Time to ditch the garden power tools?

My Black & Decker Strimmer has remained unused for many years because lawn shears do a better job and do not make a noise like a demented bee.

I used to have an ancient Webb electric cylinder mower, a gift from an elderly neighbour. That was quiet and civilised, but when I cut through the cable by accident in the 80s I made an impulse purchase of a petrol rotary mower. Having a Briggs & Stratton engine, it is unbelievably noisy, and I am careful about when I use it so as not to annoy the neighbours. I don’t use it early in the morning or after 7pm.

Compared with the mower, the hedge trimmer is fairly quiet, and I do not have much hedge. I once cut through the cable and to prevent this happening again, I put a metre of hose on the cable. That is prevented from slipping along the cable with a large cable tie. The diameter of the hose is sufficient to prevent the cable getting between the cutting blades.

Cordless power tools look very attractive, but consider the cost of replacing batteries, if they are still available.

I’m afraid it’s a case of using the easiest and most suitable tools for the job when you have a large garden with a lot of trees and bushes.

When we moved from a small garden the only power tool we had was an electric lawnmower. In a quest to make garden jobs easier we now have hand, battery, electric & petrol tools, anything to ease the aches and pains.

But saying that, Laurel is done by hand as taking a hedge trimmer to it leaves it looking a right mess.

Some trimmings get composted but a shredder is a must so the rest can be recycled.

My biggest garden nuisance gripe is bonfires.

They are much worse than garden machinery noise if you live in an area where people seem to burn anything, at any time, just after it has rained, on hot still evenings…….

We have got rid of most of our powered garden tools. The annoying noise was the main reason but I also realised they were not saving much time overall or doing a better job. I was not impressed with the finish when using a strimmer so I do all the lawn edges and bits around shrubs, trees and planters by hand with good lawn shears [not easy to find in the shops and DIY stores which mainly sell hedging shears or ‘mulit-purpose’ ones that don’t do anything well enough]. I enjoy doing the edges by hand as a precursor to mowing – it gets me closer to the garden and I can deal with things in the flower beds that might otherwise be left undone or go unnoticed; it’s also easier to avoid decapitating plants and scouring the bark off trees. I also enjoy hedge trimming by hand. All tree work I have done myself up to a reachable height because I just don’t feel safe with a chainsaw and think only trained and certificated people with full protective euipment should be allowed to use them. The shredder went after a few seasons as the amount of material to be dealt with diminished. I think the blower/vac was only deployed for one Autumn leaf sweep before it was declared redundant; I really disliked the noise it made and the weight of it when the bag was getting full. Raking up the leaves on a decent Autumnal day is a satisfying, invigorating, and quiet contemplative occupation. That just leaves the electric lawnmower in regular use and the occasional use of the power washer. I have noticed that some push-mowers make a more unpleasant noise than my Bosch mower. I also use a hand drill or brace-&-bit as often as I use a power drill for woodwork as I prefer having more control over the work – my B&D electric drill is now 45 years old so I only give it gentle duties. We stopped having bonfires after a neighbour called out the fire brigade – the wind had picked up and the incinerator was going like a mill chimney with dirty waste in the furnace; there was only a wisp of smoke by the time the fire engine arrived.

I find my shredder to be the miracle tool that allows my compost heaps to work. Taking the time to bag up waste for the Council to collect and then replacing the material lost by driving to Garden centres to buy compost, feels wrong – ecologically, practically and financially. Thus the only material I send out in the Garden waste bags is that which cannot be composted – moss, bindweed and infected material, like red-current branches with coral spot or rose leaves with black spot fungus.

Of course I have to get rid of larger woody material by burning it, but I limit myself to wood only fires in an incinerator, so there is no smoke, just a very hot flame only fire – just what we need most summers! Ah well – that is why this year I have exceptionally put out two garden waste bags with woody waste.

I have a Bosch battery powered strimmer for my allotment – beds cut out of grassland, leaving grass paths. There’s no electricity anyway, I thought petrol machinery would be expensive, need servicing and be smelly and dangerous carried in the back of the car – leaving expensive machinery in an allotment shed secured with a padlock is plain silly. That was 5 years ago, still using the same battery, quick wizz round makes the whole thing look tidy quickley. Doing it by hand would be hard and time consuming

I do agree that cordless power tools in the garden have a huge edge – I use a cordless strimmer/edger to do the lawn edges and the bits the mower (petrol) can’t get to. The cutting head swivels through 90 degrees so it cuts horizontally or vertically. Yes, it makes a bit of a noise, but I can do the missed bits and the edges of both lawns in less than ten minutes. I have a rule of never using noisy tools before 11 a.m. at the weekend, and not if I can hear my neighbours are entertaining (or snoring!).