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Mowing the yard

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meanmiJ01

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Jan 2, 2003
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A neighbor wanted to interject on my mowing the other day and I wanted to come to the board for thoughts. Since it was the third time in 8 days that I mowed it made his recommendation in my eyes even more unrealistic.

I have a .72 acre lot. I use a tractor and a weed wacker as I have everything taken care of that I don't need to push mow. His great suggestion was that I should stop using a tractor and push the whole thing. It would be a better cut and good exercise blah blah.

My question is what size yard do people have and do they push or ride?
 
meanmiJ01 said:
A neighbor wanted to interject on my mowing the other day and I wanted to come to the board for thoughts. Since it was the third time in 8 days that I mowed it made his recommendation in my eyes even more unrealistic.

I have a .72 acre lot. I use a tractor and a weed wacker as I have everything taken care of that I don't need to push mow. His great suggestion was that I should stop using a tractor and push the whole thing. It would be a better cut and good exercise blah blah.

My question is what size yard do people have and do they push or ride?
Click to expand...
I am a huge grass cutter...I love it. I cut my front lawn three times a week, travel permitting. Why? The benefit, especially this time of year, cutting the tops make the plant grow the roots. So it makes the lawn fill in gaps and be healthier for the hot summer.

There is no difference in quality of cut from push to tractor as long as your blade is sharp. It is good exercise, however. I cut three lawns (two for people that no longer can, and my own). This time of year, I typically will lose 5 to 10 lbs.

You could aways get a self propelled, and really piss him off.
 
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meanmiJ01 said:
A neighbor wanted to interject on my mowing the other day and I wanted to come to the board for thoughts. Since it was the third time in 8 days that I mowed it made his recommendation in my eyes even more unrealistic.

I have a .72 acre lot. I use a tractor and a weed wacker as I have everything taken care of that I don't need to push mow. His great suggestion was that I should stop using a tractor and push the whole thing. It would be a better cut and good exercise blah blah.

My question is what size yard do people have and do they push or ride?
Click to expand...
I have about .70 acre lot to mow. I used to ride it, but the tractor quit. I now have a self-propelled push mower, that mulches. It really helps when going up the hill (not that steep but steep enough) I always thought by riding I had enough energy left over to do the weed wacking. When I had to push the whole thing, I got worn out, and that was 20 years ago! As far as the exercise goes, I exercise for that. I dont try to cross train by walking behind a mower. The best results for exercise, imo come from the intensity of the exercise, and walking behind a mower is not very intense.
 
I have about a 0.5 acre lot. I push. On a good day it takes me a little over an hour but I do have a lot of beds, trees...etc to navigate around.

I say anything over 0.5 acre, use a rider mower. Most people in my neighborhood use a tractor with similar size lots. I am one of the few in my neighborhood with a push mower.
 
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I have 1 acre and even back when we moved in here 23 years ago I went right to a tractor. I had only 1/3 acre at my previous home and cut it by hand, although I did have a self propelled 2 cycle toro that was the fasted mower I could find at the time.

With the acre, cutting by hand with the toro was a big time hog. I was working 50-60 hours per week, traveled some, had 2 boys in sports, .... and with the tractor I cut my cutting time way down. Less than half. And with the tractor, if the grass was growing at it is now, I could in an hour give it a once over that although not the neatest job would keep the lawn from getting out of control before I had the necessary time to do a nicer job.

But I actually do believe that my 22" hand mower leaves a nicer looking cut than what I get from my 42" tractor. So if we are doing any significant entertaining during the summer I usually go over at least the front yard with the hand mower........

But once I retired from BB due to a 6th knee operation, then got to 50+, and now retired, I would not consider going back to hand cutting..... Just not the kind of exercise that my body tolerates well.....
 
GregInPitt said:
I have 1 acre and even back when we moved in here 23 years ago I went right to a tractor. I had only 1/3 acre at my previous home and cut it by hand, although I did have a self propelled 2 cycle toro that was the fasted mower I could find at the time.

