Eric Piehl comments on mowing my 🌾︎ turf grass lawn

Prepare

Prepare to mow whenever your lawn:

• 🇺🇸 in the USA, starting on Mother's Day (the Second Sunday in May), according to Americans who worry about scarce early-blooming flowers to feed our early-season pollinators;  or
• does not contain flowers needed for early-season pollinators (see infographic ↗ above or to right);

and is:

• growing,
• ragged-looking, or
• the longest grass blades in your yard are nearing 50% longer than your mowing height, as described in the table ↓ below,
• maybe every 📅︎ 10 days depending on the season and weather,
• up until the first frost.

🤧︎ If allergies ever interfere with an awesome night's sleep.

I mow my 🌾︎ lawn with a Honda lawnmower, model=HRR2169VKA EJ, serial=MZCG-9229225, manual.    Light, fast, and reliable;  it mulches very well!  I love this mower!

Once every year or two, I service with an oil change, new air filter, spark plug, etc.

Then every time I go out to mow, I:

• ☑ Verify oil level:  (page 6)
    ◦  clean dipstick with rag,
    ◦  pull out,
    ◦  oil should be in hatched area.  As needed, add oil SAE 10W-30 API service SJ.
• Knock all grass fragments out of the air filter.  (page 12)   When it comes time to replace, do so with Honda lawnmower air filter 17211-Z8B-901.
• Do all the other ☑ pre-mow checks.  (page 4)
  
  
• Keep your lawn neat by cutting it even.  Not short — that just makes your lawn grow uneven faster.  Make life easy on yourself by following recommendations of House Digest, more House Digest, your local watershed council ( personalize myWatershed ), and me …
  
  

  If you are cutting or mulching (what is mulch?):	with grass length:		then set mower to blade height:	via setting each wheel's open slots:
  in or expecting drought, or 🌾︎ grass is tall and wet	11–15 cm   4⅓–6 in		10 cm   4 in	0 in front 5 behind
  🌾︎ grass is in normal condition
  	10–13½ cm   3¾–5¼ in		9 cm   3½ in	1 in front 4 behind
  🍃︎ leaves after nights are cool	8–12 cm   3–4½ in		8 cm   3 in	2 in front 3 behind

  
  
• ☑ Verify internal door is securely latched in position = MULCH.
• ☑ Verify gasoline level, adding if needed.
  
  
• Don PPE:
    ◦  👟︎ Closed-toe shoes with 🧦 socks (crew-length, not shorties).
    ◦  👓︎ Safety glasses.
    ◦  👂︎ Hearing protection (not necessary with this quiet Honda).
    ◦  🧤 Optional gloves.
    ◦  👒︎ Optional sunhat.
    ◦  🤧︎  If allergies from mowing may interfere with an awesome night's sleep tonight:
        (A) take your 💊︎ long-acting second-generation antihistamine you didn't bother with last night,
        (B) with a 🚰︎❄💧︎ tall glass of cold water, and
        (C) don a 😷 N99 or P100 HEPA respirator/​filter.
  In my town, Lowe's and Menards have a better selection of PPE and lighting vs. Home Depot.
  
  
• If you are going to 💨︎ blow off the roof, clean the skylights, or blow off the deck, do it now — mowing will do most of the cleanup.
• Walk your yard, and pick up downed sticks thicker than a pencil, plus 🍎︎ apples, walnuts, 🌰︎ chestnuts, hickorynuts, etc.  Or kick them under your shrubs.  And throw the neighbor-kids' toys back over onto their yard.
• If you are going to 🗡 edge or weed using mechanical methods, do it now — the perimeter mow will do most of the cleanup.
    ◦  Among my weeds is hairy bittercress  Cardamine hirsuta.
  
  
• Open gasoline valve, on left side of engine.
• Hold dead-man switch to handle.
• Pull to start.
• Mow …

Finish up

• Close gasoline valve, on left side of engine.
• If you have a leaf blower, 💨︎ blow clean your mower with your leaf-blower:  top, sides and underneath (blow in through cuttings-discharge chute).  This will help it dry out quicker, and last longer.
• Consider spraying mower blade with cooking oil.
• Put away mower.  If necessary, stow handle out of way.
• If you have a leaf blower, 💨︎ blow clean your garage, driveway and sidewalks.  This will make these areas nicer to walk on and look at.
  
