Discovering the joys of scything
Posted by Neil Ross - 16:57 on 10 August 2011
I was recently part of a small, enthusiastic group on a two day course learning how to mow using a scythe. Odd to think that mowing is such an old term, from long before petrol powered grass cutting. Penny Edwards and Martin Sherring very kindly organised and hosted the event on their croft on the edge of Culbokie. As well as a good variety of tall grass to cut, copious fresh coffee and mouth watering home baking kept the trainees well fuelled.
Our tutors were Steve Tomlin from Somerset and his Austrian partner Christiane Lechner, both very accomplished mowers. Both were exceptionally good at sharing their knowledge and experience in an interesting and engaging way. Click here for Steve's blog.
Four insights perhaps give a flavour of our experiences:
The tool itself comes in several parts and we learnt how to assemble those and set up the snathe (handle) and the blade angles to suit us each perfectly. The snathes we used were cut from ash in Switzerland, the blades were forged in Austria. Setting up is an easy, but essential step before effective mowing can be achieved.
Cleaning the equipment during and after mowing is far more important than I would have expected. All to do with maintaining a sharp cutting edge on the blade. It also avoids the formation of rust that can also impair that all important sharpness.
The sharpening process itself has to happen very frequently, and is a skill in itself, involving sharpening stones, peening, and if you are unlucky and hit a stone, a fine file. The fine sharpening stone is used wet to keep the blade sharp in the meadow. Each day the blade needs peening (banging between an anvil and a hammer) to draw fresh metal to a fine edge. It is all about sharpness!
Mowing using scythes can be, and certainly traditionally would have been, a very sociable group activity. Mowers follow each other creating parallel swathes of cut grass. When blades get blunt there is a switch to the sharpening ritual, giving a natural break. Raking up grass after drying and making hay in such a traditional, low impact, low carbon way is very satisfying, perhaps most so because it revives that spirit and practice of collaboration around manual land management that perhaps the oil fueled mechanised 'improvements' of the last Century robbed us of.
Do try it yourself if you get a chance.