I hate rakes, Irk. They're always leaving bits behind. And they have a high cost-benefit ratio. Leaf blowers are more forceful and complete with their removal.
@matthew@JonT I'm nervous about what guy you mean me to be, but let me just be clear about a few things: 1) I'm all for not making a lot of noise (especially between 9PM and 11AM). In fact I hate noise. I mostly hate secondhand "music"--you know, the invariably awful shit people blast from their car speakers or that comes out in tinny insolence from their smartphones?--so I most definitely don't like equipment noises. 2) I despise the idea (and sorta loathe the people who embrace it) of pushing one's problems onto someone else. This is how problems multiply. People need to stop that shit. We're in this together, goddamnit. I'm cranky, but I'm a collectivist. 3) I'm all for composting or just letting the damned things be, like @rockblossom and others have advocated. In fact, I think it was raking leaves--or, yeah, get this, pine needles, whose horror those of you who've never raked them just can't imagine--that enlightened me to the ubiquity of social injustice and the institutionalization of futility. Now, if you mean to say that I'm the guy who's right about everything: gosh, I'm humbled, but I accept. Thanks.
@matthew@JonT Oh, and one more thing: yes, if I need to move a bunch of lightweight stuff around, I'm going to do it efficiently, but always with consideration for my neighbors. C'mon, what do you think I am? A barbarian? A one-percenter?
@rockblossom Not all of the voices in my head are as reliably correct as I am. That's kinda my job really, weighing the validity of their opposing arguments and impulses. They don't always agree, but we will find a way to get along. And they will learn silence and respect, though generally I let them run a little amok, just because I think it's healthier for them to be free.
@joelmw And how does that explanation work out for you? When I use it, I tend to get odd looks, with people backing away slowly while fumbling for their cell phones - presumably to call someone with restraints and a nice padded room to let.
@rockblossom I won't go off on this tangent right now, but I do feel compelled to say that I've never understood the opposition folks have to voices in one's head. I think the problem with the crazy people is in fact that they let one violent voice drown out all of the others, or yaknow, maybe a gang of badseed. Or maybe they just don't appreciate the relational dynamics involved in keeping the voices more-or-less at peace with each other. Yes, the scary thing is that I'm mostly serious.
@rockblossom I think I come across as harmless enough and functional in a mildly savant sort of way that people eventually just come to terms with the fact that this is how I am. And they laugh at me. I'm not as funny on purpose as I am when I'm being perfectly earnest. So, yeah, harmless guy that people can make fun of: that's how it works out for me. Not a horrible life, really.
@joelmw I have raked pine needles - 40-50 bags of pine needles every fall out of my yard alone… And raking pine needles sucks. So does raking monkey balls (they are actually worse than pine needles due to gripping each blade of grass they come into contact with), pine cones and poison ivy leaves..,
@ceagee technically I think they are from the sweet gum tree but where I lived everyone called them monkey balls. Imagine a yard full of those. They do not rake well due to the spikes.
@Kidsandliz We have chestnut trees-- the nuts come in a large outer coating w/ spikes. The squirrels haul off most of them. Some get salvaged to dry and get the nuts out. The shells that are left on ground or from gathering are ground up w/ mower for compost.
@KidsandlizSweetgum Scientific name: Liquidambar styraciflua Abundance: plentiful What: seeds; sap; leaf buds How: Break apart large seed pods to get to the sweetgum seeds then rub the seeds to free them from their outer shell before eating or grinding into flour; sap can be dried for chewing gum substitute; the young leaf buds raw Where: woods, urban & suburban landscapes When: leaf buds in spring; seed pods in fall; sap in spring Nutritional Value: seeds contain calories and protein Other uses: leaves can be mashed into a poultice for antibiotic and sting-bite relief Dangers: stepping on seed pods while barefoot hurtshttp://www.foragingtexas.com/2008/08/sweetgum.html Looks like you can gather and enjoy !
You're not wrong, Irk. If anything, leaf blowers don't bother you enough, because they are the GD worst. “A lot” is not enough. A “bottomless well of contempt” is STARTING to get there. Preach, brother.
@Pony This is a lovely haiku. And I don't at all condone blowing leaves into the neighbor's yard (and can't quite bring myself to like @2many2no's comment), but, yeah, the leaf blower moves those leaves, doesn't it?
Buy a leaf blower that actually has some power behind it, not a crappy Meh version you would sell, and you would see why they are worthy. Buy a junk one under $400 and I agree with you all day long.
You can buy electric leaf blowers. Get a 100 foot cable and do your thing. Oh and here's a great idea for using a leaf blower: I use it all the time to clean out my desktop PCs that collect dust. It cleans the entire inside of the PCs in about 3 seconds. Once you do it, you'll think I'm a genius... well, I am actually. :P
@Thumperchick I have a neighbor who has one of those fancy-doodle backpack style leaf blowers. I get so irritated when I hear it whirr up, always seemingly too early in the morning then never turning off... buuuuut after he's done doing his yard, he does ours and 2 other neighbors' too. I want to be mad, but I can't.