  
• If you have 💦︎🛢 rain barrels, verify that they are still draining, not full of algae, etc., in accordance with 💦︎🛢 rain barrel installation, use and management.
• If the weeds just got away from your mechanical efforts above, and you have a spray bottle of 2,4-D or whatever appropriate to the job, now is a good time to spray herbicide on just the weeds you see:
    ◦  Follow all label instructions — 📄︎🛂︎ the label is the law.
    ◦  Keep 🚼︎ kids, 🐕︎ pets and 🚶︎ self away until dry.
    ◦  In a couple (four, eight, sixteen) days, monitor your effects.
    ◦  Among my weeds is hairy bittercress  Cardamine hirsuta.
  
  
• Early in the growing season, you can look into controlling crabgrass  genus Digitaria.
  IF you are in an area where you get crabgrass, AND
    it got away from you (mechanical means alone are insufficient), AND
    you can use a pre-emergent (read about whether this might kill your other grass or plantings),
  THEN these are my findings for me in my location …
  
  In February (temperate 🌐︎ Northern Hemisphere):  buy pre-emergent crabgrass killer with:
    ◦  Pendimethalin (a dinitroaniline by Dow).  Used on a broad range of crops, including in Europe.  Scotts Step1 has 1.29%.  Used in Scotts Weedgrass Preventer, Lesco Pre-M, Halts, Hilpendi, Pendulum, Prowl. Satellite, Stealth, Stomp.
    ◦  Dithiopyr (with fluorine, by Dow).  Limits root growth.  Do not use on new roots, nor within 4 months of (before nor after, apparently) reseeding.  Used in Dow Dimension, Meijer Crabgrass, Spectracide Crab.
    ◦  Prodiamine (a dinitroaniline with fluorine by Dow), Sandoz 1987.  Used on a broad range of crops.  Used in Barricade, Vigoro, Balan.
    ◦  Benefin plus trifluralin (first one a dinitroaniline by Dow) (second one with fluorine).  Banned in Europe.  Inhibits growth of roots and shoots.  Used in Team, Team Pro, and store brand Crabgrass.
  
  In March (temperate 🌐︎ Northern Hemisphere):
  After the ❄💦︎ snow melts, OR
    2 weeks after forsythia blooms begin to droop, OR
    when lilacs bloom, OR
    when your soil temperature nears 11–15°C (55–60°F), OR
    before air temperature nears 25°C (80°F), OR
    any of a number of other heuristics,
  -AND-
    when you expect a pretty-good steady rain in a couple hours–days,
  THEN apply above:
    ◦  As described on the label — 📄︎🛂︎ the label is the law.
    ◦  Keep 🚼︎ kids, 🐕︎ pets and 🚶︎ self away until dry.
    ◦  In a couple (four, eight, sixteen) days, monitor your effects.

References

^[1]  My notes indicate I heard Rick Darke say this at a conference 2015-03-07.  — EP 2016-10-01.

^[2]  My notes indicate I heard a 🗣 speaker say this at the same conference as above 2015-03-07.  — EP 2016-10-01.

😷 Respirators and face masks

👥︎ Protect others.  If:

• you live during the ☣⚕︎ COVID-19 coronavirus disease pandemic or flu season, or
• you are sick with anything,

get any of the respirator or mask types described ↓ below.   When 🚶︎🏠︎ in public, particularly indoors, wear it to 👥︎ protect others, including your immuno­compromised / medically-vulnerable 👪︎ family, 👥︎ friends and colleagues, and 👥︎🌐︎ all other residents of our planet. ^{[3] [4]}

👤︎ Protect yourself.  After making an appointment to protect you against ⚰💥︎🏥︎ severe disease, if:

• your 🤧︎ allergies ever interfere with an awesome night's sleep, ^[5] after:
    ◦  mowing the lawn,
    ◦  cleaning out the shed,
    ◦  🧹💨︎ sweeping or blowing out the garage, or
    ◦  vacuuming the basement.
• you have ⚠︎🫁  asthma ^[6] , ⚠︎🫁 cystic fibrosis CF ^[7] , or other ⚠︎🫁 chronic lung disease,
• you are immunosuppressed,
• you live in an area with 🔥︎░ wildfire smoke ^[8] , outdoor pollution, or 💨︎ windborne dust, or
• you ever work with anything ☠︎ poisonous or toxic — even 🪵 wood! ,

then get a reusable 😷 P100 HEPA or N99/​FFP3/​KF99 respirator/​filter mask that removes from the air 99.97% or 99% (respectively) of particulates,[?] including droplets in an aerosol[?] down to 0.3 micrometers (µm) (¹/_50,000 in) (about the size of a large virus).

