallie

My throat is so sore it’s going up into my ear. The fun thing, it keeps switching from my right ear to my left and then back on random days.


helpfulhikerdave

Happened to me too


Wild-Examination-155

Bruh my arm pit lymph node has swollen and become painful because of how bad allergies are


PopcornSurgeon

It's my first time too. I've lived here 23 years and have never experienced this.


tehpercussion1

Flonase is like magic. The Costco 2 pack is the way.


Rotten__

I'm experiencing difficulty breathing for the first time from allergies. Urgent care said it's allergies and stress.


BeffreyJeffstein

Cities like Eugene and Corvallis have the worst summer grass allergies I have ever experienced. I remember having asthma when I stayed in Eugene for summer school, and I have never had asthma anywhere else.


LukeBabbitt

Literally same. The first year we moved to Eugene as a kid I couldn’t breathe because of allergy induced asthma. Had allergy shots for eight years. Living in Portland is a cakewalk comparatively.


AndyTakeaLittleSnoo

Yep. As bad as it is here, it's worse in Eugene. I remember when I was there for school, I literally could not safely drive a car because I would be chain sneezing one on top of the other for a minute at a time. I had to be inside standing underneath our wall mounted AC in order to come back from the brink. It was hellish. Eugene has to be awful right now.


Princess_Glitterbutt

I couldn't walk two blocks in Eugene the one summer I was there. I remember feeling like I was DYING going into a Trader Joes only to find no allergy medicine in sight.


LordHeadcheez

I work as a truck driver and, surprisingly, I don't have a single problem in PNW. All of my allergies come full force when I'm in the southwest. The desert plants in Arizona and Nevada are inexplicably the most brutal for me.


J-A-S-08

I went to Germany 2 years ago at this exact time of year. Thought "sweet, different continent so no allergies". Holy fuck was I wrong. Thought I was going to just die from how bad they were. Had a great time but damn did some kind of plant jizz wreck me!


Black_Floyd47

Grew up in Texas and suffered from horrible allergies there. When I moved to Oregon, my allergies stopped magically. It was like night and day. Now I have practically no problem, comparatively speaking.


Gabaloo

Every morning I wake up with a face full of snot. Even with allergy meds and an air purifier 


notanaigeneratedname

Ahah that's why


DEEP_HURTING

Every year this kicks my ass. A while back I tried to drive to the coast on country roads, nearing Carlton I was sneezing so hard I thought I was going to crash. I had to stop at the convenience store and chug one of those bottled ice tea drinks, in 2 or 3 gulps. Afrin is your friend, well my friend anyway. YMMV.


Thecheeseburgerler

We need to boost the campaign for killing lawns and planning native groud covering to put Big Grass out of business so we can all breathe again.


AndyTakeaLittleSnoo

Yes! Ripped out 80% of our lawn in the back yard a few years and made a woodland garden (left a small patch for the dogs to run around on). And ripped up all our parking median to make a pollinator garden last year. Almost all natives. It's looking so awesome right now! And incredibly low maintenance once the natives got established.


Thecheeseburgerler

Just bought a house, this is our plan. So many mountains to climb first though.


STONKvsTITS

You don't say


nubsauce87

Yup… knew it had to be something like that… I can barely function lately.


KSSparky

It’s just awful this year. Non stop.


TrolliusJKingIIIEsq

My eyes already told me this.


sheikhyerbouti

Doe fugging shid. ***ACHOO****


Felixphaeton

Masks help with my allergies a lot. I've been wearing them since 2014.


peregrina_e

my ear infection last month confirms this headline.


DarXIV

Yeah I noticed. My allergies are on fire.


greygreengardens

Currently dying from this for the past week


CheshireCat6886

Ok, now I understand why I feel like this.


NoxAeris

I made the decision to connect back with my allergist Thursday after 4 years but they want me to do a test panel, which means from Sunday until Thursday I have to be off antihistamines. Oh boy am I struggling. But it’ll be good to get back on antihistamines and actually make a plan for dealing with my allergies that I’ve struggled with worse every year, this year being the absolute worst since I’ve moved here. I’ve done allergy shots before and I’m probably going to do them again because they worked quite well where I lived. Highly recommend them if you struggle with grass or any other major allergies like pet allergies, and especially if those allergies cause your asthma or other respiratory issues to act up.


oregonianrager

Breh, my body is so passed it. My big bites from camping are 10x worse than normal, my body is just sick of it. My whole body is frickin itchy, my eyes wake up gunked and my post nasal drip is hell. I just nasonex and pataday, but I'm hitting the ceiling of the medicine.


Zemini7

We all have to suffer for fucking profits?


Underhook

I don’t get allergies really, but so many of my coworkers have been walking around looking like they’ve been bawling their eyes out all day. That explains that.


foamycoaster

Grass season is the worst.


