Well it’s been another busy few weeks, with the West Country Scything Festival, running courses here, and in Kent, and my own scything.
The fifth Scything festival was held over the weekend 13th/14th June. I collected two mates en route, and we spent a day in Somerset, helping some friends to cut some grass in their pasture. On the Saturday I taught on the course for experienced mowers, aimed at improving their sharpening (peening), and mowing. Sunday was the day of the competiton, and I qualified for the finals, in second position, behind the eventual winner. I didn’t get in the top three, mainly due to an untidy cut, but am happy to have made it so far. This is going to be my last year competing, and I’ll be helping with the judging next year.
I arrived home Monday night, and had one day to get sorted out before leaving for Kent, to conduct two short courses for a group of volunteers on Thursday. That was followed by another day of preparation, before running one of my scheduled courses, here in Lincolnshire on Saturday.
Things have settled down a little since then. I’m now mowing my own grass, starting at 4.30, for two and a half hours each morning. I’ve done about an acre now, with a bit of help from a friend, with about twelve hours of mowing to achieve that. Three more acres to go. providing that I can maintain the early starts, i should get the whole lot cut by ther middle of July, and will probably give it a second cut in October.
At the festival, I picked up one of Simon’s new peening anvils, the expensive German one, with the little rest on it. It’s a better shape than the others, and I have found it particularly useful when peening lots of blades for courses, as it is a bit quicker than a standard peening anvil.
Bookings are coming in for the remaining courses, and if you’re interested in learning to use a scythe, details can be found on the relevant page.
Deano
Thanks Deano for the excellent instruction on your June 09 scything course (and Bev for the tea and yummy cakes!). Although I had an idea of the mechanics of mowing from your introductory course in the Forest of Dean, June 08, it was great to be able improve on that and put it together with the sharpening of the blade (through peening), setting the blade to the handle and the handle (snath) to suit my size. What also really helped reinforce what I learned on the Saturday was staying at yours a bit longer with the opportunity to sharpen and mow two more times. Midday mowing on Sunday was hot, hard work and showed up a decided lack of fitness. However, on the early Monday morning mow at 4:30am the grass definitely seemed easier to cut or was I starting to get the hang of it? One way to find out, I’ll have to come back for some more mowing! Thanks again for a great course.
Hi steve
You’re always welcome.
Thanks for the pictures, I’m going to get them posted shortly, along with some from my workshop in Kent, and some from the scything festival.
Take Care
Deano