@BillLehecka I try to do this, but I have two HUGE trees in the front hard. My poor mulching mower can't handle all the leaves once they all come down.
@BillLehecka I do this as well. I figure any extra bits left over that don't work into the lawn will get blown into my garden and help protect against the snow from the winter.
@BillLehecka And if you try that with a yard full of monkey balls you will be sending missiles everywhere. They don't rake well nor leaf blow well either. The only solution is 5 year olds who get paid $1 for each grocery bag they fill up by hand (the big paper ones). Any older and they won't work for wages so low. Yea for 5 year olds.
I love my crappy little leaf blowers. Of course I don't use them to move leaves though. I use my little battery powered one to blow the grass of my drive and sidewalk after mowing (can't do that with a rake). And I use my electric one to suck leaves up with after I have raked them into a pile. Mulching them up like this allows me to get more leaves into each bag - this year I only had 16, full 39 gallon bags of leaves to take to my local composting site, thanks to mulching them. It would have been double or triple that if it weren't for my leaf blower set up to vacuum.
@lowerone That's what my friend does, he uses the leaf blower to blow the cut grass and small bits from trimming the bushes into the yard. We don't have a lot of trees around so we just leave the leaves (that's their name after all) to become mulch over the winter.
@Bingo I have a neighbor who during the summer busts out his power washer every single Sunday at dinner time. I've even seen him power washing the driveway. It really kills any hope of a relaxing Sunday dinner, esp. out in the yard. He will also snow blow at 5am.
I prefer to mulch with the mower but I do use the blower to move the leaves away from the wooden fence and out from under the trees so they can be mulched. It is faster than raking. I also use it to clean off the deck, sidewalk and driveway.
I have an energy-efficient leaf blower. It's called "the wind" and it works while I sit in my easy chair reading a book. If I need some of the leaves for compost, I just use a rake. Otherwise, I just leave them alone and they break down on their own and feed the grass. I think the mania for getting rid of leaves is bizarre. People are weird. They spend ridiculous amounts of time/money getting rid of the perfectly natural grass fertilizer, then more time/money putting down chemicals to fertilize the grass. WTF, people?
@rockblossom Well if you have a bunch of pine trees like I do and 40-50 bags of pine needles when you rake you have to rake. If you don't you will have pine needles practically half way up the first floor windows, the city will cite you, the landlord will have a hissy and the neighbors will hate you… On the other hand if you can get to them before the leaves fall you can sell each bag of pine needles on craigslist for $3/bag. My kid earned nearly $300 one year. When we ran out at our house she took orders and raked the neighborhood (neighbor's thought there had to be a catch LOL for her to do it for free in their yard).
That's why I use a battery-powered blower, and just for blowing clippings off the sidewalk back onto the lawn. I don't use it to push piles of leaves around, and the battery capacity mandates a limit to how long it will operate anyway. And it's much quieter than then average lawmnower.
Fools! Use an electric leaf blower to remove snow off of steps. Get steps %100 snow free so when the sun melts and turns snow to water and that water back to ice in the evening, ice will not form on the steps. (I have more steps then the average person)
@caffeine_dude "Winter is coming". Not here, not in the way most people think of winter. Sure, we'll have a couple of nights a few degrees below freezing, and we may have a couple of days of snow that melts within a day or two. But in the daytime it's warm in the sun and rarely below 50.
@rockblossom You are correct. +2 geek points. Had I noticed the capitalization of Ice in your original comment, I have just shut up and given you a star.
@caffeine_dude "when the sun melts and turns snow to water" HA! In Boston, we call that "June". There is no snow melting before then. Also, Ned never said "Brace Yourself".
@caffeine_dude Have you heard this classic dirty joke? "Suck Dammit! 'Blow' is just a figure of speech!" For snow we have a machine called a "Snow Blower". It is a 2 stage machine. The first stage uses steel blades to grind up the ice and snow and feed it in to an impeller. The impeller is the second stage. It throws the ground up snow and ice 30 or 40 feet. Once again, "Blow" is just a figure of speech. The steel impeller throws the snow, and ice. It is noisy (particularly if you go to deep and start flinging gravel), but not as bad as a leaf blower. Also, if you need to use it, a foot or two of snow is pretty good at muffling sounds.
@caffeine_dude@hamjudo, being from a warm climate, I had always heard about snow blowers but never seen one. In my head they were just like leaf blowers but for snow. I finally got to see one in action this past winter when I was stuck in a blizzard and was a little more mesmerized than I care to admit.
@ceagee For the leaf blower to work you need to get the snow right away. I still use the shovel, but the blower gets the snow in the corner that is created by the riser.
@caffeine_dude No,no. Your typing was fine. I just saw your "ice will not form on the steps" and your use of the image of Ned Stark holding the sword Ice ... and puns just form in my head. I can't help it. Really, I can't. I have a Pun-o-Matic in my brain with no off switch.