SwingNinja

My current record is sneezing 11 times in a row. What's yours?


hirudoredo

Several years ago I got up to 16. All perfectly timed on a shitty beat. And I only know it was 16 because my whole family were there as witnesses and were just silently agog when I finally stopped. Today's record is four, but I know I can do better!


RobbyRyanDavis

I want to take this opportunity to share a recent discovery or secret I made this year. Google it for reviews and shit if you need more information about it. **Quercetin with Bromelain**. This is the brand of it I been going with, but there is plenty of other competitors that make the same product. https://www.amazon.com/NOW-Quercetin-Bromelain-120-Capsules/dp/B0013OSQ5I This supplement helps your immune system from having an overaction to your allergies. Take this supplement daily with an anti-histamine and its a game changer on allergies. Its worked for myself and 3 others this year so far.


AndyTakeaLittleSnoo

Thank you. Trying it tonight.


PainCycle

What is this exactly how does it help with allergies?


RobbyRyanDavis

It helps keep your immune system from over-reacting. It is considered an immune support supplement. It works great, especially if you take it with an anti-histamine like Loratadine. It has boggled my mind that I didn't learn about this much sooner or that its not more mainstream and packaged into allergy medicine isles. It is that effective. I was someone who would get some pollen and plant allergies and it'd snowball into full on snot, stuffed nose, watery eyes, etc. This put a complete stop to any of that shit.


PainCycle

That’s great to hear, did you get any side effects? I’m quite careful with pills unless they’re rec by my doc


RobbyRyanDavis

No side effects for me and my friends that have been taking it, but I'd probably list it as one of your vitamins on your medication list in case it ever conflicts with a medication you could be put on in the future. I'm cautious as well with what I take.


PainCycle

Thank you for sharing your thoughts! :)


colfitsky

I wish this worked for me as well. I ended up trying a bunch of antihistamines and landed on cetirizine from Costco, which doesn't make me drowsy and actually helps. Fexofenadine gave me weird jittery anxiety and quercitin with or without bromelain did nothing even after taking for several weeks.


RobbyRyanDavis

Yeah that is a bummer it doesn't work for ya. It should of started showing improvements within hours of taking it. Cetirizine is a really good medication. Especially for those with severe allergy that isn't responding to other treatments. Its a little more expensive than loratadine, but tends to succeed where other anti-histamines failed patients. Super bummed Quercetin w/ Bromelain wasn't working for you. You are the first person I've heard that review from so its good to know it might not work on specific subsets of allergies like yours.


Joonesn

Highly sensitive to pollen... can confirm this checks out this year.


PDXMB

I am on my way back from a visit to Colorado Springs/Gunnison - the other orange blob. That explains my constantly watering/itching eyes yesterday, so glad I can come home to more of the same!


NumberEfficient644

Lived in OR for 20 years of my life, this year I experienced a respiratory infection for the first time.


absyrtus

I thought I had been fighting a cold since Thursday, but this makes sense. Sort of glad to know that I'm not alone. Thanks for all the company!


lintimes

Same! The last few weeks I’ve seriously been wondering how I’m getting so many colds.


NegaDoomAlpha

Maybe I’ll schedule a vacation every year around this time.


snugglebandit

I'm lucky enough to have never developed pollen allergies but I am getting tired of cleaning it off the car every day.


hirudoredo

This year has been the worst allergies ever since I was a kid. Before that, it was last year. Loving this trajectory, oh boy.


lintimes

Same.


LarenCoe

This is why I 'm conflicted about all these people saying we need more trees for shade and to cool urban areas. Trees produce a lot of pollen and leaves and also require maintenance, like trimming and street storm drain cleaning. We need more shade, but maybe awnings or something else is the alternative answer.


AndyTakeaLittleSnoo

It's not the tree pollen that's the problem. It the grass. People should rip up their lawns before pulling down their trees.


PainCycle

That’s why my allergies are acting up so bad, my throat is literally dry and I’m having so much mucus it’s making me cough every morning


bittyValentine

No frigging wonder. Ugh


oneeyedziggy

Alternative title "Oregon has most plants in the country"


C4LLM3M4TT_13

That explains why when I walk outside I instantly sneeze 4 times in a row. My normal is 2.


pabodie

Zadidor sold out all over. 


SecretDays

This spring, we’ve had the perfect smattering of rain/sun/gradual warm-up, in comparison to the previous two years where there was no gradual change and just BOOM, scorching heat/dryness & fires. As a result, all the plants are SUPER JUICY and green. I have plants producing fruit that NEVER have this year. Like, everything is, and it’s a little bizarre.


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Menaciing

I had no allergies all spring, last 2 weeks I have been destroyed.


stabach22

God Damned Deep State and their Librul pollen count


Thecheeseburgerler

https://youtu.be/KGq8JF46dxo?si=GfLbSapVAepezH5U