29th April 2016

Department: Turf

Used the Honda rotary mowers to cut in front of the glasshouse, striping them up width ways. There were cylindrical shaped beech topiary with tree circles. To cut around these when I got to them I would cut a circle around them first. This was achieved by slowly tapping the outer third handle (the one that made the mower moved), so it could move around them in a jolty fashion. Then I would line it up on the other side and resume striping. There were new patched on turf pieces also which I had to roll over instead of cutting, as they're have knitted properly into the ground yet.

After I went on the ride on mower to hoover areas cut in the Trials field and in the Arboretum/ Orchard where multiple paths have been cut through long grass (they are wanting to cultivate these areas as meadows). The grass box filled up quicker than expected. Realised a couple of things - when the blade is engaged a light actually comes on the counter (this is for the John Deeres). When the vehicle is reversing, yellow button can be pressed to keep blade engaged if necessary. When the box needs emptying, a light comes on the counter to say so.

Photo 1: Control panel of Ride On - Speed of vehicle is obvious Orange lever where rabbit and turtle is. The grass box needing to be emptied light shows up above this (picture of vehicle with open box), also the light of whether the blade is on or not is here too (this has the same symbol as the button to the right of the wheel - which needs to be pulled out to engage blade and pushed to disengage. Below that is essentially the handbrake - clutch (on the left) and this has to be pressed down for it to be on. You can just see the pedal of the handbrake to the right and under this, the one with arrow down is to drive the vehicle backwards. Yellow button to engage blade when reversing is just hidden by the middle of the steering wheel.

To empty I reverse into a compost trailer as far as it would go, and with enough room to tip the box up to empty it (operated by a gear stick on the right - the same one that controls the height of the blades). Sometimes when it's packed too tight, a little assistance was required with a pitchfork or by hand. Then reverse more if possible to push the cuttings further back into the trailer. Then move forward still within trailer to have a little space, then lift up and down waggle stick to clear the grass from the chute before moving off and putting grass collection box down. Push it down slowly enough at the end, to ensure it clicks into  place, then the emptying required light will switch off - sometimes this took a moment for the machine to register it was empty - this can prevent the cutting blade from coming on, so one has to jiggle around with the controls for a bit to get it going again.