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Stonehead wrote: I've never understood the British obsession with striped lawns.

I think you've got to be born here to understand that!

failing that....you could alway find a way to protect the veg and plants and just let a couple of sheep loose on your lawn....would be fertilised too

Stonehead wrote:

I've never understood the British obsession with striped lawns.


I think you've got to be born here to understand that!

Hey I was born here and I don't understand it either...accept for running up and down the stripes when I was a child making my dad mad because it upset the striping effect

baldowrie wrote: Hey I was born here and I don't understand it either...accept for running up and down the stripes when I was a child making my dad mad because it upset the striping effect

See - that's a good enough reason for having stripes!

Stripey lawns (apart from the fact that they are the real reason for the invention of Agent Orange - or even napalm, for which I believe we can blame the US) are not British!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

They are based upon a 1980s concept of Yuppyism, these idiotic numpties believing that if it was so at Lords or Wimbledon, it must be so in the garden at the back.

MKG wrote:Stripey lawns (apart from the fact that they are the real reason for the invention of Agent Orange - or even napalm, for which I believe we can blame the US) are not British!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

They are based upon a 1980s concept of Yuppyism, these idiotic numpties believing that if it was so at Lords or Wimbledon, it must be so in the garden at the back.

Ah - that explains it... or not.

My ex-lawn is more patchy, thanks to the goats.

I forgot to add, of course, that Lords and Wimbledon - although superficially terribly English - are, in fact, German in concept.

MKG wrote:I forgot to add, of course, that Lords and Wimbledon - although superficially terribly English - are, in fact, German in concept.

WHAT??? How that?

Come on - you can blame us for a lot of things - but that?

Well, thanks for all the advice, we already have sheep and don't plan to let them into the garden. I have a scythe, but don't fancy trying to mow a lawn with it. The qualcast sound slike the thing really, fairly cheap and good enough to do the job. I doubt I'll use a grass box and (at least) plan to mow it before it gets long enough to want one.

Stonehead wrote:I use a scythe. For a lawn, you need a hook-nosed or oriental blade, at least 70cm long and preferably longer. The advantage of a scythe is that the same snath can be used with different blades for different jobs—lawns, meadows, topping, brush, ditch clearing, hay making, harvesting spinach etc. It replaces both lawnmowers and brushcutters/strimmers.

Oooh ide love a long an involved post, or even a thread (in your copious spare time ) about scythes, their uses and the different types avalible!

I hope to get up north to Koanga Gardens and visit their smithy and get a scythe and froe blade, then make the handles myself.

We also have a 10inch grass hook that is useful for hacking at the really long stuff.

A neighbour has a Qulacast push mower and it is so useless that I thought they all must be. Then WigglyWigglers started selling the Brill Razorcut mower, which I decided (after hearing from others who already owned one) to try. It's fantastic; takes the same effort as my petrol mower and makes as good a job.

In fact, I was so pleased with it that I reviewed it for Wiggly Wigglers in the hope of persuading people like me (who had been disheartened and disappointed with the cheap, crappy ones available from our DIY stores) to get a push mower and save money on petrol and/or electricity.

You can read the review and see the before and after pictures at http://wigglywigglers.blogspot.com/sear ... 20Sherlock - just ignore the smug pillock in the first picture :)

Got a a wife called Mow

Thanks for all the information on this.

I went and bought a Brill razorcut, after much deliberation (it is expensive) I looked at all the reviews I could find, everyone seems to like them. Then Which? went and made it a best buy as well. So I got one, got it home, put it together and managed to cut about 10 feet of grass with it, thats as far as I got. At this point my disabled 14 year old step-son with weak muscles had a go and cut the rest of the grass (well over a quarter of an acre !) . Its easier to push than the petrol mower, and considerably more manuverable.

I'd recomend it to anyone in an instant.

Stoney

I've never understood the British obsession with striped lawns

Well Ina/Stoney due to the demise of not one lawn mower but 2 lawn mowers, one push and one ancient petrol, in one week I had to splash out and buy and new one. I decided to forgo the petrol option and the push option and go for cordless!

Unfortunately the cheapest one does stripy lawns and it's considerably cheaper too!

Oh the shame of it, me complying with the British stereotypical gardener. It's no good I will just have to get back to weeding at midnight under a full moon again

Booking therapy for the trauma of it all