More or less. Slow broadband, driveway maintenance and private drains notwithstanding.
Oh, I'm well aware of this (fume, rage).
They get huge kickbacks from the VATman, too.
Yeah, there was frantic activity to grub up as many as possible before the legislation came into effect a couple of years ago.
Ahh, I see. We cut ours in the winter. We should do them twice, but it costs so much to have done I only get them done once. ObDIY: I did do them myself (by hand) for a couple of years, but it was *way* too much work.
I was thinking that hedging contractors are looking for *pre-season* work and might be cheaper/willing for what sounds like an awkward job.
There is actually much more as the RSPB would prefer fruit/berry bearing hedges to be rotationally trimmed every 3 years and then as late as possible in the Winter.
Wel, as I mentioned in another par tof the thread almost every boom-mounted flail cutter is going to be too heay for a compact tractor, and you're looking at the thich end of £10k for one that works properly. There are cutter bar trimmers which look like an oversized electrical hedgetrimmer, they're powered either hydraulically or via a mechanical linkage from the PTO. They're cheaper but less capable, having much less manoueverability than the boom types. Stiull they should be able to do both a vrtical and horizontal cut and they will be much neater than flail which tends to spliner branch ends.
Somethign else to think of where you are going to house the tractor + accessories. I measured each item and drew up a floor plan for a new barn designed to let me stack the accessories two deep at one end of the barn. We have a rotovator, flail mower, ploughs, harrows and tipping boxes. I regard that as a fairly minimal set of tools.
The one local to us, Sparsholt, offers a weekend course that was certainly worth attending. They provide everything and it's a good way to get some experience before purchase.
I think as someone else has said you get a choice when you buy between a new Chinese make or a second-hand good quality Japanese. Given your use, I'd probably specify turf tyres otherwise it won't be long before any lawn is a bog. I'd also, if I were you, look at having one with the same sized tyres all round, but the only ones that I know like this are the iso-dyametric range made by Goldoni the Quasar:
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the smaller Euro/Maxter/Cluster models:
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tiny, these models are real farmyard machinery with a decent complement of double-acting spool valves and a decent PTO. The Quasar is probably too big, although as you can see from the images it has the useful feature of having two PTOs, one forward, one rear. This is a
*really* useful feature for lawn work.
Goldonis are incredibly popular in the USA as yard tractors and in California for tending vines. Less so here, but I think one of the dealers is out your way (the other is a few miles down the road from me).
Nearly, Essex:
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's more detail on the Euro range here, for some reason BSG have renamed them the "Quad" tractor:
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checking because of the range of tools, which will fit all compacts.
The worst substance that I have accidentally flailed is plastic water pipe, the black stuff usually buried undergraound for providing a mains supply to the house. Our builder threw about 10 metres of the stuff onto our land - the grass grew up and I couldn't see it. When I mowed it wrapped around the flail bar and melted. That took two days of dismantling and cutting with a bread knife to get the flail back in working order.
A (very) second-hand tractor and the new tools for use with it ran me the thick end of £30K and then I had to pay another 40K for the tractor shed/barn to house it.
It's not cheap by any stretch of the imagination and it indicates why contractors want £500 a go for hedging. A lot of that money will go on the lease payment they make on the machinery.
That's how most small farmers fund this sort of equipment BTW, they have to sit down and create a business plan for the cashflow. At present my neighbour isn't taking a wage from his farm (he can pay his kids however) since the lease paments eat up every penny made from the farm. A twitch in produce prices will see him either in profit or bankrupt.
I am not aware of any hedges here (Herts) being grubbed up in advance of the legislation. Undoubtedly there was an opportunity to amalgamate small fields and remove inconvenient ditches.
Pony paddocks can be registered and claims paid:-)
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