Method to minimize yard work

[Dream of Freedom]

I would like to know if anybody has any tricks to lowering total yard work without the extremes of getting a smaller yard or paving over it and painting it green. I have a used riding lawnmower I got for $125, but it isn't minimized enough for my liking.

[Jean]

My yard doesn't require any work. What kind of work do your yard requires?

[Dream of Freedom]

The city government gets upset if it isn't mowed. Mowing is harder if trees are not trimmed high enough to get under them. And weeds grow up around the fence.

[EdithKeeler]

Well, I recommend an evergreen ground cover—whatever is appropriate for your area—not English Ivy. I have vinca minor—it spreads pretty quickly and has little blue flowers. You can do big swatches of ground cover to minimize mowing.

You can also plant something like azaleas or rhododendrons—stays green year round and flowers in spring. There’s a house I drive by pretty often; their entire front yard is pretty much azaleas. Gorgeous when they bloom and not unattractive the rest of the time. Other things I like are Indian Hawthorn and Chinese witch hazel. You can also plant native grasses for your area. I’m a big fan of planting whatever grows naturally in the area.

[Jean]

How tall to they tolerate it? If you'de be allowed to let it grow to one or two feet, a scythe is very efficient to cut grass, even when it's tall.

[Dream of Freedom]

@EdithKeeler

Azaleas or rhododendrons might help around the fence and near the building where it's hard to get the mower in close enough to get everything. I will have to research the evergreens more too.

[Kriegsspiel]

A scythe is going to be more work than a riding mower.

What I'm doing is making sure there's no (or minimal) grass next to buildings or walls/fences or walkways. Border everything with garden beds; for the least work put decorative plants* in them or evergreens that you can mulch once a year and weed occasionally (I am growing some food, too). That obviously helps reduce the grass area, but it's also easier to turn around and maneuver without a wall in the way, depending on how your yard is laid out. Then I finish up with a weedwacker and sweep off the sidewalks.

* In addition to the ones already said you could look at black-eyed susans and hydrangeas if they work in your location

[Jean]

@kriegspiel
Even if you take into account that using thé Scythe once or twice a year works, while the mower needs lower grass?

[7Wannabe5]

Divide the total square footage of your lawn by 16. Round up that many cardboard boxes or paper grocery bags. Get a load of compost = to that many cubic feet dumped on your property. Fill each box or bag with compost and place on it's own 4X4 ft acreage. Buy 10 different varieties of seeds in the squash family. Plant 3 seeds in each bag or box. Water and weed whack in between as needed until problem is solved.

[Kriegsspiel]

@kriegspiel
Even if you take into account that using thé Scythe once or twice a year works, while the mower needs lower grass?

In American cities you have to mow your grass often or you get fined by the city. I meant that keeping the grass at a level that doesn't violate code with a scythe would be a bit much.

[Jean]

I agree then. But what an infrigment on one's ownership right!

[frihet]

I'm sure you know about robotic lawnmowers. They have become quite popular here from what I see during my walks. I have no personal experience with them though, so not sure how well they work and of course the cost dough.

[EdithKeeler]

I'm sure you know about robotic lawnmowers. They have become quite popular here from what I see during my walks. I have no personal experience with them though, so not sure how well they work and of course the cost dough.

My neighbor has one of those. I’m pretty sure it’s an early model. He lets his lawn get too high, then the robot gets stuck in the tall grass, and my neighbor stands out there and looks at it dumbly, sometimes flips it over, then ultimately goes in the house and drinks a few belts of bourbon. The grass is half mowed, continues to grow, then a month later he repeats. Then the city will get on him, he’ll have someone come mow... then we begin again.

I was just looking at prices for the robots. Looks like $1500 and more, with really cheap ones about $500. Around here yard work runs about $50-60 a week. So a $1500 robot would get you thru 25 mowings.... that’s 2 summers if you can stretch out to every other week....

Of course there’s more to yard work than mowing. I actually don’t mind mowing the yard—good exercise. I freaking hate trimming, though.

