I have to cut some
hay. It’s one of those must-do things. If I put it off, I pay the price
in the end. So I ask myself, “What’ll it be? Tai-chi or golf?”
That doesn’t sound
like a mowing question, but hold on! A few more questions will clear
things up. Or will it?
Question 1: Will I
be cutting good grass or spanking weeds?
Question 2: How
much do I need to cut today? A leisurely pace or the max?
Question 3: Am I
in the need for a physical workout or a mental balance adjustment?
Huh? Mental
balance adjustment? What the heck does that have to do with mowing a
field? It does, please read on.
Two Styles of
Scything
The art of
scything comes in two flavors, a European style and an American style.
The styles are different because the hardware is different. More on the
hardware a little later.
Using the European
equipment and scything style is less of a physical workout and more
Zen-like. Similar to some Tai-chi movements, the mower cuts an arc of
grass with an upper body rotation from the hips swinging the tool in an
arc that is comfortable to the individual mower. The action distributes
muscle activity from the legs through the torso and finally into the arms
and shoulders to guide the blade along the intended path. Since the force
applied is distributed over a large part of the body, scything ends up
being less tiring, less of a physical challenge. The equipment is lighter
too.
Clumsy at first
for sure, but once a comfortable style is found, an equilibrium of sorts
arises; the mind relaxes and wanders off to tend to other activities
instead of guiding the tool. At this point, my brain shifts focus off of
the mowing and on to more important things like repeating a chant of
personally useful affirmations…“Health, wealth, success, comfort and
security, and happiness to us all…” or maybe it will wander back to
mentally inventing that “thing” I’ve been working on for a while. But
when needed, as if some sentinel is at the brink of consciousness ever so
watchful for imminent disaster, subconscious activity pops me out of my
trance when a pending swish of the scythe would take out a particularly
beautiful wildflower or a stray clump of Angelica I could use in my next
V-8 concoction. Cutting around a flower or obstacle is certainly a lot
easier with a scythe than it is with a tractor or mower. The tool runs
on coffee, and it always starts, even after storing it for a year.
The American style
of scything is different. It is a heavier tool, more robust, and once
sharpened correctly, will stay sharp longer. The mere fact that the
American scythe is heavier makes that excursion into the world of Zen less
likely than with its European cousin. It’s all business here. And when
you find yourself knee deep in heavy growth, woody stems, late September
goldenrod, you’ll find no better friend than the American scythe. It also
runs on coffee. It just takes a little more of it.
The act of
swinging this scythe is quite different from the European version and I’ll
discuss that in more detail in a moment. In a general sense, rather than
swinging the tool in an arc, the dance is more of a short shuffle of the
blade back and forth… cut, return… step, step… cut, return… step, step… in
a rhythmic fashion while facing the grass as if putting on the golf
course… not the driving range, mind you, it’s more like the soft swing in
miniature golf (do they still have miniature golf?). The step-step
routine is like a crab-walk, traversing sidewise to the uncut grass.
Not too much is
written about the American scythe and less so about this technique of
scything. What I have found in print has always been negative. Finding
that irksome, I refused to believe it, so I had to find out for myself.
It seems to me there are just too many American style scythes around and
about in old farmhouses to warrant such a bad reputation. I figured they
wouldn’t have made so many of these tools if they didn’t work. So I
bought one. And then I found a real old one at a garage sale for two
dollars. Next, I went out and talked to some old scything guru’s familiar
with the cutting style and took on the task of learning the American
scything technique. I’m glad I did.
It doesn’t take more than an hour or two with a scythe to
reach an equilibrium with it. You can bet that in the first couple
of swings, more than likely, you’ll pitch the blade into the ground or
ricochet it off the grass hardly cutting a single blade of grass, but it
won’t be long before you are beyond the clumsy stage and enter the phase
of developing your refinements.
The scythe is one of the few tools that are so asymmetric
that it looks dangerous. After all, as the Grim Reaper’s tool of
choice, somehow we just know we’ll cut off a toe or foot or whatever.
As it turns out, you’d have to be a contortionist to cut yourself while
working a scythe. Only when you are sharpening the blade or
transporting the tool to the field is the scythe a dangerous implement.
I believe this is one of the main reasons that the mind can wander during
use and busy itself in taking care of more important things, like
visualizing world peace, sending healing energy, communicating from a
distance, etc.
Let’s take a look at the equipment.
The
Scythes
Of the three scythes shown, the left two are European
scythes, the leftmost has a grass blade, the middle one has a “ditch”
blade which is a little thicker and shorter blade and is designed to
handle rougher pastures. On the right is the American scythe, note
the highly curved handle (called a snath or less commonly, a sned).
Note also that the American style blade has less of a curvature to it than
the European ones. This has a lot to do with the difference in
scything techniques.
The European Outfit
All scythes consist of a blade, a snath (handle) and some
means of connecting the two.
Figure 2 is a close-up of a typical European grass blade
and Figure 3 shows how the attachment to the snath is made for the
European style. A complete setup will run about $125 and includes
the blade, snath, blade holder or attachment fixture, and usually a
sharpening stone and cup for carrying the stone while scything. It’s a
good idea to get a peening jig as well. See Figure 5.
The typical grass
blade is about 26 to 30 inches long (66 to 76 cm) while the ditch or brush
blades are shorter and stouter, around 16 to 18 inches (40-46 cm).
The blade is curved along its length but also in cross
section as shown in Figure 4.
The lengthwise curvature draws the grass along the blade as
the tool is swung in its arc. This slices the grass cleanly and the
cross section curvature helps in carrying the cut grass over to the end of
the stroke depositing it in a nice neat windrow. More importantly,
however, the cross section curvature serves to position the blade edge at
the optimum angle for efficient cutting. The lip or rim at the
top, in addition to strengthening the blade, serves to guide the
sharpening stone across the blade at the proper angle when touching up the
blade in the field, a process often referred to as whetting the blade).