Hey, Irk! Nice face, bro. Have you ever tried to get leaves out from under some hedges/bushes? Yeah, a rake doesn't fit under there because it keeps getting caught on the shrubberies. A leaf blower uses air (which fits in tight spaces) to blow the leaves right out. Have you every tried to rake leaves off of some landscaping rocks/pebbles? A rake will end up displacing all your rocks along with the leaves. A leaf blower will blow the light leaves away leaving the heavier rocks in place. Ever try to use a rake to get leaves out of your rain gutters? No, because that is stupid and would never work. A leaf blower, on the other hand, can blow all those leaves outta there in no time. Leaf blowers have their place, Irk. It sounds like you just don't do any yard work yourself so you have no idea of the potential applications. Get real a job, broseph.
@medz Why do you want to get the leaves out from under your bushes and hedges? If a rake can't get to them then aren't they safely hidden under the shrubbery and not bothering you in any way? I think you're looking for excuses to use leaf blowers.
@matthew Yeah well, my gutters have sharp screws jutting out in spots and I don't like open wounds when the gutters are full of bird poop from the roof. Also, there are ants in there and usually it's wet when I do it so the gloves get all nasty. Knees get all scraped from kneeling on the roof... Ain't nobody got time for that.
@JonT They look awful. Passers by be all like, "Dude, peep that clutter under that guy's bushes." Also, it's inviting varmints to make a home under there. The bushes collect the leaves, the leaves collect trash people drop, and then I have the worst looking house on the block.
I'm forming quite a picture of this homestead in my mind, with its legions of ants, and litter swirling on the breeze, and rivers of guano pouring through the downspouts, and varmint colonies under every shrub. I hope it is inaccurate as it is vivid.
@bluedyn Yeah, they're always stealing my extension cords and running up my electric bill! Then you got the critters out in the field always biting through my tractor's fuel line... Edit: That movie roolz!
@JonT When we had a dog the vet told us to try to keep the yard free of leaves because of the bugs in them and our husky just loved going out and playing in them. So that was the reason we used to get them out from under the trees/bushes. Since he's been gone it's no longer a priority.
@rockblossom What's the point? I guess it would work okay when the battery exploded from shunting the positive and negative terminals together, but that's sort of a one-shot deal and I doubt the acid burns would dissolve the zombies fast enough.
You know what bothers ME, maybe more than it should? Landscapers who use leaf blowers to blow leaves and debris into the street. They're hired to clean someone's property, and their way of doing it is to blow the junk into the street, and often directly at oncoming cars. WTF is up with that?!?
@DJP519 In my neighborhood we got notices in the water bill that you get fined if your landscapers blow debris into the street because it clogs up the storm drains
@DJP519 Some municipalities allow leaves to be put in the street for collection without bags. Usually though it's just for a few weekends a year, so it's not likely that the landscapers are doing it right.
@DJP519 This is literally every single landscaper I've ever seen. It's not like they blow them into a pile and rake them up and bag them, they just blow them somewhere else.
@stienman It's not just leaves in the fall, though. It's year round, with grass clippings, along with small pebbles, cigarette butts, and various trash and debris of all kinds. Anything that was on the sidewalk or driveway, instead ends up in the street. And it's especially annoying when you're driving down the street towards them, and your car is about to get sandblasted with that crap -- especially so if the window is down!
I used an electric leaf blower in my hovercraft. It was wimpy and I didn't do a good job of making the skirt. It could barely get me off the floor. The slightest bump and the air would spill out from underneath it, and I would be back on the floor again.
I was not willing to spend much for a blower, since I'm not anti-social and would never use one for actually blowing leaves around. I kept the 4 foot diameter piece of plywood and the blower, so I may try again.
@hamjudo You always have the best comments. You're just casually throwing out things like 'yeah I used this to make a robot once.' 'I built a hovercraft, NBD.' I'd love to see some pictures of the stuff you do, maybe even a full build out post for a cool project you're working on a la @shawn's Home Golf Simulator or @matthew's Basement Buildout. Hey you two, whatever happened with those anyway?
@rockblossom Oh, so you have to buy TWO hand implements to do the job of one leaf blower! Doesn't sound very practical. ;) Edit: I do use a broom to get the acorns off the sidewalk. It's like walking on marbles...somebody is bound to fall and sue me.
@medz Depends. In my neck 'o' th' woods, men will use a rake and broom, but wouldn't want to be seen blowing stuff around with a giant hair dryer! ;D Added: Fortunately, I have free labor for removing the acorns: a herd of deer.
@ceagee I stripe my yard. The mower shoots grass about 6-10 feet. Even with the first stripe going away from the driveway, the second stripe coming back blows the grass over. It's not a big deal -- it literally takes about a minute to clear off with my LEAF BLOWER
@capguncowboy I once had a neighbor who would get out on her hands and knees w/ a pair of scissors to make sure her lawn was "just so". You would get along well with her. ;-)
@ceagee This was taken after I mowed in the rain. I'll see if I can find a better picture tomorrow. I get a lot of compliments on my yard. It takes me 5-10 extra minutes a week to stripe it vs just mowing in one direction. In the spring when the lawn services come around and solicit their services they always ask who does my yard because it looks professionally done. One guy offered to mow it for less than I was currently paying. He didn't believe me when I told him I did it.
