what is wrong with a broom or a rake? no need for protective gear and doesn’t set next door’s baby off… he screams enough as it is.

i’m sure if i were to play music at the same dB the old bill would be informed sooner or later…

Jeez this place gets worse.

Is he blowing leaves right through the night or something? Otherwise deal with it and be thankful it’s not an old woman with her TV up loud

A leafblower is the full suspension enduro of the rake world.

AWESOME!

They are anti social. My nearest neighbours half a mile away know when I’m using mine.

I’ll use a rake sometimes, but the blower when the leaves are dry and there is little wind is pretty quick and efficient.

A leafblower is the full suspension enduro of the rake world.

AWESOME!

TooTall has nailed it.

what is wrong with a broom or a rake? no need for protective gear and doesn’t set next door’s baby off… he screams enough as it is.

Were they using the leaf blower at an inconsiderate hour?

I’d love a leaf blower. In this world you know when you have “made it” when you own a sit on mower and a leaf blower. 😀

pfft, would never want these middle-class hands to touch such an ugly device. That’s why God invented gardeners you know!

I have a toddler who’s been carefully trained over the past month to think that putting leaves in buckets is a ‘big boy job’ and therefore being allowed to do is some kind of special privilege.

More effective than a leaf blower. though almost as noisy and runs largely on fish fingers.

another proud owner of a leaf blower.

love it. stomping round the garden pretending its a gatling minigun like Jesse Ventura in Predator!

i blast em into big piles (also use rake on the stragglers) then flick the switch and suck em up! empty my sack over the back fence from whence the trees they fell from are stood.

dont have a mower tho 🙁

They are quite popular round our way and while I have no particular axe to grind against leaf blowers I would like to know…why?

Is it tidiness or do fallen leaves present some kind of hazard or harm the garden in some way

Just curious like

empty my sack over the back fence

😯

I’ll explain why we use blowers as generally the public find them confusing. Incidentally, tbe leaf blower is my most important tool, the only one that saves me serious hours of work and could not be temporarily repaced by another tool.

1. Leaf blowers are not just for leaves. They clear grass cuttings from paths, twigs, stones/soil are blown back in to shrub beds, hedge cuttings get blown onto lawns so they can be sucked up by mowing.

2. Try brushing up wet leaves. A blower lifts them no bother and puts them somewhere I can then collect them.

3. Gravel paths/driveways. You can’t brush leaves off them and a rake won’t collect the majority of small bits. Left on stone chip areas, leaves will decompose and provide something for weeds to grow in and encoirages moss / algae.

4. Gardens often have ‘sink’ areas that can be used to blow leaves and debris into and not require picked up. These could be out of sight behind hedges etc, places where the debris can be left to rot down and add something back to the ground.

5. Dog poo. If I have to cut a lawn and find dog poo, I’ll either leave the site and still charge for the wasted time, or on the odd occasion use the blower to move the poo out of tbe way. I won’t have dog poo on my machines/clothes/face/in tne van.

6. General speed. Far quicker to walk straight lines on large gardens windrowing leaves for a final rake up than to rake the whole garden.

7. Awkward corners. Blowers can clear leaves from corners and under shrubs/hedges far more thoroughly than rakes.

8. Loads more reasons but I’ve had enough of tne typing for now.

Screw noise pollution. Maybe we should ban vehicles, children, building works, road repairs and anything else that makes noise? My blower is one of those nice commercial ones strong enough to knock down kids and throw small pooches in the air 🙂

i propose all chippies to be using hand saws and hammmers so i dont have to listen to loud banging from the nail gun and the buzz of the chop saw…..

When I see this kind of thread title, before I read it, I always wonder if it’s someone wondering if they would be being antisocial if they did such and such…. or if they are just complaining about someone else..

glasgowdan++

Also, “I love the smell of 2-stroke in the morning…” (you’ll have to imagine the surfers and helicopters).

Some people *really* like their leafblowers.

They do make a bloody annoying noise – a rural equivalent of the jet ski.

Listening to ‘Gardener’s question time’ on Radio 4 (check out my middle class credentials!) I once heard an expert say that contrary to popular belief he did not think leafs on the lawn did any harm and just obliterating them to tiny bits by mowing them into the lawn was a benefit over bothering to pick them up. I have hung onto this belief to justify my slovenly ways.

Depends where you live. We have some big trees in and around our garden and the leaves soon get completely out of hand if not picked up at least weekly in the fall. A leaf blower just makes it easier and quicker to deal with. Never heard of anyone complaining about a leaf blower before. Life must be good if that’s a worry for you.

This –

Jeez this place gets worse.

and this –

Life must be good if that’s a worry for you.

+10