[jonnycomputer]

It absolutely is more labor intensive. Partly because its a regularly disturbed area without a buffer zone to protect it from new weed intrusions. I get weeds I've never seen before each year on my lawn.

It's not just grazing animals btw. It's fire. Large parts of the US Southeast, for example, used to be savanna, basically grasslands interspersed by trees. Fire is necessary to maintain that, to beat back woody growth.

[cmrdporcupine]

There's good evidence that indigenous people along the whole east all the way up from the SE to the NE were managing forests with deliberate fire, too. For the purpose of maize agriculture, but also by keeping underbrush at bay they encouraged open grazing areas for the deer they hunted.

Also long before that, there were now-extinct species like mastodon that cleared forest floor, etc.

Anyways, all that is side-ramble. The reality is that in humid temperate areas the things you replace a lawn with end up being just as much or more work.

Nature is not the self-maintaining self-balancing paradise that it is often sold as. It is a world of constant intense competition (Say this in a Werner Herzog tone). If you leave ground bare, and there's water, something will grow there. That's fine in the woods. In the city, it's usually something you don't want that takes root.