@Kidsandliz It's not 100º, but it gets up in the 90s. on a regular basis. I really don't mind the heat. Besides that, when you're using a rider mower, it doesn't really feel like work -- lots of shade trees in the back. I mow every 6-7 days. Waiting longer than that makes my yard resemble a hay field
@capguncowboy I didn't realize you were talking about a riding mower. I was talking from the perspective of a push gas mower. Yeah ride one of those with a golf umbrella for shade if need be… not so bad.
Don't move here Irk. If it isn't raining, there isn't a time where you can't hear one. OK, maybe when there is snow on the ground... I have a neighbor who keeps his lawn leaf free. He blows the leaves off every day. Nobody knows what a rake or a broom is anymore.
@KDemo Yeah well I bet it doesn't work on neglected yards where the grass is 8" high and even with a gas mower you need to push hard and back it up a bunch to keep it from choking...
I've never used a leaf blower, but I doubt Irk's ever used a rake. I've used a rake. It's not fun. It's actually kind of horrible. I never want to rake again.
My father once had a brilliant idea: use a leaf blower to clean out the chicken house. It's a small chicken house, so he put on goggles to protect his eyes from flying wood shavings and feathers.
I really, really wish video recording equipment had been as ubiquitous then as it is now, because this went roughly as well as expected. He was in there ~15 seconds and came out covered from head to toe in feathers and chicken shit.
It's now a meme in our family. Whenever someone does something stupid, we all agree that, "at least you didn't try to clean a chicken coop with a leaf blower."
Fuck. right now there are two dudes across the street and they both have these damn things going full bore I closed my windows but it's still loud and now my office smells like burning hondas.
Looking a little... red there, Irk. Georgia Red, maybe?
@molfsontan There's clearly something wrong with the chroma-key today.
@molfsontan Maybe he's blushing. Or just really, really angry.
I love purple.
Did someone wash Irk with their red boxers, or what
I love purple.
I know, right? Not only is Irk all pink today, he's also really pixelated around his edges. Bad compositing? Bad composting?
It probably bothers me more than it should
I love purple.
I hate rakes, Irk. They're always leaving bits behind. And they have a high cost-benefit ratio. Leaf blowers are more forceful and complete with their removal.
And they can be electric.
Geez, Irk. Get a clue.
HERE'S THE GUY, EVERYBODY
@matthew he's definitely the guy.
@joelmw Maybe you could get a goat to eat the leaves.
@matthew @JonT I'm nervous about what guy you mean me to be, but let me just be clear about a few things: 1) I'm all for not making a lot of noise (especially between 9PM and 11AM). In fact I hate noise. I mostly hate secondhand "music"--you know, the invariably awful shit people blast from their car speakers or that comes out in tinny insolence from their smartphones?--so I most definitely don't like equipment noises. 2) I despise the idea (and sorta loathe the people who embrace it) of pushing one's problems onto someone else. This is how problems multiply. People need to stop that shit. We're in this together, goddamnit. I'm cranky, but I'm a collectivist. 3) I'm all for composting or just letting the damned things be, like @rockblossom and others have advocated. In fact, I think it was raking leaves--or, yeah, get this, pine needles, whose horror those of you who've never raked them just can't imagine--that enlightened me to the ubiquity of social injustice and the institutionalization of futility. Now, if you mean to say that I'm the guy who's right about everything: gosh, I'm humbled, but I accept. Thanks.
TL;DR? @joelmw knows what the fuck he's talking about.
@joelmw And so do all of the other voices in his head.
@matthew @JonT Oh, and one more thing: yes, if I need to move a bunch of lightweight stuff around, I'm going to do it efficiently, but always with consideration for my neighbors. C'mon, what do you think I am? A barbarian? A one-percenter?
@rockblossom Not all of the voices in my head are as reliably correct as I am. That's kinda my job really, weighing the validity of their opposing arguments and impulses. They don't always agree, but we will find a way to get along. And they will learn silence and respect, though generally I let them run a little amok, just because I think it's healthier for them to be free.
@joelmw And how does that explanation work out for you? When I use it, I tend to get odd looks, with people backing away slowly while fumbling for their cell phones - presumably to call someone with restraints and a nice padded room to let.
@rockblossom I won't go off on this tangent right now, but I do feel compelled to say that I've never understood the opposition folks have to voices in one's head. I think the problem with the crazy people is in fact that they let one violent voice drown out all of the others, or yaknow, maybe a gang of badseed. Or maybe they just don't appreciate the relational dynamics involved in keeping the voices more-or-less at peace with each other. Yes, the scary thing is that I'm mostly serious.
@rockblossom I think I come across as harmless enough and functional in a mildly savant sort of way that people eventually just come to terms with the fact that this is how I am. And they laugh at me. I'm not as funny on purpose as I am when I'm being perfectly earnest. So, yeah, harmless guy that people can make fun of: that's how it works out for me. Not a horrible life, really.
