The scythe experiment - the eco alternative to a decent mower
One acre… the amount that somebody could plough in a day (with horses, not a tractor!), and about 4000 square metres (One hectare is 10,000 square metres). So… what is the area of nettles which can be scythed by one woman in a day?
We seemed to have some kind of mental block with clearing the orchard/garden between the house & barns. Mostly because I expected M to do it, and also perhaps because I was waiting for us to have more sophisticated tools to hand. As it is, our domestic lawn mower and strimmer clearly weren’t up to the job… we’d discussed getting a more specialist bit of kit (after seeing Jerry’s ride on mower & inch long lawn), but it’s kind of low on the priority list. In the end, I was driven to cutting the meadow (that sprung up in the mean time) using the scythe. Driven by apples… which have been falling for the last month. Read the rest of this entry »