With the acre, cutting by hand with the toro was a big time hog. I was working 50-60 hours per week, traveled some, had 2 boys in sports, .... and with the tractor I cut my cutting time way down. Less than half. And with the tractor, if the grass was growing at it is now, I could in an hour give it a once over that although not the neatest job would keep the lawn from getting out of control before I had the necessary time to do a nicer job.

But I actually do believe that my 22" hand mower leaves a nicer looking cut than what I get from my 42" tractor. So if we are doing any significant entertaining during the summer I usually go over at least the front yard with the hand mower........

But once I retired from BB due to a 6th knee operation, then got to 50+, and now retired, I would not consider going back to hand cutting..... Just not the kind of exercise that my body tolerates well.....
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totally agree. Think about it, with 42" versus 22", the base is simply not going to be able to react to the variations in the yard.
 
Tell your neighbor to mind is own business, then do whatever you want.

I don't mow anymore, I have a small .2 acre city lot and it's only $35 for me to pay someone every 2-3 weeks. If my lawn were large enough, I'd do a riding mower without a doubt. Otherwise it's difficult to drink beer and mow at the same time. I've never seen a push mower with a cupholder before.
 
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I would agree that using a push mower does provide a better cut and overall nicer looking job. But how you cut your yard is your business. When you get to about a half acre that is borderline needing a lawn tractor. my last house had a full acre and with my Toro Lawn tractor it would still take a good hour and 15 mins to 90 minutes. That did not include edging and trimming with weed eater. Honesty now I don't ever really want more than about a half acre...just too much work. LOL.
 
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1 acre + hills + woods = all three for me. I paid the green & yellow tax for the rider and get it serviced/sharpened every season. I wind up using the self propelled push mower for right along the road/around electric boxes/areas where it is too steep to safely drive and then weed wacker for the edging. For a good job it'll take ~2 hours.
 
meanmiJ01 said:
A neighbor wanted to interject on my mowing the other day and I wanted to come to the board for thoughts. Since it was the third time in 8 days that I mowed it made his recommendation in my eyes even more unrealistic.

I have a .72 acre lot. I use a tractor and a weed wacker as I have everything taken care of that I don't need to push mow. His great suggestion was that I should stop using a tractor and push the whole thing. It would be a better cut and good exercise blah blah.

My question is what size yard do people have and do they push or ride?
Click to expand...


I have 1/4 acre and I push. If it was over .5 I would have a ride on.

You can do whatever you want. Don't change because some nosey neighbor.

I know someone that that asked my why I don't have a landscaper. I was like WTF? Why would I pay a landscaper than then pay to go to a gym to walk on a treadmill. F'ing stupid.
 
Well if you 3 times a week mowers were my neighbors Id suggest mowing it 2 times less a week. I have neighbor that does it twice. Big noisyass mower that sounds like a helicopter for 2 hrs a night twice a week . People are nutz about mowing grass. The field on the other side gets planted and combined w huge JD equipment and I can barely hear them.
 
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meanmiJ01 said:
A neighbor wanted to interject on my mowing the other day and I wanted to come to the board for thoughts. Since it was the third time in 8 days that I mowed it made his recommendation in my eyes even more unrealistic.

I have a .72 acre lot. I use a tractor and a weed wacker as I have everything taken care of that I don't need to push mow. His great suggestion was that I should stop using a tractor and push the whole thing. It would be a better cut and good exercise blah blah.

My question is what size yard do people have and do they push or ride?
Click to expand...

57 acres, 20 to mow... I use a push mower. Just kidding, JD755 compact tractor with 60" deck.
 
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I have a rider for my roughly .5 acre. To me it's about saving time. At this time of the year I'm mowing every 3-4 days. Best decision I've made for lawn care. Second best was paying a lawn service to fertilize / spread weed killer. I come up and see the stake in the yard that they were there and the lawn looks great. I spread the pelletized lime myself and also plug the lawn using the rider and overseed it myself. The lawn service seems to way overcharge for these services.
 