@joelmw I have raked pine needles - 40-50 bags of pine needles every fall out of my yard alone… And raking pine needles sucks. So does raking monkey balls (they are actually worse than pine needles due to gripping each blade of grass they come into contact with), pine cones and poison ivy leaves..,
@Kidsandliz I'm sorry for your pain and mine both.
@Kidsandliz Monkey balls? Do I want to know ?
@ceagee technically I think they are from the sweet gum tree but where I lived everyone called them monkey balls. Imagine a yard full of those. They do not rake well due to the spikes.
@Kidsandliz We have chestnut trees-- the nuts come in a large outer coating w/ spikes. The squirrels haul off most of them. Some get salvaged to dry and get the nuts out. The shells that are left on ground or from gathering are ground up w/ mower for compost.
@Kidsandliz Sweetgum Scientific name: Liquidambar styraciflua Abundance: plentiful What: seeds; sap; leaf buds How: Break apart large seed pods to get to the sweetgum seeds then rub the seeds to free them from their outer shell before eating or grinding into flour; sap can be dried for chewing gum substitute; the young leaf buds raw Where: woods, urban & suburban landscapes When: leaf buds in spring; seed pods in fall; sap in spring Nutritional Value: seeds contain calories and protein Other uses: leaves can be mashed into a poultice for antibiotic and sting-bite relief Dangers: stepping on seed pods while barefoot hurts http://www.foragingtexas.com/2008/08/sweetgum.html Looks like you can gather and enjoy !
@Kidsandliz Those spikey little bastards are EVIL.
You're not wrong, Irk. If anything, leaf blowers don't bother you enough, because they are the GD worst. “A lot” is not enough. A “bottomless well of contempt” is STARTING to get there. Preach, brother.
I abhor leaf blowers. They're evil. I wrote a haiku about one of them that torments me regularly.
Bitch with leaf blower
Blowing leaves into my yard
You're doing it wrong.
@Pony Not from her point of view.
@Pony This is a lovely haiku. And I don't at all condone blowing leaves into the neighbor's yard (and can't quite bring myself to like @2many2no's comment), but, yeah, the leaf blower moves those leaves, doesn't it?
@Pony Nicely done. Bitch was returning your leaves. To your yard.
Buy a leaf blower that actually has some power behind it, not a crappy Meh version you would sell, and you would see why they are worthy. Buy a junk one under $400 and I agree with you all day long.
@Stallion I can think of a lot of cheaper ways to bother the neighbors.
You can buy electric leaf blowers. Get a 100 foot cable and do your thing. Oh and here's a great idea for using a leaf blower: I use it all the time to clean out my desktop PCs that collect dust. It cleans the entire inside of the PCs in about 3 seconds. Once you do it, you'll think I'm a genius... well, I am actually. :P
@MeatyYoker careful by spinning your fans, you could generate power back into the computer. (Just do not do it too long)
@caffeine_dude thats not how that works.
KEEP YOUR LEAVES ON YOUR SIDE, NEIGHBOR
You can't do THIS with a rake.
Or this.
Or even this.
And especially not this.
@curtise I like the first two. The guy in the last one is a dick. But this is how I feel about most dumbass pranksters.
@curtise But they seem like a perfect couple.
@curtise you forgot this:
@katylava Not exactly the most efficient way to feed an ill family member chicken soup, but yes, I did forget that! 😂
Leaf blowers! Usually loud and inefficient! Woo-hoo!
(But if someone wants to use their blower on my yard right now, we'd love the break from raking!)
@Thumperchick I have a neighbor who has one of those fancy-doodle backpack style leaf blowers. I get so irritated when I hear it whirr up, always seemingly too early in the morning then never turning off... buuuuut after he's done doing his yard, he does ours and 2 other neighbors' too. I want to be mad, but I can't.
You're right Irk. Justification for leaf blower is like an alibi rather than an excuse.
Why use a leaf blower? Use a mower and mulch those leaves back into the ground. It's been shown to be healthier for your lawn.
@BillLehecka we do that. And some are raked into a pile to use with the compost.
@BillLehecka You and my husband subscribe to the same methods for de-leafing the yard.
@BillLehecka +1
@BillLehecka I try to do this, but I have two HUGE trees in the front hard. My poor mulching mower can't handle all the leaves once they all come down.
@BillLehecka I do this as well. I figure any extra bits left over that don't work into the lawn will get blown into my garden and help protect against the snow from the winter.
@BillLehecka And if you try that with a yard full of monkey balls you will be sending missiles everywhere. They don't rake well nor leaf blow well either. The only solution is 5 year olds who get paid $1 for each grocery bag they fill up by hand (the big paper ones). Any older and they won't work for wages so low. Yea for 5 year olds.
I love my crappy little leaf blowers. Of course I don't use them to move leaves though.
I use my little battery powered one to blow the grass of my drive and sidewalk after mowing (can't do that with a rake).
