Mow your own lawn

[trapdoor2]

Two or three neighbors mow their own here...they're still in their 40s.

I was fired from mowing the lawn. I always hated doing it. Miz Diane finally gave up and fired me...about 10 yrs ago.

Nice not having to store a mower, gas, and all the rest. The service does a nice, quick, clean job and charges only $65.00 per. That's ~$130 a month.

If I had my druthers, I'd have a yard full of, well, anything but grass. I remember one family (back when I was a little kid), their front yard was a cactus garden. No need to tell us kids to stay off that one!

 

[burntfrijoles]

I

If I would have gotten $25 to mow a yard when I was a kid I could have retired after 2 yards. I remember getting a quarter maybe 50 cents from a rich guy. Hell I was happy with an ice cream.

I would say those folks got a bargain. BTW, when I was kid I think the going rate was a couple of bucks. The $25 was the going rate several years ago. Now, kids just don't do it.

 

[CharlieO]

I used to enjoy mowing the lawn and maintaining the gardens when we lived in Wisconsin. I actually looked forward to it after the long depressing winters. The problem I had was that I usually enjoyed doing it until around the 4th of July and then realized that I had four more months before the season ended. We also found that yard maintenance was taking away from our ability to get out and enjoy our summer weekends. It was difficult to find a lawn service who would take over in the middle of the season, so eventually we hired a guy who would cut the lawn during the season for $150 per month and plow the driveway as needed in the winter for $25. That was money well spent.

Now that we live in Florida there is no way that I would even think of cutting our lawn. We live in a gated community where probably 95 percent of the residents hire a lawn service. Even if you think you might enjoy doing it, would you really want to be out there in 90+ degrees and 90 percent humidity for at least six months of every year? Surprisingly, my 86 year old next door neighbor is out there every week on his seriously over-sized riding mower, cutting his 1/6 acre lot. I give him credit for having the ambition to do it.

 

[Lou Tencodpees]

Mowed my own in Michigan, took 6 years off in Florida, back to doing my own in Texas. I do my best thinking when cutting grass.

 

[SRHmusic]

Wow, a 'reasonable' $130/month adds up over a year to a couple or few nice guitars or a week at the beach in the still nice part of the off season each year.

P.S. I really don't do a "lawn". I do put out clover seed every couple of years and enjoy the little multi-colored flowers that pop up...non-chemical, natural ground cover, that's the ticket.

We get a lot of clover here. Native plant, and the bees like the flowers, too. It doesn't hold up too well in a soggy winter, though, so we keep the grass going on one overseed and one fertilization a year. We only need to mow every other week most of the time.

 

[Red Ryder]

I

I would say those folks got a bargain. BTW, when I was kid I think the going rate was a couple of bucks. The $25 was the going rate several years ago. Now, kids just don't do it.

We got a dime a week to do all the chores around the house. We collected soda bottles and mowed with a push mower. Sometimes those older guys with the ducktails would give you a nickel if you let them know if the cops were hanging out at the end of the street. In 1963 we moved out to the middle of the desert 30 miles from town. After that it was hard for a kid to make a living.

 

[MTPoteet]

I just took my weed wacker and wacked my lawn down to the dirt, then covered it with plastic( Visqueen).

Theoretically this should kill it completely within two months, then I can zeroscape.

My mower is now scrap metal!

 

[985plowboy]

I bought me a brand new hustler zero turn 54” cut mower this past March.
My poor old John Deere finally gave up.
It’s so nice just being able to crank up and go without the requisite half hour plus of mechanically convincing the mower that it was still able to run.

 

[teletail]

Mary Tyler Moore mowing her own lawn.
View attachment 985477

And Ritchie too young to appreciate his good fortune!

 

[arlum]

The idea of paying somebody to do something I could do myself has never appealed to me whether I could afford it or not. Now that I'm getting older and my wife keeps checking on me to make sure I haven't blown a heart valve I'm starting to reconsider.

 

[schmee]

It's amazing, I've tried to get some yard work done offering $25 an hour. Nope. No takers.
Yard service companies wont do hourly. They wanna bid the job and bid it high, real high.
Even the kid on CL has caught on... he wont do hourly either now!

 

[kuch]

I'm 69 and I still edge and mow my own yard as needed.
One of my summer projects this year is to "remodel" our front yard to a "sustainable" style to minimize grass and watering. Gonna get started on it in a week or two....

 

[Chester P Squier]

I have a battery-powered mower. No effort to start it. The only problem is that the battery does not last all that long, so it takes me three days to mow.

I tried to find a replacement battery, but none are to be found. One was close, but you would have to cut some of the plastic to make it fit.

We're looking at buying a new one, one with two batteries (that don't power it at the same time). We can afford it.

In fact, I just got in from mowing 2/3 of my back yard. The battery died. It's very hot so I am not complaining.

 

[StoneH]

Mow the yard? That's what wives are for. . . and she looks good doing it.

 

[cometazzi]

I live in Florida and I don't pay nearly that much. $400/month would be way too much. I don't mind mowing other than my knees. It's the edging, trimming and clean up that I dislike. Most of my friends in my age bracket still mow their lawns. Some enjoy doing it until the temperature gets to 95-100 with Florida humidity then it's not so enjoyable anymore.

I don't mind the expense. It's well worth it. I guess I'm too lazy or would rather be playing the guitar and recording music.
BTW, gone are the days where the kid next door will mow your yard for $25.

I wasn't knockin' on people who pay to have their lawn mowed. I just don't know how the folks in the PacNW are paying that much to have someone do it, especially in the economically-depressed valley I'm from. I feel like they were inflating their quotes for an out-of-stater, but whatever.

And yes, I totally get paying for a service so that you don't have to do something you don't want to*, or can't do. That's exactly what I was trying to do for Mom! And I definitely think it's worth it to hire someone to do these things if they're injurious or for you, or require unhealthy amounts of exertion. I think I'm on the low end of the average age range here at TDPRI, but I know our bodies don't last forever.

*Something that's probably a bit controversial, is I've considered hiring a cleaning service to run through my place on a schedule. I'll admit that it's for no other reason than I dislike cleaning. I still do it, but I don't like it. My sister has a 'cleaning lady', and calls this "buying your time back".

I'd say that phrase applies to yard service as well.

 

[bholder]

No. Lawn mowing is the stupidest suicidal waste of gas on the planet. Just stop.

 

[fenderchamp]

 

[GeneB]

My wife gave me 'Rays Lawn Care' for my 65th b'day. It's $60/month for cut/edge/blow. I sold my mower at a yard sale but kept the trimmer and other related stuff to supplement Ray's work. I figure after about 50 years of mowing (started as a kid for Dad) I earned a rest from walking behind a mower.

 

[regularslinky]

We do it ourselves. Actually my wife does most of it, says she enjoys the exercise. I deal with it very grudgingly. I don‘t get the whole idea at all. We grow grass, only to fertilize, weed, and mow it constantly, leaving something that isn’t aesthetically pleasing, isn’t good for the environment, isn’t good for wild life, wastes water, wastes money, etc. Why? I can find better ways to waste my time and resources, thanks.

 

[JSMac]

I'm just this side of 70 and still mow my lawn. I intend to keep doing it until someone tells me to "Get off your lawn!"