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You might be my neighbor...

A group of us use the same service. Very cost efficient for them to be in the same spot and not have to reload equipment and transport.

The WSJ did a study of home maintenance projects a few years back. By a mile, the one it made the most sense to outsource was lawn care. More free time at a time of year you want it, equipment costs and maintenance thereof, fairly reasonable costs of outsourcing.
 
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You cou
meanmiJ01 said:
A neighbor wanted to interject on my mowing the other day and I wanted to come to the board for thoughts. Since it was the third time in 8 days that I mowed it made his recommendation in my eyes even more unrealistic.

I have a .72 acre lot. I use a tractor and a weed wacker as I have everything taken care of that I don't need to push mow. His great suggestion was that I should stop using a tractor and push the whole thing. It would be a better cut and good exercise blah blah.

My question is what size yard do people have and do they push or ride?
Click to expand...
In the mid 80's my father-in-law purchased a hover mower in addition to the other farm equipment we used to take care of 30 acres of family homestead. Pop brought the mower home on a Saturday afternoon and the first to grab the mower and put it into action was my youngest bro-in-law.

He started the mower and started swinging large horizontal arcs across the hill side and pop started yelling at him. Tommy didn't hear pop screaming so pop runs up to Tommy and touches him on the shoulder to get his attention. Well, Tommy swings the hover mower in the direction of pop and hovers over and slices the top of pop's work boot toe.

It sure was a sight seeing a 6'-3", 330 lb jumping up and down on his left leg and holding his right open toed boot with both hands. Pop's large toe was broken, only the top of the work boot was sliced. When the jumping stopped, Pop stood motionless, now with both feet on the ground, staring at his toe.

Tommy was a $hit disturber when he was younger. another bro-in-law and i spent half the night of Christmas in the garage assembling Tommy's new Christmas bike. Within a weeks time, he'd have it taken apart and couldn't reassemble it because of missing parts. He did that with a trail bike also. On weekend farm work detail Pop would send word into town and tell Tommy to get to the country. My bro-in-laws would make bets to see how long it would be to see Pop chock on his chew yelling at Tommy and chase him off the farm.

You could be the first in the neighbor hood to own an
Air Force Hover Mower F-19 .. :cool:

Air Force offers the most blade options on the market, including the newly patented steel blade option, and is backed by the manufacturer by a one-year limited warranty. In addition, Air Force Hover Mowers not only maximize the value of your investment in your equipment, it also efficiently maximizes the time and effort put into your turf care needs.

photo_afhm_diagram.jpg
 
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CF LION said:
This belongs under the vinyl pool liner thread.
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Dr. Evel said:
You might be my neighbor...

A group of us use the same service. Very cost efficient for them to be in the same spot and not have to reload equipment and transport.

The WSJ did a study of home maintenance projects a few years back. By a mile, the one it made the most sense to outsource was lawn care. More free time at a time of year you want it, equipment costs and maintenance thereof, fairly reasonable costs of outsourcing.
Click to expand...

I've had a lawn cutting service for about 20 years now. It's the one chore that has to be done every week, and if it rains, I'm travelling, have other things to do, etc, I don't have to worry about it.

I mulch in the spring and rake the leaves in the fall myself. A weekend in the spring and a weekend in the fall that I can pretty much do when I want.
 
I have 1/8 acre, but have a farm behind me and some common space next to me. I cleared the brush from the fence row behind my house and the common space. That about doubled my mowing. I have a honda self propelled push mower. Works great as long as I mow often enough. Otherwise I have to either bag or go super slow to avoid stalling. Either way takes longer than just mowing more often.

Having a service might be worth the money based on the time savings, but I enjoy lighting up a cigar and following my mower around the yard. Also gives me an hour or so of peace and quiet (counting the time it takes to string trim around trees, sidewalks, etc.).
 
