Anyone know of a UK lawn mower maintenence forum. Just got a small query on a recent Ebay buy (What Stu is to old unusual motors I am to garden machinery).
Can't see anything much by Googling.
Last edited by: Fenlander on Mon 23 Aug 10 at 14:15
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wow that was qucik mark, you must be a sad git, sorry, I mean contributer.
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Not about for two weeks and straight in on a lawnmower query... excellent... except there's only tumbleweed in that forum... one post this year! All the ones I've found on google seem to suffer the same problem. You'd think there was somewhere you could talk mowers 24/7.
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"somewhere you could talk mowers 24/7." Have you noticed people avoiding you F? :-)
JH
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the, "what breed of horse dung is best" thread is very lively tho.
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>>>the, "what breed of horse dung is best" thread is very lively tho.
Connemara... was there ever any doubt?
>>>Have you noticed people avoiding you F? :-)
Oh... it's the lawnmower thing is it... that's not so bad then.
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>>Not about for two weeks and straight in on a lawnmower query
A litte alarm goes off in my coffin to tell me when you need me; I am here only to serve.
And only tumbleweed in a lawnmower forum? !Quelle Surprise! There was me thinking it'd be a right little hotbed of acitvity and intrigue.
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just cracked my briggs up to oil the gimbals
fired first tug
proper engineering see...................
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>>>And only tumbleweed in a lawnmower forum? !Quelle Surprise! There was me thinking it'd be a right little hotbed of acitvity and intrigue.
Well I *am* surprised when you can find a plumbers forum where they'll be up at 2am chewing over the merits of different toilet pan designs.
>>>just cracked my briggs up to oil the gimbals fired first tug... proper engineering see
I'm not so sure about Briggs engines. This new to me Hayter has one in as-new running order but it isn't a patch on my other two Honda mowers for ease of starting and smooth quiet running. I've treated it to a service though and it will do the rough ground bits OK.
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...This new to me Hayter has one in as-new running order but it isn't a patch on my other two Honda mowers...
Two Hondas, a Hayter - are you cutting a lawn or a golf course?
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Ahh I mentioned elsewhere... I am to garden equipment what Stu is to unusual middle age cars :-) Just can't resist a bargain. We do have big lawns though... well more a small paddock and 300ft of verge I keep tidy.
Last edited by: Fenlander on Tue 24 Aug 10 at 13:53
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A hundred yards of verge is a fair swathe on its own.
And a small paddock - sounds like a job for a ride-on.
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>>>sounds like a job for a ride-on.
We did have one but it was more hassle than the effort it saved. Our grass is divided into a back lawn, front lawn, veg gdn lawn, highway verge, tree'd area, near paddock, rougher far paddock. That's 7 different areas with different mowing needs and some are reached through narrow gates or down steep banks.
It's all fine when the weather's good but a pain to keep up with it during rainy periods.
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...We did have one but it was more hassle than the effort it saved...
Just goes to show you never know how a job will pan out until you've done it a few times.
Sounds like you're in a pleasant enough spot.
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>>>Sounds like you're in a pleasant enough spot.
15yrs maturity of extensive hedge/tree planting has made it so... but we are in the rural open fenland which isn't for everyone. Some of the relatives from our rather more hilly home areas wonder what we're doing out here.
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Its the fact everyone has to plant huge hedges or rows of trees round the house to keep the lashing winds away is what turns me off about the fens.
Only the miriad power lines marching to Kings Lynn power station break up the vista.
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While I too prefer landscapes with bumps in it, there is something bewitching about the Fens, particularly in Winter I feel.
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>>>everyone has to plant huge hedges or rows of trees round the house to keep the lashing winds away is what turns me off about the fens.
Yes many folks feel like this and I have no problem with it. I suppose the fact that we live here by choice speaks volumes about our feelings. There is a huge element of freedom about the area when the house views to front and rear are easily 5 miles across country. After being here pretty places with hills like Devon/Cornwall or the lanes of Herefordshire can feel quite claustrophobic.
That's why we like Scotland so much.... hills and wide open spaces.
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I think I know the house you refer to Z, on the way to Kings Lynn it's on the left, in a field and surrounded on 3 sides by very tall conifers.
I often think it must be so dark from the back of it and wonder if the shelter is worth the lack of light and view.
The Fens do have a sense of freedom and space and make you feel a very small person in the bigger scale of things.
The skys are wonderful both by day and night, and you can see weather coming over Bill's Mothers, and prepare for it.
It rains sideways most of the time because of the wind, and the snow can be black too, when the wind blows the black soil off the fields and on to newly fallen snow.
Moving from the rolling landscape of Leicestershire and Rutland it took me a long time to get used to it, but I wouldn't change it now.
Pat
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The best examples of very big hedges I know of is on the Canterbury Plain in New Zealand.
There are thousands of them. The sight of them for mile after mile along the journey is so boring, I guess that is why Google finds so few photos.
tinyurl.com/37qqv9x
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I am not at all keen on the stark square wall of tall leylandiis around many fen properties. We have about 30ft length of them beside the drive from when we moved in and finally the natural planting we've established outside them has taken over so they will come down in the next six months.
