Girsecutting

[peeriebryan]

Taken from another thread....

 

I feel my profession has been slighted

 

How difficult is it to cut grass?! Is it any more difficult than say boiling an egg, or tying your shoe laces? Lets face it, there are not many people of reasonable physical and mental fitness who are not capable of operating a lawn mower or strimmer

I take it you've never worked for a commercial grasscutting company then? It's completely different craic from pootering around the garden on a fine day with a Flymo and a Fisher Price strimmer

 

And you'd be surprised at how few people can skillfully, safely and efficiently operate lawn mowers and strimmers at an industrial level. That's why it's not just school bairns on their holidays that work for the contractors

 

*composure regained*

[Twerto]

having just cut my lawn for the first time in 3 years a couple of weekends ago.. I bow to any grass cutter.. I'm still acheing now. ( but i am quite unfit as it is )

[peeriebryan]

Du should have PMed me Twerto. We could have done dee a peerie homer next time we're Wast

[Twerto]

kewl i will defo bare dat in mind

[Fjool]

It wouldn't have been a peerie job. 'Twerto Acres' was looking more like deepest Peru. There were wild animals living in there I tell thee!

[Njugle]

I've heard complaints about the 'incoming' contractor already this year. One of which i was shown first hand, at Baila, where the cut grass was left lying where it fell, and over the road. The other spot looked worse as all the grass was on a road, i can't specify it though as i didn't pass the same site later to see if they had cleaned it up.

[Ghostrider]

^^^ They're not doing any better than last year from what I can see. Admittedly the area in question is "rough ground", however it's had three cuts this year already. The first one was fine, theres not much that can go wrong with an initial "quick strim" tidy up. The second was done early on a wet morning with a wheeled handheld mower, and the wheels were managing to collect a significant amount of clippings as they travelled, which, mostly got knocked off again when the operator turned the mower round to take the next cut, leaving, by the time he was done a significant path width strip of patchy gungy grass pulp part on the edge of the grass part on the pavement along one side of the plot. Add to that that he was running just a little too wide with the most of his cuts, which was leaving strips of cut, but somewhat longer grass at their edges.

 

This third cut just done was done with the ride on mower, and is okay as far as it goes, they just completely omitted to strim along a wall which runs along one side of the plot. Both examples, IMHO, made the area look considerably worse than if it had never been cut at all

 

All of these are "little" niggly issues I don't deny, however to me, it just illustrates an apparent carelessness and an undesirable standard of workmanship ethic on the part of the company and/or it's employees.

[Guest Anonymous]

If the workers they have are anything like those they had last year, I think it would be unfair to criticise them too much. They may be lacking in training and/or experience but they did seem to work hard.

Personally I think that by scrimping the price to get the contract, the company expects, not enough workers, to get through an unrealistic amount of work, in not enough time. Hence corners will be cut,, or not, (sorry about pun).

Blame for any shortcomings of the service lies fairly and squarely at the door of the numpty who awarded them the contract again. All that numpty had to do was to look at the difference in service and quality between Golders and the previous contractor.

 

Cheers,

Da Auld Een

[breeksy]

We could have done dee a peerie homer next time we're Wast

 

doh!

 

Sorry - couldn't resist...

[BigMouth]

They have done a reasonable job around by my place.

 

My only complaint was that one of them was strimming without eye protection. There again it is his eyesight and not mine

[Ghostrider]

If the workers they have are anything like those they had last year, I think it would be unfair to criticise them too much. They may be lacking in training and/or experience but they did seem to work hard.

 

Cheers,

Da Auld Een

 

Agreed. I've not managed to catch a swatch at this year's lot "in motion" as yet, but last year's crew certainly couldn't be faulted for enthusiasm or energeticness, it's a shame it wasn't matched by knowledge/experience/management allocating time/resources for them to produce better results.

 

The issues definitely lie entirely with the management, and those who appointed that management, for all the problems, either in expecting too much from inadequately trained/experienced people, or not allocating adequate time to be able to cover the work required to an acceptable standard.

[nautim]

They have done a reasonable job around by my place.

 

My only complaint was that one of them was strimming without eye protection. There again it is his eyesight and not mine

 

When we were in temporary council accomodation a host of people appeared and strimmed the grass, then left again. That was fine. This obviously spurred on the next door neighbours whose grass was quite long by this time. What worried me about the lack of eye (and face) protection was the fact that they had several large dogs who availed themselves of the same area which was being strimmed every day....

 

When **it hits the strimmer is it the same effect as **it hitting the fan?

[Tomblands]

Well, I've never actually hit turd with a fan, so I don't know exactly what happens.

 

Hitting a pile of dog poop with a strimmer is probably one of the most unpleasant things I have ever experienced...and I've been to and Aberdeen vs Dunfermline 0-0.

[Fjool]

I accidentally strimmed a frog once. Fortunately I was using a Fischer-Price 'My First Strimmer' and all that happened is the frog flew across the garden, hit a wall and lay looking dazed. It hopped off after a while to tell its mates about the gluff.

[Styumpie]

Taken from another thread....

 

I feel my profession has been slighted Wink

 

Styumpie wrote:

How difficult is it to cut grass?! Is it any more difficult than say boiling an egg, or tying your shoe laces? Lets face it, there are not many people of reasonable physical and mental fitness who are not capable of operating a lawn mower or strimmer

I take it you've never worked for a commercial grasscutting company then? It's completely different craic from pootering around the garden on a fine day with a Flymo and a Fisher Price strimmer

 

And you'd be surprised at how few people can skillfully, safely and efficiently operate lawn mowers and strimmers at an industrial level. That's why it's not just school bairns on their holidays that work for the contractors

 

*composure regained*

 

Sorry if it seems like I trivialised your career a bit Your job is every bit and more valid as allot of the jobs here in the isles, at least you do something constructive.

 

I've operated various sorts of industrial machinery. grass cutting from a scythe to some pretty heavy duty machinery, As with operating any heavy machinery, a measure of common sense is required. Lawn mowers, lawn tractors and large petrol strimmers are designed to be fairly simple and safe to use provided you follow the safety guidelines.