CF LION said:
I've had a lawn cutting service for about 20 years now. It's the one chore that has to be done every week, and if it rains, I'm travelling, have other things to do, etc, I don't have to worry about it.

I mulch in the spring and rake the leaves in the fall myself. A weekend in the spring and a weekend in the fall that I can pretty much do when I want.
Click to expand...

That'll be the day I'm too lazy to make my wife or one of my daughters mow the lawn for me....
 
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fairgambit said:
Gambit's Summer Rule #1: Never cut your own grass. You find good help and pay them what they are worth.:)

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You may recall my winter rule for snow shoveling was similar.:)
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At our age, You have to be very careful when observing the shoveling of snow or mowing grass, medical studies suggest that those are the worst two activities that give men hard attacks. :rolleyes:
 
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meanmiJ01 said:
A neighbor wanted to interject on my mowing the other day and I wanted to come to the board for thoughts. Since it was the third time in 8 days that I mowed it made his recommendation in my eyes even more unrealistic.

I have a .72 acre lot. I use a tractor and a weed wacker as I have everything taken care of that I don't need to push mow. His great suggestion was that I should stop using a tractor and push the whole thing. It would be a better cut and good exercise blah blah.

My question is what size yard do people have and do they push or ride?
Click to expand...
5.2 acres which I cut regularly. 60 inch zero turn. I keep it cut so I can practice hitting golf balls and it also looks great when cut.
 
I mow about 1.5 acres with a commercial walk behind. Riding mowers and the smaller ones don't last all that long. My last commercial mower lasted over 20 years.

I mow my 6 acre field with a flail mower on my tractor. I used to have goats that took care of the field. But, you have to take care of the goats when the grass is gone. They also trim up a lot of brush.
 
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Had 1.2 Acres growing up, almost all lawn. We had a riding mower but when it broke, the push mower came out. And the push mower self propel was broken as it was only used when the rider broke. So try doing a 1.2 acre yard with a broken push mower. Took about 4+ hours as my dad made me bag everything and put all the grass clipping nicely in the vegetable garden in the back. Worst was one time I got off kilter a little bit and by the time I finished, I was at about a 30 degree angle and not straight back and forth. He said it looked so bad I had to go back and mow it again to get the striping straight. So try mowing for 4+ hours only to turn back around after lunch and mow the same lawn 'straight' for another 2 hours (as didn't need bagged at that point). There might have been some bad language and a whole lot of 'i hate you dad' thoughts during that second mow.
 
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GregInPitt said:
I have 1 acre and even back when we moved in here 23 years ago I went right to a tractor. I had only 1/3 acre at my previous home and cut it by hand, although I did have a self propelled 2 cycle toro that was the fasted mower I could find at the time.

With the acre, cutting by hand with the toro was a big time hog. I was working 50-60 hours per week, traveled some, had 2 boys in sports, .... and with the tractor I cut my cutting time way down. Less than half. And with the tractor, if the grass was growing at it is now, I could in an hour give it a once over that although not the neatest job would keep the lawn from getting out of control before I had the necessary time to do a nicer job.

But I actually do believe that my 22" hand mower leaves a nicer looking cut than what I get from my 42" tractor. So if we are doing any significant entertaining during the summer I usually go over at least the front yard with the hand mower........

But once I retired from BB due to a 6th knee operation, then got to 50+, and now retired, I would not consider going back to hand cutting..... Just not the kind of exercise that my body tolerates well.....
Click to expand...

I guess I confuse you with the guy from Fox Chapel. Nobody in Fox Chapel cuts their own grass!
 
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LurkerLazarus said:
I guess I confuse you with the guy from Fox Chapel. Nobody in Fox Chapel cuts their own grass!
Click to expand...

Not that many in USC do either. But I came from a family (two brothers) that all earned their way through college, worked from before we were teens, so we all do what we are able and reasonably competent to do...... Actually, just did mine.... in the rain.....
 
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