And I use my electric one to suck leaves up with after I have raked them into a pile. Mulching them up like this allows me to get more leaves into each bag - this year I only had 16, full 39 gallon bags of leaves to take to my local composting site, thanks to mulching them.
It would have been double or triple that if it weren't for my leaf blower set up to vacuum.
@lowerone That's what my friend does, he uses the leaf blower to blow the cut grass and small bits from trimming the bushes into the yard. We don't have a lot of trees around so we just leave the leaves (that's their name after all) to become mulch over the winter.
I can't stand the racket either, but they work in situations rakes don't... especially for mesquite needles in gravel. Sorry
My neighbor uses his leaf blower every.single.day. Often at 7am. I frequently want to do very mean things to my neighbor.
@Bingo Maybe you should buy him a rake for Christmas.
@Knightp That's way nicer than I was thinking.
@Bingo I have a neighbor who during the summer busts out his power washer every single Sunday at dinner time. I've even seen him power washing the driveway. It really kills any hope of a relaxing Sunday dinner, esp. out in the yard. He will also snow blow at 5am.
I prefer to mulch with the mower but I do use the blower to move the leaves away from the wooden fence and out from under the trees so they can be mulched. It is faster than raking. I also use it to clean off the deck, sidewalk and driveway.
I have an energy-efficient leaf blower. It's called "the wind" and it works while I sit in my easy chair reading a book. If I need some of the leaves for compost, I just use a rake. Otherwise, I just leave them alone and they break down on their own and feed the grass. I think the mania for getting rid of leaves is bizarre. People are weird. They spend ridiculous amounts of time/money getting rid of the perfectly natural grass fertilizer, then more time/money putting down chemicals to fertilize the grass. WTF, people?
@rockblossom Well if you have a bunch of pine trees like I do and 40-50 bags of pine needles when you rake you have to rake. If you don't you will have pine needles practically half way up the first floor windows, the city will cite you, the landlord will have a hissy and the neighbors will hate you… On the other hand if you can get to them before the leaves fall you can sell each bag of pine needles on craigslist for $3/bag. My kid earned nearly $300 one year. When we ran out at our house she took orders and raked the neighborhood (neighbor's thought there had to be a catch LOL for her to do it for free in their yard).
@Kidsandliz Wha...huh...why the hell would people buy bags of pine needles? For fireplace tinder?
@Sapper No - gardening - as mulch I guess.
That's why I use a battery-powered blower, and just for blowing clippings off the sidewalk back onto the lawn. I don't use it to push piles of leaves around, and the battery capacity mandates a limit to how long it will operate anyway. And it's much quieter than then average lawmnower.
Fools! Use an electric leaf blower to remove snow off of steps. Get steps %100 snow free so when the sun melts and turns snow to water and that water back to ice in the evening, ice will not form on the steps. (I have more steps then the average person)
@caffeine_dude No, Ice was not formed on the steppes. I think it was forged in Valeria.
@caffeine_dude "Winter is coming". Not here, not in the way most people think of winter. Sure, we'll have a couple of nights a few degrees below freezing, and we may have a couple of days of snow that melts within a day or two. But in the daytime it's warm in the sun and rarely below 50.
@rockblossom You know ice was formed at The Wall. pfft.
@caffeine_dude The snow tends to be packed in here. We rarely get the fluffy stuff that you could blow off the steps w/ anything.
@ceagee Same here. If you tried to blow snow off our steps, we'd be laughing while we shoveled.
@Thumperchick Yup. But Ice (in the image @caffeine_dude used) was spell-forged Valyrian steel. (Do I win Geek Points for knowing that?) http://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Ice
@rockblossom
@caffeine_dude Around here "winter is coming" looks more like this:
@rockblossom You are correct. +2 geek points. Had I noticed the capitalization of Ice in your original comment, I have just shut up and given you a star.
@caffeine_dude "when the sun melts and turns snow to water" HA! In Boston, we call that "June". There is no snow melting before then. Also, Ned never said "Brace Yourself".
@caffeine_dude Have you heard this classic dirty joke? "Suck Dammit! 'Blow' is just a figure of speech!" For snow we have a machine called a "Snow Blower". It is a 2 stage machine. The first stage uses steel blades to grind up the ice and snow and feed it in to an impeller. The impeller is the second stage. It throws the ground up snow and ice 30 or 40 feet. Once again, "Blow" is just a figure of speech. The steel impeller throws the snow, and ice. It is noisy (particularly if you go to deep and start flinging gravel), but not as bad as a leaf blower. Also, if you need to use it, a foot or two of snow is pretty good at muffling sounds.
@caffeine_dude @hamjudo, being from a warm climate, I had always heard about snow blowers but never seen one. In my head they were just like leaf blowers but for snow. I finally got to see one in action this past winter when I was stuck in a blizzard and was a little more mesmerized than I care to admit.
@rockblossom did I typo steps for steppes? Meh is the fist thing I do in the morning.
