Embracing yard work in retirement

[Koolau]

I do yard work now self limited to 4 hours a day. Otherwise I could be doing yard work 24/7. I don’t embrace it, but I do enjoy mowing on my riding mower, and riding around in my Polaris ranger side by side. View attachment 59338

Way cool vehicle!

Too bad it's not street legal. Would be fun to get "looks" as you drove down the street (heh, heh, or the sidewalk). Thanks for sharing.

 

[flyingaway]

I always do yard works as free exercises.

 

[Al18]

I enjoy yard work - most of the time. The yard mowing is easier since switching to an electric mower. Not back breaking to start the mower, and the electric runs smoother with less noise. Another plus is I get about 45 minutes per charge - a forced break on the hottest days.

 

[Ronstar]

Way cool vehicle!

Too bad it's not street legal. Would be fun to get "looks" as you drove down the street (heh, heh, or the sidewalk). Thanks for sharing.

I live in an unincorporated subdivision where most people have side by sides or golf carts. Lots of them on the subdivision roads, but I rarely see them on the county roads outside of our subdivision. I’m not sure if they are legal on the roads in our area or not. They are legal by ordinance in some nearby communities. I do take mine for a ride on our subdivision roads a few times a year just for fun.

 

[pjigar]

When we moved this summer from a 2.5 acre lot in Wisconsin to a small xeriscaped lot in Tucson, the mowing all went away. There is still some trimming of native shrubs and making sure the big Saguaro and lime tree get enough water but not much else. Oh, I do have one new yard task: a nightly patrol of the back yard for scorpions with a black light. Found quite a few in the first couple of weeks but rarely now.

When we moved to acreage, we would spot many snakes (almost once every couple of weeks) around the house. I am a snake affectionado so it was exciting to witness so many different species (10 so far) of snakes living around us. But after a couple of years of mowing around the house, they have all pushed out their territory. I rarely see any snakes around the house. The only ones we see around the house is either a western rat snake or plain-bellied water snake. I am sure they are still around and I just don't see them near the house.

 

[pjigar]

I also enjoy yard work. I have sort of transformed the abandoned acreage slowly over the years. A little bit of regular work can work magic over the years. Yard work is my excuse to get out of the house, get some fresh air, and sun (and some allergens to keep the allergies at bay).

 

[folivier]

Never was fond of yard work even though we usually had 1-2 acre yards to mow. Did it out of necessity. Now nothing to do at the condo. At the cabin grass isn't a problem since it doesn't grow enough to have to mow. I do enjoy cutting and splitting firewood. At least for now but at 71 even that's starting to get old.
We do use our Ranger to get around our cabin neighborhood, especially in winter with tracks when the roads are closed.

 

[Cassius King]

I thoroughly enjoy doing yard work.
I love doing yard work, getting it done then jumping in the pool with a drink.

 

[TheWizard]

I thoroughly enjoy doing yard work.
I love doing yard work, getting it done then jumping in the pool with a drink.

Into the hot tub with a drink for me...

 

[38Chevy454]

I've got 2.5 acres, mostly lawn. Big 60 inch zero turn mower and do it myself. DW likes gardening and have lots of plants around house and along fence lines.

Sometimes the yard work is fairly physical when doing lot of trimming or pruning. But for the majority it's low physical work and good way to get some outside time with a little hidden exercise.

 

[jollystomper]

My yard work is pleasant exercise for me. It is not too large (a little more than an acre) to be overwhelming, and I do a portion at a time. I like moving around, and the visual sense of accomplishment I get. have my ear buds in listening to music or a humorous or sports podcasts, and the time passes nicely.

At times the neighboring dogs will come to the fences with their "greetings nice hooman, you are doing nice work and we hate to bother you, but might you have a bit of a snack for us?" barks, and that is a fun break .

 

[like2]

I had a gardener for mowing the lawn, but once retired I got a battery powered mower and took over the job. I have always maintained the trees and shrubs myself. The addition of lawn maintenance is pretty enjoyable for me. My yard is not huge, the time to
mow front and back is usually around an hour. I normally spend 4-8 hours a week on overall yard work.

 

[athena53]

I'm getting tired of it. I have gardens in several areas on my property and try not to use weed killer because it drains downhill into the lake. I'd go broke buying mulch. So, it's mostly pruning and hand-weeding. The side yard with the hosta bed has little bitty poison ivy plants here and there and I have to be very careful because when I get it it ends up spreading to places on my body that were never exposed. Thank heaven for Urgent Care and prednisone.

Mowing was a harder cardio workout than anything else I did (push mower, not self-propelled). I had to give that up after open-heart surgery (pushing with that force would stress my healing sternum) and hired a service. I'm keeping them. I have gotten back into weeding and pruning. I had to- I'm planning to put the house on the market in the spring and move to a retirement community. I WILL have a balcony. I'll grow a few herbs and maybe some flowers in pots and call it good.

 

[1242Vintage]

Have a very large yard, creek and an orchard on acreage beyond that at our place. Yard and orchard maintenance is my therapy.

Put on the headphones with favorite music and I’m good to go for a few hours.

Only task that I don’t enjoy happens after rainstorms. All the debris in the creek from upstream parcels washes down into my flat section of the creek. If I don’t clear that out, it blocks the flow and floods my orchard. Not good for my trees!

