7 ms·

What is wrong with using a rake to pick up leaves? Leafblowers are loud, dirty, they raise huge clouds of dust, they stink of gasoline, and at the end of the da

• trothamel 8y ago
  Blowing leaves is faster - why would a service use leaf blowers if it wasn't less work. And of course, that's the big issue here. By taking more time, raking makes cleaning the yard more expensive. When it comes to people in houses, that makes yard care more of an expense, which means some people will have to spend more time doing it rather than hiring a service. When it comes to condos or rentals where it's included, it makes rent more expensive. But hey, some louts won't have to put up with the sound of a leafblower for a few minutes a week. Who cares if everyone is worse off?
  • eropple 8y ago
    Services use leaf blowers because it's less work and because they don't give a shit about the externalities they create. It's more than just sound. Leaf blowers mostly use dirty, dirty two-stroke engines. Tons of emissions--which, regardless of the smell, we should be minimizing--and an awful stink. If you can afford a house, you can rake the lawn and sweep the driveway. Or, as the article notes, even in Totalitarian Hellscape Washington you can buy a battery-powered leaf blower. What a horrible horrible sacrifice you must make.
    • loudtieblahblah 8y ago
      I own a house. I have medical problems limiting just how much I can exert myself. This wasn't true when i initially bought the home. Raking leaves, is a 3-5 times event that could take me about 16 hours (an entire weekend) each time. Blowing the leaves takes about 5-6 hours. I had an electric blower for a long time and honestly, it only shaved off maybe a 10th of my time b/c it simply wasn't strong enough. I recycle, i drive a hybrid, i compost and garden, i have an electric mower. But for some people who spout endlessly about "externalizes", it's like there's no end to minimizing my foot print until i just up and commit suicide. You all sit back with your high and mighty judgements and half of you are just kids who've never been responsible for anything but yourselves, or dorky urbanites who have half a putting green for a yard in high crime areas. Or hell..both things at once.
      • eropple 8y ago
        Ah yes. Dorky urbanites. Certainly nobody who grew up in areas most minimally called "exurbs" would ever say that a two-stroke engine is unconscionably filthy to run. Certainly nobody who ever hand-raked a five-acre lawn growing up. One of the nice side effects of moving out of such places is that the impact I cause on the environment is significantly smaller and with effort it can be smaller still, but definitely--no idea what I'm talking about. Nope. Or, put more bluntly: your complaints are against the voices in your head. Airing them here is ugly. And you still shouldn't use gas-powered blowers. (I'd say "at least use a four-stroke", but they're probably too heavy to be practical given what you've said.)
      • toomuchtodo 8y ago
        Have you considered an electric leaf blower?
        • loudtieblahblah 8y ago
          i have one. It works about a 1/4 as well as a gas one. Using a rake takes me 2 days to rake my yard. (about 16 hours) An electric blower, 1.5 days (roughly 10-12 hours) A gas blower takes me about 4 hours. I have 2 medical conditions going on right now and can't pay someone $200 every single time i need my yard picked up. I spend enough in medical bills right now.
          • toomuchtodo 8y ago
            If you email me (email in profile), I would like to help you find a solution considering your constraints.
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  • peteradio 8y ago
    Two stroke engines that power these things are dirty as fuck. Sucks to be the worker running these things, I'm super sure they are compensated appropriately and provided the necessary protection gear. Let alone anyone outside within 100 feet.
    • toomuchtodo 8y ago
      Two stroke engines should be outlawed entirely. There is no reason for them to still be sold with batteries having advanced as much as they have. Hand held tools and scooters can be electric, small outboard motors for marine applications can be four stroke or propane fired.
      • abraae 8y ago
        If you're carrying your tool in to somewhere remote for a day's work, filthy old two stroke is the easiest, most energy dense power source. As opposed to a truck load of batteries.
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        • HarryHirsch 8y ago
          Wait, what. This is about the yard crew and their hand tools. Everyone has electric at home, and the power cord has been invented.
          • toomuchtodo 8y ago
            Yard crews can also carry batteries and chargers for hand tools. I know because I’ve helped setup a trailer charging system, powered by solar, for a local landscaping contractor. The only tool they use that is fossil powered is a propane riding mower (which is clean burning). I am working on building them an electric riding mower with reclaimed Tesla modules from an S.
• yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
  > Using a leafblower is a sign of entitled loutishness. You were fine up until here. Insulting people for wanting to use an easier option isn't a great look.
  • toomuchtodo 8y ago
    I don’t think it’s wrong to comment on people who care more about convenience and cost then the externalities they’re creating (air and noise pollution). “Selfish” is not a protected class.
    • HarryHirsch 8y ago
      Especially on this website, where you can find a substantial number of people working from home in upscale developments. Also this: the leafblower ban was voted on and passed. The majority of Washingtonians thinks that running your petrol toy in public is so rude and bothersome that the practice needs a city ordinance banning it.
      • winnin_the_game 8y ago
        Your comparison doesn't actually hold. Working from home, while more convenient, actually decreases the externalities we pass on to others.