[arcyallen]

Here's my conversation with my city regarding my "tall grass":

Me: "You've sent me a letter threatening me with a $500 fine if I don't cut my grass. Are you kidding me?"
City: "Your grass needs to be less than 12" high. And we didn't threaten you with a fine."
Me: "You sent me a copy of the city rules including "$500 fine" highlighted in bright yellow. Seems like a threat of a fine to me."
City: "Well, we had a complaint from a neighbor. Your grass needs to be less than 12" per our laws."
Me: "Ok. How tall is my grass?"
City: "Well, your neighbor complained".
Me: "Yes, you said that. How long is my grass? Did you measure it?"
City: "...uh, well, no. Listen, maybe the next time we have a complaint we'll call you first.
Me: "Sounds like a plan. Take care.:

And yeah, it -was- close to 12"

[Sclass]

My solution. (Not really ERE style but I succeeded in making a tough job easier and cheap).

I have recently inherited a 0.8 acre property in Los Angeles. It has three lawns, big trees, manicured shrubs and various vines like ivy, wisteria and morning glory. As a kid I spent six hours a weekend in the spring maintaining the grounds with a 19” rotary mower, electric corded string trimmer, 5hp chipper shredder, 10” electric chainsaw, pruning shears, electric hedge trimmer and 40 gallon trash cans. My dad thought it would teach me work ethic but I think it only made me hate working. The place goes back to nature fast if I don’t cut and clear.

About a year ago I was getting tired of my gardener charging me $250 a month to mow and trim. And then something awful happened. He got deported. A nice law abiding family man who had a habit for DUI. Gone in a flash. I didn’t even say goodbye. The maid told me what happened. Sucked but that’s for another political thread. I hired this guy since 2000.

I went into our garden shed and junked all the 1970s cheap tools my parents bought me. They were like torture child abuse tools. I bought a 160cc Honda powered 22” AWD walk behind mower made by Snapper for $300. You can walk behind this thing and mow with one hand most of the time. Its areal cut rate is very fast. I bought a Honda Versattach 25cc 4stroke gas powered string trimmer hedge trimmer combo for $650. This was expensive. This thing is a beast. It has so much torque you just throttle it up and walk down the hedges with the trimmer arm and it levels the hedge in seconds. No bogging. Same with the string trimmer, I can cut ivy and wisteria to shreds in minutes. I found that using the string trimmer with on the hedges is very fast with this high powered unit. Low power requires time and patience. Power allows you to rip more material in less time.

I also rebuilt a walk behind string trimmer my mom bought after I left for college. Poor lady lost her free gardener and bought this 5hp wheeled beast to keep the weeds down. I rebuilt the engine (in the fixit log) and this thing tears through high weeds fast and mulches. 5hp engine on a string trimmer. Think about that for a second. A beast.

So the basic idea was get machines that have a high rate of work (provided by gasoline) to just shred the place as I walk through the yard. I was aiming for speed because I only wanted to spend a couple of hours every two weeks in the spring which is the most intense time. Basically, look at what the pros use. They want to use the least time, cover the greatest area and use the smallest number of people. So they use powerful machines. Convert gasoline into work. Being green is not the goal. Being fast and $ efficient is the game.

So I mow which is the fastest way to clear (22” cut width). Then I trim with the trimmer (17” width). Then I wave the gas hedge clipper (22” long). Full throttle. The Versattach literally makes it rain green when I hit the hedges. I look like swamp thing when I’m done. Then instead of blowing and raking up the cuttings, I put the mower into mulch mode and mulch it up in place on the ground where it fell. I can groom heavy spring growth on the property in 2 hrs during my visits to the home. Up close it is obvious that everything is butchered. But from the street it looks neat and well kept.

Some refinements for speed were removing obstacles that made it hard for my AWD mower from making long uninterrupted passes across the lawns. Mom had rock gardens, islands of ground cover, little path markers made from cement blocks. I removed all that trash to make way for the mower. Minimize turns and reversing.

Not environmentally nice. Basically burn a gallon of gas to take the land back from nature. I learned this from the landscapers in the common areas of the community I live in. These guys have to clean acres of hillside and shrubbery weekly. The place echoes with the annoying whine of two stroke motors and reeks of premix oil. It occurred to me this is the way the HOA efficiently deals with this problem. Gas into work. Faster, cheaper. Disgusting? Yes. But highly effective.

Here are some links for the tools. When I bought them I just told myself they’d pay for themselves if I fire the gardener. $3000 has been saved in the last year of this. And I spent about $1000 in high quality equipment and $3 of gas every visit.

High quality tools are key. I’d always used cheap gear and it didn’t convert heat (gas) into work efficiently. This slows things down. So I went Honda four stroke. Much lower emissions than my old Briggs and Stratton trash. No premix. You can smell the difference even through a P100 mask which I wear religiously because I was sensitized to the yards allergens at a young age.