 

[Sanbenito1]

yard work is more fun than going to the gym! I find it to be a creative process, too

 

[INTJ10]

I do the yard work for the exercise. Most of it is mowing, trimming and blowing a small yard with electric tools.

 

[ychuck46]

At 72 I still do all the yard work myself, as well as all general maintenance around the house, including electrical and plumbing. I do it for two simple reasons, namely it is exercise, and I am too cheap to pay someone else to do it. Right now I have a huge amount of leaves to get up since we are heavily wooded which I do with the lawn tractor and the Cyclone Rake. In the spring it will be back to some planting and taking down trees, although I will have to hire for the massive ones that will need a cherry picker.

 

[big-papa]

We bought hour house as newlyweds in 1990. No landscaping had ever been done on it and we experienced the joy of putting all of that in ourselves - exactly what we wanted and where we wanted it. Time goes by, things get replaced, but that's life.

At one point in time, life got so hectic that I simply didn't have time, so I hired a lawn care service for several years. Then I found myself between jobs for about 10 months and started doing the mowing/trimming myself again - that was about 10 years ago or so. Retired now and I don't mind replacing plants, putting new plants in, etc. But I absolutely hate mowing and trimming. We have an acre and it takes a couple of hours once a week, but as often as once every 4 days when we get steady rain. Seriously thinking about going back to a service...

Already get plenty of exercise during the week, which I actually enjoy.

 

[ArmchairMillionaire]

We live on a small city lot, plus an extra 1/2 lot with a second driveway.

I have an almost 20 year-old MTD (Yard Machines) 24" push-mower. The original frame rusted out a few years back, but DBIL had an empty frame (he gave the mower engine to a friend) so I swapped my engine and blade onto the older frame (still 1/8" steel so it won't rust out as fast as the newer, thinner one did) and even though the engine is almost 20 years old, it still starts on the first pull. It takes me 40 - 45 minutes to cut all the grass. I actually really enjoy mowing the yard with my non-self-propelled push-mower. I also volunteer to cut the grass at DMIL's house (she's 70) over the summers as well.

My neighbor had one of those electric mowers about 7 or 8 years ago, but his must have been an early model. His lawn is smaller than mine (takes about 1/2 hour to cut) and that EZ-GO electric mower would cut it on a single charge the first year. The second year he had it it would cut about 3/4 of the way before the batteries died so he would fire up the gas mower to finish the job. The third year, he could only cut about 1/2 the yard on a charge before he had to bring out the gas mower... Now he only has a gas mower.

My gas mower is put away for the winter. Tomorrow, I'll fire up the snowblower with some fresh non-ethanol gasoline and make sure everything works correctly. This will probably be the last year I'll be able to use it. It's starting to crumple in some areas due to rust. I don't think I'll be able to just swap the engine out on the snowblower, though. I bought it for $425 about 12 years ago. I think similar ones are going for around $1400 nowadays, but I guess that's a post for the inflation thread.

 

[hotwired]

I actually owned a lawn care and landscaping company 28 years until 2017. I did more than the average bloke in our yard but in retirement I'm trying to step it up.

The various lily vases are taken from June through September. I've got them staggered. You can look at bloom times and heights and create a pretty constant rotation.

The rock wall is brand new I had no vision but spent 3-5 hours each day, 3x per week pulling stumps and rocks out of the ground, re-loaming and seeding the areas I'd devastated and using those rock plus repurposed rock from an ancient wall nearby. I then dumped composted loam along the front, shaped it into a bed, then divided and transplanted 30 or so iris and stella d'oro lily , then mulching. It SHOULD be natural enough that I don't have to spend much time each spring

 

[VanWinkle]

I do all of my yard work and gardening. I raised veggys for 40
years, but now just grow landscape plants and flowers. We have
common area behind our new home in Tennessee and
I have started a small garden in the Common area where a
tree came down last year. It gets enough sunshine for "partial"
sun plants. I enjoy getting out and working in the yard, but that may
change in the future. I am still young at 70 and able to handle
the chores without pain killers.

 

[sengsational]

I like Steve's bite sized chunks approach. That's kind of how I approach yard work now, as opposed to a "get it all done on the weekend" approach before retirement, which left a bad taste in my mouth for yard work.

If the weather is nice (or I'm prepared for the weather), not too many bugs, etc, I'll spend just enough time outside doing yard work, but the second it gets uncomfortable or uninteresting, I retreat from the work. Then repeat. Enough gets done, and I get a little segment of cardio. The key for me is to just get out and walk around, because just imagining "trim the bushes" doesn't get me going. I have to see the bushes, along with lots of other things, and pick the job that motivates me. I'm not a huge mowing guy (kinda boring), so my wife does that, along with the flowers. I do everything else.

 

[audreyh1]

I actually did some yard work this week, ha ha. It’s been too hot until now. Just some plant trimming and cleaning up a bit. They are going to be spreading new mulch in the garden beds soon.

HOA services includes plant trimming, but we always skip the Oct/Nov trim because our yard is full of butterflies right now and we don’t want any blooms cut off.

 

[imjustawarrior]

I was going to clean up the leaves in my front yard one last time, but a strong wind came along and did the work for me. I feel sorry for the people at the end of the street. They get all the leaves and tumble weeds.

 

[Gumby]

I still have at least three more weeks of leaf clearing left. I put them in 3ft x 3ft x 3 ft bags, haul them out to my garden in the back of my Forester and dump them on top of my plot. I'll till them under in the spring.