Lawn Mowing
 

I was just wondering if anyone is mowing their own lawn. I have had different lawn services over the last year and am not impressed by them. I am thinking of doing it myself. Time is not a problem I figure a few hours a week. Before I invest in equipment I thought it would be a good idea to ask for the pros and cons. Pros-- better looking lawn, a small amount of exercise, save $45 per month. Cons-- $300-$750 equipment investment (mower, edger, gas can,), gas and storage of same, heat stroke, equipment maintenance and storage.

Don't even need a few hours a week. I have an oversize lot and it only takes about an hour to do the lawn, edging, and trimming. Getting gas in a 5 gal. can lasts forever so that is not a problem. Sure, it gets a little hot sometimes but not bad if you do it in the morning. Plus, it is a nice feeling not having to shell out the $$$ in the winter when they only cut it once or twice for the whole season. As far as initial investments... you can find all kinds of good deals on Craig's list, the for-sale forum in TOTV, or yard sales here in TV.

if we weren't snowbirds we would do it ourselves just because a walk behind push mower gives a better cut and mostly because we would know that we weren't bringing any grass clippings into our lawn from somewhere else that might add to the damage winter frost can do to the lawn.

don't forget to add fertilizer expenses into your cost estimates. equipment can often be purchased at yard sales, thus reducing those expenses if thinking of buying new.

When we get there full time, I will be doing ours. Well Sweetie and I will probably take turns like we do here in Ohio.

It won't be near as much exercise but hey, every little bit counts.

Might be wrong... but I didn't think mowing company's fertilize the lawns also.

They do not fertilize. You need another service for that. When I am there full time my first joy will be to fire Massey, then the lawn mowing service. I already moved a mower down there and a spreader to fertilize. And will do it all myself for as long as I can.

Do it yourself
 

These are all realatively small yards. I do my own plus some of my neighbors were feed up with mowing services so I do a couple others besides my own. It is great exercise and you don't have to pay for the exercise and a side benifit is not having to pay another contractor to do what you can do. I also fertilize, weed and do bug control. It all saves a minimun of 100.00/ month. It aint brain surgery. All this and you eliminate your gym fees too.

Look on craigs, this site and the advertiser on this site 4 sale ocala I think it is. You should find all you need for less than $200.00. If you are only doing your yard consider electric devices. They are always cheaper and have minimal maintenance.

Do the cutting in the morning. It's very easy.

When we get there full-time, I'll do it myself. That is, if "do it yourself" includes adding it to your honeydew list.

We just got a Neuton Electric and for what we have now it works fine. We are going to downsize the lawn more with flower beds in the future. Compared to our last house with about an acre this is much easier.

There are companies that do total lawn care. We use PTL and they mow,fertilize,weed,treat for pest inside and out and even trim the bushes. It is not cheap but they do a good job and we have been very satisfied with the services they provide.

where do you store the mower?
 

So I am impressed with you all that do your own mowing and lawn care. My question is...where do you keep the mower and supplies? Do you have plenty of room in the garage for them?

guess it depends who ya use

We mow our lawn
 

Not only are you saving between $50 to $100/month, BUT, and this important, NO ONE cares more about your yard than you do....We bought our mower at John Deere self-propelled, they suggested raising mower to maximum, (4 in.) for St. Augustine....When we had a lawn service we found that they ZIPPED along, mowed and blowed in about 7-10 minutes, did hair-pin turns in yard with riding mowers causing worn areas....We mow early or late in evening when cooler and usually can finish in about an hour.....My husband applies Scott's Turf Builder, a light dusting once a month...Also need to water weak areas, and once a month yellow areas might need some iron..We also have Scott's check for those naughty bugs...I think the edging is probably the icing on the cake....Enjoy and hope you love the Villages like we do....

My husband mowed our lawn until about a year ago. He had to give it up because of skin cancer surgeries. He enjoyed mowing it, felt he got some exercise and the lawn always looked good. We have had lawn services since last July and our lawn has been in the worse shape. They rush the mowing, are sloppy about the trimming and always miss something. We paid $180.00 during the winter for no lawn service. My husband is thinking of going back to doing it himself.

That is why we have a very low maintenance CYV. Had the grass and shrubs removed and replaced with rock and native plants that do not need trimmed or watered.:)

Sure... keep the mower near the wall and the weed wacker with attachments hang on the wall above it!

Hi all,

We have recently bought a home in Pennecamp. For now, we will be coming down on vacations.

It seems like most of you are unhappy with the lawn care service. In view of our situation could you suggest some alternative or a trustworthy service.

We will be down the first two weeks in November and are looking forward to meeting our new neighbors.