Those *hedges* if you can call them that... more like barriers... in your link Henry are ruinous to the landscape.
All our planting has been natural species in conjunction with a local authority grant scheme and it gives a soft and totally natural look. I feel quite strongly about re-establishing trees and hedgerows in this area.
Every part of what you see in the following images was bare ploughed arable land when we bought the place 15yrs ago. We put in a fair bit of work planting one January back then but nature has done the rest.
What folks see from the road.. i245.photobucket.com/albums/gg72/SealgairC420/Garden2.jpg
What we see from inside... i245.photobucket.com/albums/gg72/SealgairC420/Garden1.jpg
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As you say Fen, very soft and natural. Well done. I lost count of the hedging plants we put in after 300. Our hedges had been neglected for years and were full of dead stuff. Theyre nice and dense now and covered in flowers for the insects and fruit for the birds. We have mice and wrens in the ivy that I allow part way up the trees but not too far. We've lost branches like that. The self seeded trees are a bit of a menace though. We'd be living in a forest if I didn't keep them in hand. SWMBO puts every oak seedling in a pot! Do you want any oak? :-)
Hedge cutting time is not too far off :-(
JH
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>>I lost count of the hedging plants we put in after 300.
Indeed. At the same time as the house planting we established boundary hedges on a seperate 8ac field in the next village. The hedging plants and the black anti-weed roll seemed to go on for ever that January. We have ivy in areas too... it seems to grow very well too here... even started making inroads to my workshop in a corner piled with gear.
No oak thanks.... if anything we are at the thinning out stage. The hedgecutting is a bit onerous. The main outer boundary hedge has hit 3m+ and we get a guy to do it every couple of years and I do all the rest (4-stroke Honda hedgecutter... heavy on the arms after a few hours).
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I love the fens. Generally.
Though I do think that Brandon Bank must be one of the most remote places in the South(?) of England.
Last edited by: Mapmaker on Wed 25 Aug 10 at 12:52
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>>> I do think that Brandon Bank must be one of the most remote places in the South(?) of England.
Brandon Bank as in along the Little Ouse? Last time I was there we were in a small open boat one Feb having launched from Ely. It was very remote and very cold that time of year.
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>> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandon_Bank
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>> Informative, eh!
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At least there is a start
Well get writing ? :-)
I have updated quite a few pages including a world wide known topic.
I add my bit and leave it to the editors to sort out preferred format.
Every little helps.
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>> >>>
>> Brandon Bank as in along the Little Ouse? Last time I was there we were
>> in a small open boat one Feb having launched from Ely. It was very remote
>> and very cold that time of year.
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Did you know Brandon Staunch when it was derelict, before they demolished the old stonework? That was an eerie place. We moored near there and read stories of the old fen tigers.
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No never reached the staunch Cliff. We were cold that day by the time we were half way up the Little Ouse and it's not a place Dad took his larger boats despite 10yrs boating in that area.
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Where I live we have the famous British Lawnmower Museum (I have my Flymo serviced by Stanleys, which is part of the setup):
www.lawnmowerworld.co.uk/
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A lawnmower museum.... Ohh the kids will be so pleased if we pop in there on our way to Scotland... great song too :-)
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There's one in Cornwall too www.cornwall-online.co.uk/heritage-trail/heritage-national-trust/trerice/Welcome.asp
Been there. IIRC they have old garden tools too. Not bad.
JH
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Here in Essex,there are people who collect lawn mowers-saw a display of push mowers at some sort of summer fair and mentioned to them that there was a Valor motor mower sitting unused at the back of one of my sheds;they said they weren't interested but knew someone who might be.They turned up the same day and took it away-even gave me money for it that I hadn't asked for.
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We have a lawn mower man who seems to live in the village but no-one seems to where or even, who he is.
He's a happy little soul, thin and nimble and about 130yrs old by the looks of him. Every summer he's to be seen pushing lawn mowers around the various village roads. Always a different one though.
Does he collect them, repair them or mow peoples grass for a bit of pocket money?
Pat
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As its the Fens, I am suprised the locals havent built a straw man and burned him alive at the village midsummer festival.
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>>>I am suprised the locals havent built a straw man and burned him alive
We don't like to talk of these things to strangers......
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...We don't like to talk of these things to strangers...
So how realistic are the Mardle Fen plays on R4?
I think they're a good listen.
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>> The skys are wonderful both by day and night, and you can see weather coming
>> over Bill's Mothers,
As in 'black over Bill's Mother's'? Always thought of that as Black Country rather then fen speak!!
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That's the one Bromptonaut, it's Fenny speak, I think:)
Pat
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I heard it as a child in Scotland. Perhaps it's Shakespearean.....
Yonder, hind the abode of young Will's Dam, boileth a maelstrom of hunted ebony.
:-)
Last edited by: Humph D'bout on Thu 26 Aug 10 at 19:03
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Lawn Mower Forums? Hayter issue. - No FM2R
