RAKING LAWNS 205 



best lawn mowers, in the writer's opinion, are those 

 with large wheels and which cut very wide swaths. 

 In his own practice, he uses no machine which 

 cuts less than eighteen inches. 



As a rule, it is not necessary to rake the leaves 

 off lawns in the fall. They afford an excellent 

 inulch, and during the autumn months the leaves 

 upon the lawn are among the handsomest features 

 of the landscape. The leaves generally blow off 

 after a time, and if the place has been constructed 

 with an open center and heavily planted sides, 

 the leaves will be caught in these masses of trees 

 and shrubs and there afford an excellent mulch. 

 The ideal landscape planting, therefore, takes care 

 of itself to a very large extent. It is bad economy 

 to burn the leaves, especially if one has her- 

 baceous borders, roses and other plants which 

 need a mulch. When the leaves are taken off the 

 borders in the spring, they should be piled with 

 the manure or other refuse and there allow to pass 

 into compost. (Pages 115, 116.) 



If the land has been well prepared in the begin- 

 ning, it is ordinarily unnecessary to cover the 

 lawn with manure in the fall. The common prac- 

 tice of covering grass with manure should be dis- 

 couraged because the material is unsightly and 

 unsavory, and the same results can be got with 

 the use of commercial fertilizers and by not raking 

 the lawn too clean of the mowings of the grass. 



The common watering of lawns by means of 