@hamjudo My snow blower does not work well on steps. And there is not detachable wand like on my vacuum.
@ceagee For the leaf blower to work you need to get the snow right away. I still use the shovel, but the blower gets the snow in the corner that is created by the riser.
@caffeine_dude "right away" like right after the Great Lakes dumps a foot or two or three ? " : )
@caffeine_dude No,no. Your typing was fine. I just saw your "ice will not form on the steps" and your use of the image of Ned Stark holding the sword Ice ... and puns just form in my head. I can't help it. Really, I can't. I have a Pun-o-Matic in my brain with no off switch.
@caffeine_dude ANd a leaf blower will not work on 2' of wet snow that fell all at once.
Hey, Irk! Nice face, bro. Have you ever tried to get leaves out from under some hedges/bushes? Yeah, a rake doesn't fit under there because it keeps getting caught on the shrubberies. A leaf blower uses air (which fits in tight spaces) to blow the leaves right out.
Have you every tried to rake leaves off of some landscaping rocks/pebbles? A rake will end up displacing all your rocks along with the leaves. A leaf blower will blow the light leaves away leaving the heavier rocks in place.
Ever try to use a rake to get leaves out of your rain gutters? No, because that is stupid and would never work. A leaf blower, on the other hand, can blow all those leaves outta there in no time.
Leaf blowers have their place, Irk. It sounds like you just don't do any yard work yourself so you have no idea of the potential applications. Get real a job, broseph.
"Ever try to use a rake to get leaves out of your rain gutters?" I go lower-tech still for that:
They're kind of like meat rakes, I guess
@medz Why do you want to get the leaves out from under your bushes and hedges? If a rake can't get to them then aren't they safely hidden under the shrubbery and not bothering you in any way? I think you're looking for excuses to use leaf blowers.
@matthew Yeah well, my gutters have sharp screws jutting out in spots and I don't like open wounds when the gutters are full of bird poop from the roof. Also, there are ants in there and usually it's wet when I do it so the gloves get all nasty. Knees get all scraped from kneeling on the roof... Ain't nobody got time for that.
@JonT They look awful. Passers by be all like, "Dude, peep that clutter under that guy's bushes." Also, it's inviting varmints to make a home under there. The bushes collect the leaves, the leaves collect trash people drop, and then I have the worst looking house on the block.
@medz You've got bigger problems if you have sentient leaves that run out from under your bushes to collect the trash people drop.
@medz What do you have against varmints? The rats of Nimh lived under a bush. Are you saying you hate the rats of Nimh?
I'm forming quite a picture of this homestead in my mind, with its legions of ants, and litter swirling on the breeze, and rivers of guano pouring through the downspouts, and varmint colonies under every shrub. I hope it is inaccurate as it is vivid.
@matthew Yeah, it's rough, but nothing a good leaf blower can't solve!
@bluedyn Yeah, they're always stealing my extension cords and running up my electric bill! Then you got the critters out in the field always biting through my tractor's fuel line... Edit: That movie roolz!
@JonT When we had a dog the vet told us to try to keep the yard free of leaves because of the bugs in them and our husky just loved going out and playing in them. So that was the reason we used to get them out from under the trees/bushes. Since he's been gone it's no longer a priority.
Have any of you guys tried an electric rake?
@Trask Not very good at collecting leaves, but surprisingly effective against zombies.
@rockblossom or perhaps attach a rake to a roomba?
@rockblossom What's the point? I guess it would work okay when the battery exploded from shunting the positive and negative terminals together, but that's sort of a one-shot deal and I doubt the acid burns would dissolve the zombies fast enough.
@Sapper Probably about as much point as using a leaf blower on a windy day.
You know what bothers ME, maybe more than it should? Landscapers who use leaf blowers to blow leaves and debris into the street. They're hired to clean someone's property, and their way of doing it is to blow the junk into the street, and often directly at oncoming cars. WTF is up with that?!?
@DJP519 In my neighborhood we got notices in the water bill that you get fined if your landscapers blow debris into the street because it clogs up the storm drains
@DJP519 Some municipalities allow leaves to be put in the street for collection without bags. Usually though it's just for a few weekends a year, so it's not likely that the landscapers are doing it right.
@DJP519 This is literally every single landscaper I've ever seen. It's not like they blow them into a pile and rake them up and bag them, they just blow them somewhere else.
@stienman It's not just leaves in the fall, though. It's year round, with grass clippings, along with small pebbles, cigarette butts, and various trash and debris of all kinds. Anything that was on the sidewalk or driveway, instead ends up in the street. And it's especially annoying when you're driving down the street towards them, and your car is about to get sandblasted with that crap -- especially so if the window is down!
@DJP519 my neighbor's landscaper plugged his yard and pulled out my underground fence I spent a day putting in.
The real problem here are trees. Let's look at the bigger picture.
@Kevin The real problem is that neither leaves nor trees is a problem, but we think they are.
@joelmw
Darn, too late for Halloween.
You can't use a rake to power a hovercraft.
