Best method for one man leaf removal in a large yard

[macgyer58]

I have about 2 acres of property. Pretty heavily treed around the edges and about 8 huge oaks over the 1 1/2 acres of grass area. I just got a ZTR to mow the lawn and I'm trying to figure out the best way to get rid of the leaves. In other words, what method will allow me ( one person with no helpers) to get the leaves off the lawn in the least amount of time. The two options I'm looking at are...

1) Buy a backpack leaf blower and a wheeled blower ( could use advice on what horsepower to get 5hp, 15hp, or somewhere in between), and blow them into the surrounding wooded areas.

2) Get a cyclone rake to attach to the ZTR. I'll still need to purchase a backpack blower or the optional 17 foot hose to get leaves from the planting beds.


Forgetting the cost of the system, does anyone have any comments on these two options in terms of time involved and any other advantages or disadvantages. Anyone had any experience with both? Thanks

[DoWhatYouDo91]

to save the most time go with a cyclone rake, get the model that meets your needs. get a back pack blower, instead of the 17ft, or estate house (there're heavy and somewhat hard to manuever), save yourself some time blow em out of the beds and suck them up with the cyclone, just my opinion of what i do with my cyclone.

-John

[Puddle of Oil]

try a leaf plow on the front of your ztr then a trac vac/cyclone rake for the back of the mower, or ether or. wb blowers and bb blowers as well.

[hackitdown]

I bet the blowers will be fastest. Blow 95% of the leaves into the woods, then go over the lawn with the mower to suck up the last few leaves.

If you do it weekly or so, you can run the blowers for 10 or 15 minutes, then just mow the lawn as usual, in the usual amount of time.

An 8 or 9HP walk-behind blower will be fine, and will fire the leaves a good 20 feet into the woods, and disperse them nicely. I'd suggest a huge backpack, like a BR600.

The thing with a cyclone rake is that you will develop big piles of leaves wherever you dump. And I'm not sure that you will use it for anything else all year, where a backpack will be used all year.

[macgyer58]

It sounds to me like either setup will work and maybe its just a matter of personal preference. I was hoping to try out the leaf blowers a few times and see how much of an effort it is with that first. The problem is that there are places to rent the wheeled blowers but no one seems to rent the back packs naround here.

Thanks for the input. I'd be happy to hear from anyone else who has an oppinion.

[JJS]

backpacks are worth every penny, we have 2 packs gonna pick up another, 3 blowers, 9, 11, 14 hp, just bought a leaf plow for the ztr, have a olathe lawn sweeper, collection system on the zero, tarps rakes, 37hp giant vac. hopefully have the solution to any leaf problem that we come across.

[nobagger]

My advise, find some help! We do a few larger accounts and even with 3 or 4 guys its quite a job. We use 3 big back pack blowers, a 10hp and a 9hp w/b blower, a walk behind mower for a bulldozer, a z turn as a bulldozer and our leaf loader and I bet you were there 11hrs.

[Micheal2008]

I did my moms back yard and alittle of neighbors yard just to test out my brothers echo 775t and seems to take me longer then i wanted/ figured.. And there are a crap load of leafs next to the building now.. But i will soon have my leaf blower same model and hope me and him will be able to take out some leafs in decent time using 2 rakes/ 1 big tarp/ 2 shovels/ and two backpack blowers..

[Kennedy Landscaping]

Blowers IMO.

[P.Services]

how about a bagger on the ztr and a bp blower for the beds??