The ⚕︎ medical industry loves their single-use N95/​FFP2/​KF94/​KN95 (🇺🇸 in USA, 60% of KN95 are counterfeit) respirators, that remove 95% of these particles.

Try hard to select masks actually do that, and are not counterfeit.   How to shop, how to spot fakes.   A good source.

For full effect, view the video ↗ above or to right by selecting the video image, then icons YouTube (if present), ⏯︎ ⊠ Skip Ads (if present), ㏄ captions (if you wish), ⛶ full­screen, and ▶︎ Play.

When 🚶︎🏠︎ in public (when density of people within that space × time you will be there exceeds your family's risk-tolerance), wear your mask to 👤︎ protect yourself.

After purchasing your 😷 respirator or face mask, please continue:

• 👥︎👤︎ Men, ✂︎ trim your 🧔 facial hair in accordance with 🇺🇸 USA CDC document "Facial Hairstyles and Filtering Facepiece Respirators"   (unless you plan to exclusively wear a HEPA helmet ).
  This author is happy to see his Air Force-style mustache (trim and stylish, the chevron, apparently) passes CDC criteria.
  
  
• 👥︎👤︎  ▶︎   Learn how to adjust and verify the fit of your respirator or face mask. Donning[?] procedures for models approved by 🇺🇸 USA CDC NIOSH > choose your type of mask, then your manufacturer.
  
  
• 👤︎ If you are going out to mow the lawn, clean the shed, 🧹💨︎ sweep or blow out the garage, or vacuum the basement.
    ◦  Before donning your 😷 respirator or face mask, drink a 🚰︎❄💧︎ tall glass of cold water.
    ◦  While wearing your 😷 respirator or face mask, take frequent breaks, with more 🚰︎🚰︎❄💧︎ tall glasses of cold water — your respirator makes it more difficult to dump heat.
  
  
• 👤︎ If your 👓︎░ glasses ever fog up while wearing your mask:
    ◦  don , then pull earloops down from earlobes,
    ◦  get an add-on headstrap, or get a mask or respirator with headstraps instead of earloops,
    ◦  get and adjust a face mask brace or bracket,
    ◦  learn how to better fit your mask or get a mask or respirator that seals better, or
    ◦  other ways to avoid foggy glasses while wearing a mask.
  
  
• 👤︎ If your respirator is mostly nonporous (e.g., soft rubbery elastomer such as silicone, and hard plastic),  ▶︎  learn how to 🫧💦︎ wash and 👕︎ dry your 😷 respirator.
  If wearing your 😷 respirator or face mask while mowing, you are going to be 💦︎ sweating into it a lot.  If your mow takes you over 🕐︎ an hour, you want to clean it after each day's use.  Shortly before I found this video, I discovered that I can disassemble my 3M 7502 above into three parts by separating the stiff darker pieces at the 👃︎ nose bridge at the embossed "M" "7502".  Cleans way better (you can actually rinse away all the spit and 🫧 soap), and dries way faster (hours, not days).  Do a good job, and you don't get a 👃︎ stale smell the next time you don your respirator!
  
  
• 👤︎ If your mask is built of porous com­po­nents (e.g., woven, felt or knit fabrics), and you intend to reuse it, let them 👕︎ dry well in a clean place between use, and let sit for a few days to 👕︎ dry and allow the virus to fall apart.

👥︎👤︎ If you are a 🏫︎ teacher, or 🗣 speak in-person to groups primarily from one place, and who probably should wear a mask but that might interfere with your job function:

• Get or make a portable room air cleaner as ↑ above.
• Better than that, get a mask you can wear — check out the 🗣😷 choir mask ↑ above.
• If needed, get a 🎤︎ microphone.

Happy mowing, cleaning, vacuuming, 🧹💨︎ sweeping and blowing!

(If you got to this respirator/​face mask section direct, check out sections 🤧︎ allergy and PPE ↑ above!)

References

^[3]  "Considerations for Wearing Cloth Face Coverings."  🇺🇸 USA CDC.  Updated June 28, 2020.   Accessed 2020-07-13.
   (With easier-to-read analysis "A quick note on masks and CDC guidance …"  Katelyn Jetelina.  2022-01-06.   Accessed 2022-09-20.)

^[4]  😷 "COVID-19:  Why we should all Wear Masks —
there is new Scientific Rationale."  Sui Huang.  2020-03-26.   Accessed 2020-04-25.