I used an electric leaf blower in my hovercraft. It was wimpy and I didn't do a good job of making the skirt. It could barely get me off the floor. The slightest bump and the air would spill out from underneath it, and I would be back on the floor again.
I was not willing to spend much for a blower, since I'm not anti-social and would never use one for actually blowing leaves around. I kept the 4 foot diameter piece of plywood and the blower, so I may try again.
@hamjudo You always have the best comments. You're just casually throwing out things like 'yeah I used this to make a robot once.' 'I built a hovercraft, NBD.' I'd love to see some pictures of the stuff you do, maybe even a full build out post for a cool project you're working on a la @shawn's Home Golf Simulator or @matthew's Basement Buildout. Hey you two, whatever happened with those anyway?
@JonT I've got some more photos for that!
A rake won't get the grass clippings off my driveway and sidewalk after I mow my lawn.
@capguncowboy But a broom will.
@rockblossom Oh, so you have to buy TWO hand implements to do the job of one leaf blower! Doesn't sound very practical. ;) Edit: I do use a broom to get the acorns off the sidewalk. It's like walking on marbles...somebody is bound to fall and sue me.
@medz Depends. In my neck 'o' th' woods, men will use a rake and broom, but wouldn't want to be seen blowing stuff around with a giant hair dryer! ;D Added: Fortunately, I have free labor for removing the acorns: a herd of deer.
@rockblossom Along with a herd of deer, we have a scurry of squirrels.
@capguncowboy Then you are mowing in the wrong direction. Always mow so the grass goes to the next row/area you are going to mow.
@ceagee I stripe my yard. The mower shoots grass about 6-10 feet. Even with the first stripe going away from the driveway, the second stripe coming back blows the grass over. It's not a big deal -- it literally takes about a minute to clear off with my LEAF BLOWER
@capguncowboy I once had a neighbor who would get out on her hands and knees w/ a pair of scissors to make sure her lawn was "just so". You would get along well with her. ;-)
@capguncowboy
@ceagee This was taken after I mowed in the rain. I'll see if I can find a better picture tomorrow. I get a lot of compliments on my yard. It takes me 5-10 extra minutes a week to stripe it vs just mowing in one direction. In the spring when the lawn services come around and solicit their services they always ask who does my yard because it looks professionally done. One guy offered to mow it for less than I was currently paying. He didn't believe me when I told him I did it.
@capguncowboy Pretty area. ok. And lawn. You should of taken the guy up on it. He would of had to pay you !
@ceagee Nah, mowing my lawn is an hour I get during the week to chill out and listen to some music. I actually enjoy it
@capguncowboy YOu must not have to do it week after week in 100 degrees and 99% humidity with the sun beating down...
@Kidsandliz It's not 100º, but it gets up in the 90s. on a regular basis. I really don't mind the heat. Besides that, when you're using a rider mower, it doesn't really feel like work -- lots of shade trees in the back. I mow every 6-7 days. Waiting longer than that makes my yard resemble a hay field
@capguncowboy I didn't realize you were talking about a riding mower. I was talking from the perspective of a push gas mower. Yeah ride one of those with a golf umbrella for shade if need be… not so bad.
@capguncowboy Are you in this picture?
@editorkid no, but that does resemble my mower :)
Don't move here Irk. If it isn't raining, there isn't a time where you can't hear one. OK, maybe when there is snow on the ground...
I have a neighbor who keeps his lawn leaf free. He blows the leaves off every day.
Nobody knows what a rake or a broom is anymore.
Hey, why isn't there a yard roomba? It would suck the leaves into a big bag. Let's make one. What'll we call it? SuckUp?
@KDemo http://www.robomow.com/en-USA/
@JonT - Wow, that was fast! Glad someone benefitted from my idea.
@JonT @KDemo Great. Now I want one of those.
@KDemo Yeah well I bet it doesn't work on neglected yards where the grass is 8" high and even with a gas mower you need to push hard and back it up a bunch to keep it from choking...
@Kidsandliz - Personal problem? ;-) Bring it up with @cengland0.
Best use of leaf blower ever {skip to 4:26 for blower action. But whole thing is great !} :
I've never used a leaf blower, but I doubt Irk's ever used a rake. I've used a rake. It's not fun. It's actually kind of horrible. I never want to rake again.
@katylava One of the biggest problems with rakes is stuff gets stuck to them, and then you have clean off the rake so you can rake some more.
My father once had a brilliant idea: use a leaf blower to clean out the chicken house. It's a small chicken house, so he put on goggles to protect his eyes from flying wood shavings and feathers.
I really, really wish video recording equipment had been as ubiquitous then as it is now, because this went roughly as well as expected. He was in there ~15 seconds and came out covered from head to toe in feathers and chicken shit.
It's now a meme in our family. Whenever someone does something stupid, we all agree that, "at least you didn't try to clean a chicken coop with a leaf blower."
@Sapper that's awesome
Fuck. right now there are two dudes across the street and they both have these damn things going full bore I closed my windows but it's still loud and now my office smells like burning hondas.