Monthly Archives

February 2025

Feb 15
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First mower oil change in two seasons!?

By | Lawn Care, mowers | No Comments

Don’t slip up

Oil changes are important. If you own a car you know that regular oil changes are crucial to your car’s performance. The same goes for gas lawn mowers, like my Honda. I bought my mower two years ago through Facebook marketplace on the North Shore for only $125.

My work on the following weekend paid for it, and it’s been running great for two full seasons. On old, dirty oil. Don’t be like me.

Since I had never done an oil change on a mower, I wrongly assumed I needed a pump to extract the oil. So I searched for a pump on Amazon and other websites and, when I couldn’t decide on a good, affordable model, I put it off. I’m a busy guy and my Honda kept humming with dirty oil.

Changing your mower oil

While I was making my landscape business plans for 2025, taking care of my mower was on the list, and I finally got to it over the holidays. I had to get it off my to-do list.

I didn’t buy a pump, I simply tipped my mower on its side and emptied the oil into an empty car oil container. And man, was it black. I will probably change the oil again at mid-season, just because. I don’t mow a lot during the week so changing the oil twice in one season should suffice.

Full-time landscaping companies change mower oil every two months. It depends on your mower use. Homeowners can probably get away with one oil change a year but, at only $9, it can be done more often.

I bought mower oil at the nearest RONA location for C$9. No big deal. But I had to double-check the oil chamber volume for my Honda mower model. The number should be visible right on the mower body.

I think it was just under 600mL so I put the full container in. That’s it. Yes, I was kicking myself for not doing it sooner but I’m a busy guy.

Other changes

You can expect things to fall apart on a used mower. For example, the throttle cable blew up so I bought a new one online and changed it myself. I can’t afford C$90+ shop rates so I make small changes myself. If the engine dies, I will get a new mower but Hondas are amazing machines, so it’s unlikely. At C$125 used, this was a great investment because the mower has been making me money for two seasons already.

My pull cord also broke so I switched the whole top plastic cover to which the pull cord mechanism is anchored. It gives the mower a newer, fresher look. Incidentally, I always recommend having a full pull cord mechanism handy as a spare so you can switch in the field and avoid downtime.

Also check your spark plug and air filter.

Lastly, sharp blades are mandatory. I used to get my mower blades sharpened but the cost is similar to a new pair of blades. So, I usually start the mow season with brand new blades and I use a file to sharpen the old, dull blades. It’s a lot of work but it’s cheap. One day I will upgrade to a bench grinder.

Conclusion

Your gas mower works hard all season so give it some love. I’m glad I finally upgraded my used Honda this winter so I can start the mow season in spring with confidence. I need that baby to hum all year.

Feb 08
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On the cost of switching to plastic turf

By | Lawn Care, Turf | No Comments

The problem

As soon as I took a look at the lady’s small sparse lawn, I understood her frustrations. She lives in a strata and the lawn is a skinny rectangle where grass barely holds on. Of course, this was in early January so you can’t really judge the patch; I’m sure it looks better in May.

Still, it’s a small patch, and a tall spruce tree towers right above it, which means plenty of shade and acidic needles raining down on it all year. Grass needs plenty of light to thrive.

Shade, spruce needles and heavy use.

Can you switch to turf?

Yes, you can but it will cost you. The homeowner got one $2,500 quote and gave up. Normally you would get at least three quotes but, clearly, it was too expensive. Considering the cost of living in 2025 Canada and Donald Trump’s tariff threats, plastic turf is a luxury, not a necessity.

Why is it so pricey? You have to pay for materials and labour, follow the steps outlined below and deal with poor access. There is only stair access which means heavy labour.

Plastic steps

Step one involves removing the old grass and maybe one to two inches of soil, then levelling it nicely. All of this excess dirt has to be walked down stairs.

Once this initial step is completed, you have to install crushed rock which forms the firm base for your plastic turf. And, again, this is a nightmare for the underpaid hired hands because they have to walk it up the stairs, probably in buckets.

Raking and compaction follow. The machine can be lifted up the stairs but it won’t be pleasant. Then you run it over the rock base to make sure it’s solid.

The last step involves installing the turf and anchoring it with pins.

$2,500 seems like a lot of money to switch a small rectangular patch of grass to turf but there’s considerable labour involved, plus the cost of materials.

Crushed rock base, heavily compacted.

What CAN you do?

Well, we pruned the spruce tree, taking out some of the lower branches but nothing too crazy. There are privacy issues because the spruce tree forms a natural barrier between neighbours who may or may not want to see each other too much. But it should let more light in.

You can also get rid of the needles periodically and apply lots of lime to try and lower the pH level. When the soil is too acidic the grass plants may not be able to get or use available nutrients.

Water and fertilize liberally.

Conclusion

I love this example: not every homeowner is ready to shell out thousands for plastic turf. Not that I like plastic turf. Personally, I would keep the weak lawn even if my pockets were deep.

Feb 01
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Why beech trees are hard to forget!

By | Gardens, Trees | No Comments

Hands bleeding

One of the trees we looked at during my winter plant identification course walk was a huge weeping beech tree (Fagus). It’s located near the main building inside the Van Dusen Botanical Gardens. It’s a beautiful, massive, weeping specimen.

In our multi-family strata complexes, where there is less space available, it’s common to see columnar beech specimens which stay upright and narrow. All you have to do is prune them back into shape once in a while.

It wasn’t hard to find the leathery brown leaves; there were piles of them by the rock wall. So I collected a few and now I’m pressing them in one of my books at home. Looking at leaves in winter obviously helps you identify the tree. Assuming the leaves are really from the tree you’re looking at. Always collect as much information as you can.

Buds

Tree buds are obviously the key identifying feature in winter. And here I have a lot of bad experience. Years ago in White Rock, my task was to thin out beech trees that had previously only been power sheared. It was a bit slow because beeches have this habit of fusing their branches.

That’s another key identifying feature; and it makes pruning slow and annoying because the branches you want to remove, may be fused with neighboring branches. That makes it difficult to extract them and could lead to unintended large holes in your tree.

Blood on my hands

By far the worst beech bud feature is its sharpness. I didn’t pay any attention to this in the beginning. I knew it was a beech tree and I made a lot of mess. So when it came to removing the branches I lost a lot of blood when my fingers collided with the sharp buds. I couldn’t believe how sharp and dangerous the buds were. I literally had blood on my hands.

That’s why it’s very unlikely I will ever forget beech trees and their sharp, pointy buds. Beeches are beautiful trees, yes. I especially like their fuzzy seed capsules and the seeds inside them. We found some in the leaf litter at Van Dusen. But do be careful when handling beech branches because the buds are super sharp. I think you need heavy duty gloves to handle them.

Beech tree buds