So there you have it. My fast and efficient solution. It makes sense when I think about it. Just do what the professionals do. They are motivated to make it quick and efficient or they won’t survive.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Snapper-22-i ... OUQAvD_BwE

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Honda-VersA ... /301581867

Next up is replacing my crappy corded chainsaw for a lithium ion brushless dc deal.

[Gilberto de Piento]

I'm interested in minimizing yard work too. I am going to to try putting down a lot of mulch where there is bare dirt between the shrubs and flowers in hopes of blocking weeds from growing. I'd also like to fill in more area with plants that are capable of blocking the weeds on their own, like hostas. I'm also reshaping edges so I can push the reel mower in loops without stopping and mow right up to the edge of the mulch so I don't have to trim it with clippers.

[EdithKeeler]

I'm interested in minimizing yard work too. I am going to to try putting down a lot of mulch where there is bare dirt between the shrubs and flowers in hopes of blocking weeds from growing.

Put down garden cloth under the mulch—
Blocks weeds much better than mulch only. If you want to go cheap and a little more natural, use several layers of newspaper under the mulch, or flattened cardboard boxes. The paper or cardboard will eventually break down, but you’ll have at least a couple of years or more with blocked weeds. I’ve used both—-garden cloth and cardboard. I think you have to be careful with newsprint—heavy metals in the colored ink, I think.

[niemand]

- Use screening/fencing to block your garden from the public/neighbours’ eye, giving you the option to be lazy without the city coming after you.
- If you must have grass, have a variety that grows very slowly like a tall fescue grass and you won’t have to do
much mowing.
- Have only hardy plants suited to your climate zone and you won’t need to do much watering.
- Have perennials instead of annuals and you won’t have to do any sowing every year.
- Have trees that don’t shed their leaves and you won’t have to rake it all up in autumn.
- If you have edibles, do companion planting and you won’t have too much trouble with pests.
- Mulch heavily and you won’t have to do much weeding.

My $0.5

[Sclass]

- Use screening/fencing to block your garden from the public/neighbours’ eye, giving you the option to be lazy without the city coming after you.

Yeah I have high walls and fencing surrounding the property. The fences are dense with vines. My neighbor has to get on a ladder to talk to me. I’m happy he looks over to watch for squatters. It is Los Angeles after all.

So there is the fire department in our area and animal control who do the majority of the harassment. FD doesn’t want a lot of dry grass so it needs to be cut. Makes sense. Our neighborhood has coyotes. They love my yard the most because it is quiet and often overgrown. The neighbors have complained that the yard is a breeding ground for coyotes and they called animal control. Animal control is underfunded and they didn’t do anything to me.

I told the neighbors coyotes may pass through but it isn’t their home. Then I started doing my mowing regimen a year ago. As I mowed I discovered two dens hollowed out under hedges. Covered in fur balls. Surrounding them in the high grass I found a dozen cat pelvises and skulls. I guess the neighbors were right. So I ran my brush cutter through the dens. I also mowed the grass very short.

I used to have dreams of owning some woodlands. Now I’m just sick of it all. I’m ready to move into a high rise condo.

The OP reminds me of a friend who bought a farm to set up a ham radio tower. He was a radio head not a farmer. He destroyed two riding mowers on his 10 acres. Then he bought a full size tractor with a PTO mower. He got tired of driving it periodically during the wet season so he went to the farm supply and bought drums of Roundup. He turned the place into a dust bowl with a big radio antenna in the middle. Just what he always wanted.

[BookLoverL]

I also like the idea of a scythe - I researched it a while back and it sounded like it would be efficient once you got the hang of the technique, much quieter, give small wild animals more chance to escape, and it would be easier to mow tricky corners. Also, scythes do not require fuel, and you only need to cut either a couple of times a year or right before it gets to the height that your neighbourhood allows you to grow it to (I still can't believe you have actual rules about that in the US...). I haven't actually tried a scythe myself yet, because I couldn't get my family to go for it, so they're still using the gas-powered push lawnmower, combined with a powered strimmer for the steep parts.

In terms of plants, I've also read somewhere (possibly a permaculture site) about replacing the grass with other options that don't grow as tall and/or are more suitable for the local climate, such as chamomile, or, if you're in a desert area, xeriscaping.