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Backyard
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== History == === United Kingdom === In English [[suburban]] and [[gardening]] culture, back gardens have a special place.<ref>{{cite book|chapter=From woollen carpet to grass carpet: bridging house and garden in an English suburb|isbn=0-226-52601-1|title=Material Cultures: Why Some Things Matter|author=S Chevalier|year=1998|quote=Every resident ... has a private garden divided into two areas, the front and the back garden whose social role is ...|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wtiXlOKW4qYC|publisher=University of Chicago Press}}</ref> In [[United Kingdom|Britain]] there are over 10 million back gardens.<ref name=EarthEndures>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/earthonlyendures0000pret|url-access=registration|title=The Earth Only Endures: On Reconnecting With Nature and Our Place in It|year=2007|author=Jules N. Pretty|isbn=978-1-84407-432-7|publisher=Earthscan|pages=[https://archive.org/details/earthonlyendures0000pret/page/36 36]}}</ref> British planning require minimum distances between the rear faces of adjacent dwellings and so there is usually space for a back garden of some sort. In other countries, such as Australia, this does not apply and preference for buildings with a large footprint has tended to squeeze out the space at the rear.<ref>{{citation |page=86 |title=The Life and Death of the Australian Backyard |author=Tony Hall |publisher=Csiro Publishing |year=2010 |isbn=978-0-643-09816-9}}</ref> === Australia === In Australia, until the mid-20th century, the back yard of a property would traditionally contain a [[fowl run]], outhouse ("[[Outhouse#Australia_and_New_Zealand|dunny]]"), [[vegetable patch]], and [[woodheap]]. More recently, these have been replaced by outdoor entertainments such as a [[barbecue]] and [[swimming pool]].<ref>{{cite book |pages=127β128 |chapter=The Big Backyard |title=A History of European Housing in Australia |author-link=Patrick Troy |author=Patrick Nicol Troy |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |year=2000 |isbn=9780521777339}}</ref> But, since the 1990s, the trend in Australian suburban development has been for back yards to disappear as the dwellings now occupy almost all of the building plot.<ref name=Hall/> In higher latitudes, it is economical in low [[land value]] regions to use open land surrounding a house for [[vegetable garden]]ing during summers and allow sunlight to enter house windows from a low horizon angle during winters. As land value increases, houses are built nearer to each other. In order to preserve some of the open land, house owners may choose to allow construction on the side land of their houses, but not build in front of or behind their house in order to preserve some remnants of open surrounding land. The back area is known as the backyard or [[back garden]].
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