lawn mowing
Mowing is one of the most important steps in lawn care. The more often you mow your lawn, the thicker it will be. Regular, proper mowing will make the lawn lush, soft and dense and will avoid many problems. There will be no place for weeds on such a lawn, bald spots will never appear, lawn grass will winter well and delight with delicate greenery in early spring.
How to mow the lawn
To cut the lawn, modern summer residents have enough tools at their disposal: lawn shears, trimmer, electric and gasoline lawn mowers.
Lawn clippers
Lawn shears are one of the simplest lawn mowing tools. They are useful for trimming the lawn along the edge, in hard-to-reach areas. If the area of the lawn is small, the scissors can be used to cut the entire lawn.
Grass clippers come in two types: mechanical (manual) and cordless. You can use mechanical scissors with both right and left hands, without problems turning them at different angles - up to 360 °. It is better to choose models with rubber-plastic handles so that the tool does not slip. It is better to avoid wooden handles altogether - the pressure to hold such scissors will make your palms very tired. Choose for yourself models with a comfortable weight so that they are easy to hold in your hand. Blades should move smoothly when opening and closing.
Cordless scissors look like a barber's hair clipper. The blades in these scissors are larger, they are battery operated. One charge is enough for 1-1.5 hours of continuous work, diamond sharpening ensures the sharpness of the tool for a long period. It is clear that it is more convenient to use battery scissors than mechanical ones - the haircut is faster, the gardener gets tired more slowly. However, battery-powered devices are heavier, so it will not be easy to hold such a tool out of habit. Electric, battery models are suitable for mowing not only a spacious lawn, but also decorating a hedge and an alpine hill with slopes of different heights.
When choosing battery shears, pay attention to the capacity and type of battery: a lithium-ion battery, if the connectors match, can also be used with other types of garden equipment. The built-in mechanisms must be made of quality metal, the blades must be made of durable steel. The productivity is also affected by the frequency of cutting movements: 90 or more / per minute.
Lawn mowing with a trimmer
The trimmer is considered a convenient and compact tool for mowing a small lawn, removing weeds near walls, trimming grass between trees and shrubs in the garden. The trimmer, depending on the type of engine, can be electric or gasoline. The gasoline engine does not limit the trimmer in movement, because. not connected to the mains. They have high power and productivity, and they are even used to remove young shrubbery. Among the disadvantages of such a tool: high cost, the need for regular refueling with gasoline and oil, noise during use and exhaust emissions.
The electric trimmer works almost silently, but is only suitable for cutting delicate lawn grass. Even with weeds, he will cope with difficulty. Therefore, when buying, you should pay attention to the power indicators. Consider the length of the electric cable so that the trimmer gets to all hard-to-reach places. There are tools with a lower and upper motor location. With a lower motor, the trimmer is cheaper and more manoeuvrable, but it should not be used on a wet lawn due to the danger of water entering the motor. The top motor trimmer can be operated in all weather conditions.
It is possible to connect batteries to electric trimmers, from which it can work for at least half an hour to trim the edges of the lawn after passing the lawn mower.
Lawn mowers for summer cottages
The lawn mower belongs to a more serious gardening equipment, designed for mowing grass over a large area in areas with a flat landscape and simple geometry. The choice of lawn mowers is quite complicated: there are electric, battery, gasoline and mechanical lawn mowers. Gasoline lawnmowers are considered the most versatile and unpretentious, but their quality of performance, power and reliability may not be needed in ordinary garden plots.
First lawn mowing
To determine when it's time to mow the lawn, take a closer look at the blades of grass. If they have grown to 8-10 cm, it is definitely time to mow them. It is important not to miss the time of the first haircut, otherwise the blades of grass will stretch, flatten, trample, and in order to restore their splendor and density, efforts will be required. At the same time, do not try to mow "under zero" - the recommended height is not less than 5 cm, especially for a young lawn.
The lawn should be cut from the first year of planting. The more often you mow your lawn, the better. Mowing stimulates the growth of lawn grasses, the cover becomes thicker and more magnificent, more and more resembling a soft cozy green carpet.
Choose a clear day for mowing when the lawn is completely dry. Wet grass will clog the mower, getting stuck and sticking to the cutting tool. The soil, on the other hand, must be moist. Otherwise, the plants will break out of the dry earth with the roots, and bald spots may appear on the lawn - you will have to sow, shed.
How often to mow the lawn
Lawn height should be approx. 5 cm. Therefore, start cutting as soon as the blades of grass outgrow this mark. Don't overdo it though - cutting your lawn short during the hot summer months can dry out your lawn.
If you are about to mow very tall, overgrown grass, it is safer to cut 1/3 of its height so as not to disturb the growth of the lawn and ruin the look. Further, the neglected lawn needs to be cut and put in order gradually in several stages, the frequency of 1 time in 2 weeks.
Lawn mowing before and after winter
Before winter, you need to mow the lawn for the last time before the onset of frost so that it winters well. The last haircut in the fall is best done in calm weather. A cold wind can freeze the tops of the lawn, which will affect its quality next spring. After winter, the lawn also begins to be cut when the grass reaches 5-7 cm in height. It is not recommended to mow the lawn too short in spring, so that the grass does not turn yellow, does not burn out in the sun. In terms of timing, mowing the lawn after the winter usually starts in May, when the main work on the spring preparation of the site has already been completed.
How to mow the lawn in hard to reach places
Usually a lawn mower cannot handle lawn mowing in inaccessible places. The grass along the edge, near the benches, under the bushes is trimmed with a trimmer or scissors. Of course, such a procedure may seem redundant, but it is the design of the edge of the lawn that largely determines its appearance and the aesthetic perception of the site as a whole.
If the lawn has a rectangular or square shape, decorated along the edge with paths and borders, then a lawn mower will also cope with cutting hard-to-reach places. Hard-to-reach areas include areas around tree trunks, under bushes, along fences and walls.
How to trim the edge of the lawn
To cope with the task of trimming the lawn along the edge, you can resort to some tricks. In fact, there are only two ways out of the situation - either use special tools for mowing the lawn in difficult places, or use spectacular design tricks. You can trim the lawn along the edge with lawn shears (choose modern models with long handles), cordless trimmers (looks like a hair clipper), or a trimmer (electric trimmer with nylon line). When working with lawn tools, you need to follow basic safety precautions and prepare for tedious work.
Landscaping techniques will help to avoid unnecessary labor costs. For example, the design of the border along the edge of the lawn.
Tatyana Osipova, landscape designer, Novosibirsk: “Many years ago I came up with “one stone borders” and now I often use this technique. They are very effective in cutting off various zones, for example, a lawn and a flower garden, a lawn and a rockery. For such borders, you can use the same stone as for the main paving of garden paths and trails. It can be a garden curb stone, decorative flagstone. When using a curb stone, lawn mowing is greatly simplified. Unlike the curb tape, the curb stone is tougher, the lawn does not climb on it. And it’s convenient to mow: we put the wheel of the lawn mower on the curb and mow. If curb tape is used along the edge of the lawn, it will be more difficult to mow - first you have to remove the grass with a trimmer, and then walk with a mower.”