    • Nasrudith 8y ago
      I am in the "screw even bothering with leaf raking for anything but recreation" camp but I think that is essentially the longstanding state of progress when it comes to efficiency. It often pays off but not without costs and it shouldn't be done to extremes. We don't use x-rays to fit shoes anymore for instance.
    • loudtieblahblah 8y ago
      Neither is young, urba, stuck up progressives with good guy badges and pseudo morals
• ars 8y ago
  A rake only works on grass. But if you have taller bushes and other types of plants it's pretty much impossible with anything else except a leafblower. Also, good luck raking on the side a small, but steep, hill - you can't even stand on the hill without lots of pain and damaging the surface. But you can use a leafblower from the top. i.e. just because you have a limited experience in the world, doesn't mean others do too.
  • iguy 8y ago
    Do those need to be leaf-free? I mean I thought the point was lawns, with less labor than a rake. But on land far too steep for lawn, can't you just leave things alone? (I own exactly 2 pot-plants, FWIW.)
    • ars 8y ago
      It's not too steep for a lawn though. (It's tough to mow, but not impossible.) Plus even if you have flowers and such you don't want lots of leaves there.
      • iguy 8y ago
        How do you mow lawn on a slope you can't even reach with a rake? Maybe with a goat? :) And, in my limited understanding of horticulture, I thought leaves happened later in the year than flowers. Don't they blow off or turn into fertiliser before spring?
    • loudtieblahblah 8y ago
      you spend time making a garden, and then tell me if you want leaves blocking the sunlight and suffocating everything you spent time planting.
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  • quantum_magpie 8y ago
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• jccalhoun 8y ago
  What's wrong with leaving the leaves where they land?
  • ndnxhs 8y ago
    I do prefer when the council blows away the leaves on the bike paths because it gives you better grip.
  • loudtieblahblah 8y ago
    Because I ensure my property is taken care of so rodents don't take over my property, so bugs and ticks don't make it dangerous for my kid to go out and play, so the elements don't erode away the drive-way, sidewalks, and foundation of my home. I think anyone making the comment you're making has had very limited exposure to suburban or even rural life. Your 2 cents is applicable for people living in apartments, or urban centers where at most you're getting a 3x3ft patch of land you call a yard. I chose to live where I live so my kid could have somewhere to play outside that didn't require a bus pass or a car trip. Where my dog can run free on my property. Where I can grow a garden on my own. Unfortunately, I'm surrounded by trees and I upkeep my property not just FOR ME and all my "selfish" reasons but also so my leaves don't blow over into my neighbor's yard and undo all the work they did to get their leaves up. I don't think it's all that absurd that humans wish to control the environment around their homes. Either for practical or aesthetic reasons. I get minimizing environmental impact. I spent 16 back breaking hours plugging zoysia grass in my yard so i wouldn't need weed killers and such down the line (it grows so thick, it chokes out weeds). I use an electric mower b/c they've gotten good enough to rival most gas mowers. I had to buy an extra 2 batteries to get through my yard, but it works. But I have a herniated disc and a currently undiagnosed GI problem - I have a child to take care of. I work full time. If a little noise from a leaf blower from 9am until 4-5pm, with some breaks, is just too much for some people b/c I'd rather get my leaves up in half to a whole day as opposed to 2-3 days with a rake, then they go sit and spin. At least I take care of my property, unlike a bunch of lazy, do-nothing trash that can't bother
• loudtieblahblah 8y ago
  It takes me 2 days at 8 hours a day to pick up my yard with a rake. It takes me a half day with a leaf blower. Between October and Feb I may have to pick up leaves 3 or 4 times to keep it from killing my grass or at the very least not be a bad neighbor and allow my leaves to blow over into the yard of people who just picked up theirs I have a kid to take care of, other house upkeep to do, a 40-50 hour a week job. This whole thread is filled with young, urban kids who have never been responsible for property
  • loudtieblahblah 8y ago
    I should also mention - Leaf blowers are a god send for people with medical problems that 8+ hours of raking would seriously harm them or be impossible for them.
  • HarryHirsch 8y ago
    Yes, it's the suburbanite problem of too much house, too much yard. There's too much of everything to keep in presentable condition. One solution would be to hire outside help to keep the excess of stuff clean, but that may be expensive. There's another solution, to cut down on the amount of stuff. When I was a kid the lawn would take 30 minutes to mow with a push lawnmower, and maybe 45 minutes for raking. Once a week. On Saturdays, because Sundays is quiet day. Washington told its citizens to either earn enough and keep quiet or downsize to keep quiet. It's a good start. It's time that other peoples' ostentatiousness stopped spilling over in my domain. Leafblowers are just one symptom. SUVs are another.
    • loudtieblahblah 8y ago
      I'd rather have all the problems of the suburbs time 10 than live in then be ping ponged between the classist snobs that live in well off areas in urban centers and the high crime areas of those not so well off, with all your pollution and your asthma that you're breathing in day in and day out in concentrated ways, while taking my kid out to throw a ball or to walk my dog means i need to hop in a car and go to a park 5 miles away. Portlandia isn't for everyone.
  • 8y ago