Jack&Pam

We moved here almost 1 year ago, my dear husband edges, mows and blows in about an hour once a week. Our lawn looks great (never cut too short)....and we don't chance spreading disease from multiple yards over ours.
He purchases a Craftsman electric mower...and after a few "civil" words about the cord...the two of them seem to have come to a pretty cooperative arrangement.
He also uses a battery pack 2 way edger and a blower....no gas smell in the garage....

Back north, all the lawn care services use nothing but walk behind hand mowers. I was surprised at the number of services in The Villages which use the turn on a dime riding mowers for even the smallest lawns.

There are a few services here in The Villages which only use the walk behind mowers. Of the homes that I have seen using these, their lawns look fantastic. The cost of one of the corner lots that I know, is only about $20 per month more, and it is worth the price.

Try owner/operator Ron's Lawn & Maintenance Service, 352-557-1900.
He weeds, edges, trims trees & bushes, etc.
He uses either regular or riding lawnmower - your choice.
Reliable and very reasonable.

Great Lawnmower
 

If interested in a Great Lawnmower, like new, I am selling mine. It had only been used 5 times, approximately 3 hours.
You won't need gas can with this one as it is an Electric/Cordless Black&Decker, 36V Rechargeable 19 Inch Mulching Rear Bag Mower, Model CM1936.
Reason for sale: My health isn't what it use to be, so I decided to have a lawn service mow my lawn for me.

You can call or E-mail me if interested. The original Cost was $429 and I am selling it for $325 .

Ray 352-633-0723 or rkstefano@yahoo.com

You got me thinking again which is unusual. Before moving here a year ago I never had anyone do my lawn. Now that I'm retired I figured have someone do it for me, but I get frustrated almost every time they cut it. At first they were OK, but gradually deteriorated. I heard that in the past year, they have almost doubled their customer base (I live in Buttonwood which has been growing every day) and still use the same crews. I didn't want to store a mower, edger, and blower, but am getting ready to. You need to cut it once a week in the summer, and can actually edge it the next day if you get tired, and in the winter hardly ever. I never mowed with electric but am going to investigate it as gas gets to be a pain when it won't start later on when it gets older.

We have been cutting the grass ourselves since moving down beginning of June; hubby does the trimmer, edger & blower and wifey mows the grass. The first week it took us about an hour and now we have gotten it down to about 45 minutes. Then we dive in the POOL! Can't beat the Villages lifestyle.:D
Yard looks great so far.

I too am having this problem.:22yikes:

Just a FYI. On ANY gas engine with a PULL start cord. Pull the starting cord very slowly until it get very hard to pull. Then let the cord back in......then pull the cord as if you were trying to start it. This method.... pull until it becomes very hard to pull....puts your piston at TDC.( Top Dead Center) .When you do the full pull ..you have a complete cycle of piston which SHOULD cause engine to start. IF you do not BEGIN at TDC..you risk getting too much fuel in the combustion chamber...which will cause "wet spark plug"...and hard starting.(i.e. many,... many pulls) ALSO.... please remember to Clean the Air Filter on your Mower. Restricted air-intake causes extremely hard starting. ALAS....the spark plug. A NEW ONE every Year. OK we covered it, adequate FUEL+ AIR+ SPARK= VROOM

After bad experiences from 2 lawn services. I do my own, we bought a Ryobi battery trimmer/edger & Ryobi battery mower. Both work great, just charge them the day before cutting. Mower has power left after finishing the lawn on our designer. We save $70/month. Paying $70/month in the winter, when little was done was especially annoying.

mrfixit, Thanks, what you say make sense. What I'm refering to for hard to start is during the winter when the mower, or any small engine that isn't started often, and the gas gums up the carb. Had that problem with generator, pressure cleaner, and edger in the past. Used stabile and am not sure it really works that good. With ethonal I use the marine stabil, but have never had trouble with electric except the bother of the cord. I'm not sold on recharageable as past experience with drills is that the batteries don't last long and replacement cost as much as a new drill.

Shimpy - Are you draining the gas out of the carbs on your various machines when you put them away for storage? Do they have fuel shut-offs on them? If a gas tank is above the engine (no fuel pump) and there isn't a shut-off valve, the fuel will constantly be keeping the carb fuel bowl full. Even with fuel stabilizer, you can have some problems if fuel is constantly in the carb over long periods of time.

Also something to consider - use some 'fogging oil' spray prior to storage. Light bodied spray oil that comes in an aerosol can. It'll have the little plastic wand for the sprayer. Always available at any boating supply place - can also be found in many auto parts departments with the chemicals, etc. It will coat all the innards of the intake, combustion chamber(s), and exhaust with a bit of the oil to ward off rust/corrosion. It's REALLY helpful in moist, humid environments like FL.

