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Who Says Mowing The Lawn Is Hard Work?

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By CHRIS DEWEY

Special to the Tribune

Published: June 29, 2008

I'm so excited! I'm getting my new lawn mower today. The old riding mower quit, and I had to decide what would be the best available mower technology to replace it.

Being a promoter of green options in the landscape, I wanted something that would lower my fuel costs and speed up the job since I have a one-acre lot to deal with.

My relatively large corner lot has the obligatory grassy swales for drainage. Discounting house, pool, a significant area of Florida friendly, drought-tolerant plants and several nice stands of sand live oaks, there's still a lot of grass to mow and maintain.

The old riding mower was hot, noisy, painfully slow and consumed way too many gallons of gas and hours of time getting the job done each week during the growing season.

I researched all the options. A manual push mower was easily dismissed as impractical. Push or self-propelled, walk-behind gas mowers really won't work for me any better either.

Similarly, a corded electric mower wasn't going to work since you can't go beyond the reach of a 100-foot extension cord.

The battery-powered push mowers are nice, but it is way too much walking, and a single charge is unlikely to get the job done. They won't save me time, either, and with my sciatica, it would be a weekly torture ritual.

I seriously considered one of the new electric robot mowers, but I have too many barriers and obstacles for that to work in my particular situation, though it would have been my choice for a lot less than half the size.

It was looking like I had no viable choice but to replace the gas-guzzling riding mower with another just like it.

I already don't irrigate, fertilize or use pesticides on the combination of Bahia grass and "weeds." I've let native trees and bushes reclaim as much of the space as possible.

It's frustrating to have no better choice than to continue to belch out noxious fumes astride a hot noisy machine week after week.

And then I found just the product for my exact needs: It is a hybrid mower made right here in the Tampa Bay area and has been featured on the Discovery Channel. It is a joystick-controlled, remote-control lawn mower for about the same cost as a good quality riding lawn mower.

Now I am looking forward to sitting in the shade under one of my trees with a cold drink, controlling my new mower with joysticks at a distance.

Capable of a zero-turn radius and in open country, this remote-control mower can go up to 10 mph. It does have a gas engine driving the mower blade and an alternator that charges batteries and powers the powerful separate electric-drive motors on the rear wheels.

This hybrid is claimed to use 40 percent less fuel, and that is easy to believe since it isn't built to carry a rider. And it can't turn over and kill me on the slopes of the swale, either. I'm even hoping it will cut mowing time from several hours to less than an hour.

The manufacturer says that at least 30 percent of its sales are to the disabled. I'm not disabled now, but as I slow down with advancing age, I will be prepared to mow weeds and grass without having to spend a bundle every week on one of the mow-blow-and-go lawn services.

And if it breaks, I can put it in the trunk and drive it to be serviced without needing to rent a flatbed truck.

I wish I could get rid of lawn mowing entirely, but at least I've found a way to save money and time while cutting my mowing contribution of carbon dioxide nearly in half.

The writer is the Florida Yards & Neighborhoods Builder/Developer Program coordinator in Pasco County, a position funded by the Southwest Florida Water Management District. He can be reached at (727) 847-8177 or e-mailed at Cdewey@pascocountyfl.net.

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