Thursday, November 04, 2010

Meet my Tractors, Part I of a Long Story



I have a sort-ov long story about the history of my tractors.  So, this is 1 segment of the story and then another day I will add another segment because otherwise I think you will be sitting here forever reading about my tractor saga.  
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Exhibit A:  The big Kabota tractor.  It has everything - post hole digger, front end loader, mower deck, york rake, brush hog and rotatiller.  I was originally talked into the purchase of this thing by my husband over 10 years ago because he needed a riding lawn mower.  Take it from me - never fall for the line - "oh, you don't need to go look at it, Honey - they deliver!"    Because this one was too big for the lawn that needed to be mowed.  None-the-less we are well prepared should we ever buy some huge spread somewhere, maybe have a few hundred head of cattle or something? - obviously it would have to be something bigger than our current property.  Well, my Dad likes "yard ornaments", I guess my husband does too.  Except Dad's tractors are really old fashioned and have character.  Got to remember to do a post just in honor of Dad's tractors.  This one is just ugly, but I suppose functional.


Enter Exhibit B:  The "small" Kabota, minus the jumbo grass collector bags that attach to the back.  This one is bigger than your average riding lawn mower.  Actually, it would come in very handy if we ever happen to own - say - a 19 hole golf course some day.  Again - I fell for the line of having the mower delivered.  It does do a hum-dinger of a job mowing - but it needs some sort of service.  Which means I have to either buy a new flatbed trailer (I sold mine because I got tired of driving around all sorts of BIG things for many miles through 2 different countries), or borrow one to get it to the service center.  But I do know some mechanically inclined people who may be able to fix it for me in the spring.  In the meantime, since I am not there and it will be snowing, I am not too worried about it.
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Not tractors, but part of my whole mowing the lawn story:
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Not pictured:  Exhibit C:  The self-propelled Sears lawn mower - the kind you push around.  Because even though we have 2 tractors, we needed something much smaller to get into the smaller spots.  First time someone else mowed the lawn for us they ran over a bunch of rocks and ruined the blade thing underneath.  We have tried to mail order the replacement part, but Sears doesn't mail order parts.  We have been to Sears, but they didn't have that part the day we were there.  You have to understand, it takes us 6 hours round trip to get to Sears so we don't go so often.
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Not pictured:  Exhibit D:  My very own, very old electric lawn mower.  I won't give this thing up for anything because is always works like a charm, will practically mow through a forest, is light weight, you can push it either way... it is an oldie so is very tiny - I can pick it up with one hand and bang it up and down if the mower part gets stuck and it is instantly unclogged.  It has a beautiful, long, GREEN electric cord (green for grass - get it?).  Except my husband stole my cord this summer to plug in a very important freezer and I just never got around to buying a different cord for the freezer and who is stupid enough to unplug a freezer in the summer to mow a lawn?  Not me, because that would be the 1 day that the sky falls down on me and I would forget to go plug it back in.
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So, there you have it - 4 different "lawn mowers" to pick from at any given time, except the big tractor is too big to be called a mower, right?  You would think that it would be an easy enough task to get the lawn mowed every so often, but not so!  You will have to stay tuned for the next segment of this story.
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Oh - and by the way - that small Kabota tractor photo - yours truly had just mowed that small patch of back yard - I also have a very huge meadow but that is so grown up I have to figure out how to use all those handy-dandy attachments on the bigger tractor in the spring.  I am sure that will be a story all of it's own.

4 comments:

Not Lucy said...

I would almost kill for Exhibit A! We have 4.5 acres and I have so many projects that might actually get done if I had a piece of equipment like that! I can't talk my husband into one - he think things like garage roofs are more important!!!!!

Saska said...

DOn't even get me started on Tractors!
Just buy a couple of cows...they'll keep it all mowed down for you and you get fertilizer (whether you want it or not!

Lori said...

We have a very small lawn in town. Every year my husband whines about our elderly small self propelled Snapper. It cost me $70. When we mow, it takes a little over an hour. flat. easy. No--we are NOT getting a new mower! But sometime I will show you pictures of combines. Just asked my husband and I am getting one of "those" answers. I will say SIX. This harvest he went from machine to machine robbing parts. Maybe I will take some pictures for you.....I totally understand the tractor thing! And the cord. Yup, I had a special cord for my camper. I kept it hid from the farmers in my family, had it several YEARS. They found it--its toast--and boy no one wanted to fess up to that! I bet you have to hide your tools too........

Bernadine  Koster said...

That is quite a saga! And it looks like you had quite an experience with tractors. The first one looks like a very reliable mean machine. I know that it is dependable, but I would go for the small Kabota. It looks very handy and light. But having a big one won’t hurt.