To use: Take off whatever is necessary to gain access to the carb throat, start the engine, have access to the throttle control, then start spraying the oil into the carb. The oil will want to stall the engine out - keep it running by giving it a bit of throttle. Regulate the throttle and the spraying to keep the engine going. When you're ready to stop, kill the engine with the oil. Doesn't take a whole lot of the oil to get the whole job done. (Do this outside of your garage as the burning oil stinks and makes a nice cloud of blue smoke!! :) ) Once you're done, shut off the gas, drain the carb, and you'll be good-to-go the next time you want to use the equipment (use fresh fuel). I've NEVER had a problem with starting ANYTHING up after extended storage if I do these things prior to putting them away.

Maybe I'm covering territory with which you're already familiar - sorry if that's the case!!! :thumbup: Just trying to help - - -

Bill :)

Bill, where there is a petcock, I do shut it off and let the engine run dry, but never went to the trouble of draining and spraying oil since I wasn't really storing it for a long winter, just a couple months at most. I just learned to start and run each motor every 4 or 5 weeks as the repair shop suggested. Now living here I only have a pressure cleaner to start every month. I keep a gal can with marine stabil in it and when it gets about 2 months old empty in into the cars gas tank.

mower
 

IF YOU SERIOUS ABOUT DOING YOU LAWN, I JUST STARTED DOING MINE, DOCTOR STOPPED ME, I HAVE A ALMOST NEW LAWN MOVER SELF PROPELLED GAS AND A TRIMMER/EDGER GAS AND A GAS CAN TOO. FOR ONLY $265.00, IF INTERESTED CALL ME 751-5812 NORM.:BigApplause:

Les, sounds like you've got a good plan! :thumbup:

Bill :)

Ethanol phase seperation etc.
 

There is a remarkable product out there named K100 Gas treatment

Change is hard for most and I will not knock stable Star or any other products.

I will make this statement. Use K100 in your cars motorcycles scooters boats two stroke four stroke anything that stores gasoline and your ethanol fuel storage and performance problems are gone.

Wish I was here full time to demonstrate better for all you folks. The Villages Cart Store has seen the product demonstrated but has not opened up yet to sell it. Advanced Auto carries it

http://www.k100fueltreatment.com/stabilizer.html

http://shop.advanceautoparts.com/1/1...ywordless-_-Ad

FYI - Re: availability at Advance -

If I key in 32162 for the zip, it says "Call store" for ALL stores in the surrounding area. Sounds like they might not stock it everywhere.

Bill :)

i chose STELLAR,
he does it all including fertilizer

Yes they do if you ask for the service.

Lawn mowing
 

I bought a mower for a couple hundred bucks eight years ago and a gas powered string trimmer and a gas powered blower. We live in a designer home with a fairly large lawn and too many shrubs. Takes about an hour to mow, trim, and blow. Has to been done once a week in the Summer but much less in the Winter. I like doing it. One of the only things that I have done in my life where I can see immediately when I am done.
If I were to win the lottery I would still do it. Don't like the big rider mowers making ruts in my lawn either. They seem to take the same path every time they mow. Only downside is finding someone to mow when we leave for a few weeks in the Summer but now have a guy to do that.

Another reason not to have ur lawn mowed by anyone but yourself is that the commercial outfits trim ur concrete borders around ur house. They go so fast with their edgers that they are constantly chipping my concrete. Sparks fly when they trim. I do it myself for all of the above reasons and would not have it any other way.

Looking forward to cutting our grass again. We brought our self propelled lawn mower and gives me a little exercise and instant gratification too. I love trimming the bushes. Anyone remember Morticia on the Addams Family show?;);)

We move into new home a week from tomorrow..Yay!!!!

Interesting thread!

I use Pri-G in all of my outdoor power equipment. I think it is much better then sta-bil. Far cheaper also, as one quart treats an unbelievable 512 gallons of gas. If everyone used stabilizer small engine repair shops would go out of business.

I am struggling with the mowing issue. I love to mow. Up here in NY I have 3 acres and mow with an exmark professional ZTR 52"mower. My Florida home has a much smaller yard, but still bigger then most. Currently I have a good lawn mowing service that mows, trims, edges and blows weekly and only charges me $55 per month at my Florida home. They are great guys.

For that price, I could hardly do it myself. I really do not have all that much room to store a good mower, etc.

I'll be selling my exmark before I move down there. My son is eying my Shindiawa trimmer, and my wife is telling me to sell my edger, etc,etc....

I just don't know. I'm only happy when working hard around the house, and have a hard time relaxing......

Frank

if any of you self-mowers want to move next door to me I'll slip you a few bucks to do mine too


not being there full time I have to use a service

we visited in August and there were huge brown patches, which they claimed was fungus and would cure itself

when we left, four weeks later, there was little improvement

so once their contract ends in March...