Saturday 16 April 2011

Samurai weeding.

It's spring, and the whipweed is especially lively this year. I can't even step outside without the crack of chlorophyll ringing in my ears and whacking across my face. It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the barbed stings.

So I have ordered the Samurai Weeding Tool. Layered steel with a razor edge. That should sort out the whipweed. And those people who keep coming around to demand tacks. They come around every year and I always tell them I don't have and don't want any, but they keep coming back.

This time I'd better be sure to get to the post box before little Caligula does. He likes toys.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sir, might I humbly suggest that you also purchase a grass slasher, as per this one: http://www.chillingtontoolsonline.co.uk/grass-slasherweeder-p13

My family and I have owned and used these tools for nigh on forty years, and used them on all manner of vegetation, from grasses to weeds like nettles, brambles and so on, right up to hedge trimming. If suitably sharpened and wielded with sufficient force, the tool will cut through branches up to an inch thick with one stroke, and through bigger ones with a couple of hits.

It is ambidextrous, and in use I recommend using both hands, to prevent fatigue. I also recommend not approaching anyone using such a tool; the radius of danger is approximately eight feet or so from the user, not including flung vegetation and the like.

Enjoy, and make sure that little bugger you call a son doesn't get his hands on it, or your writing career will be cut extremely short!

Dr. Dume said...

Dr. Dan, thank you for the tip. The device does indeed seem quite fearsome so it might be able to cope with spikebush and stranglevine, and maybe even Ferals and council officials.

I would have to keep it under lock and key or it would end up in Caligula's toybox along with all my power tools.

Anonymous said...

If you can obtain one, the Brott 320 Grasscutter is also a worthy purchase. If you can imagine the sort of ride-on mower that a deranged Welsh Hells' Angel would produce, in collaboration with a farmer and blacksmith, then this is surely it.

At the front, a pair of wheels, seat and steering handle + controls. In the middle, a powerful flail mower throwing clippings up and over the back as per a silage cutter. Slightly behind this, a Briggs & Stratton engine. At the back, gearbox and a powered roller.

I used a beast such as this for many years until it finally died (the engine broke up, and knocked out the back of the crankcase), and found it capable of cutting all manner of grass, weeds, scrub and so on. The only real flaw was that it was a bit too high-geared; low gear should've been much lower, and the engine could've done to be bigger, too.

The other fine attribute of the machine was noise: the roller wasn't sprung at all, so all the low-frequency rumbling from the engine and flails got transmitted down into the ground. This had the extremely useful effect of shifting moles; for all the years we usedthat machine, we never saw a single mole in the field. Plenty of frogs (significantly fewer after we'd been round cutting), a few voles, but never a mole. The households surrounding the paddock were over-run, though, but never worked out why they had moles and we didn't.

Pictures available on request.

Dr. Dume said...

Dr. Dan, it sounds like a fearsome machine indeed.