Spraying!

[Growing Green]

I've had two people call me in the past 3 days asking if I sprayed for bugs in their lawns. I wanted to take the advice of Matt and just say yes I can do it, even though I had no idea how to do it, but if I'm not mistaken I need to have a license for that. Is that correct? Do any of you do this work? People down here in Austin love organic products. I've put this on my CL post in the title and this is what has got me 3 calls in the past 3 days. Unfortunately, only one was to mow the lawn. I told one of the ladies I would go and look at her lawn and figure out what the bugs are and if I can help fix the problem then I'll find her someone who can. She was so appreciative she said that she wanted to show me what she wanted to do as far as landscaping and that when I went over there we could talk price. Again, I have very little experience in actual landscaping, but will the customer know that? HECK NO! I'm excited that I'm actually starting to get some calls. Tomorrow will mark 2 weeks in the business. I actually went and cut a lawn today...was hilarous...as I made a million rookie mistakes. Here comes the story... Got a call from lady and she told me that she had not mowed her lawn all summer and she only needed front lawn mowed. I told her I would go over to her house and give her estimate. I looked at lawn and was very overgrown. Well being this was my FIRST CUSTOMER since I started and she looked like she was struggling financially since she had hip replacement that I would be nice and told her $30. Oh God why did I give her that price??? She first thought I said $40 and she said that unfortunately she couldn't afford that, but I told her no I'm offering $30. She said that she can afford that and then then off I went mowing her lawn with my Craftsman 6.5hp push mower. It was awful...I was having to mow over some spots 4 times. I then said let me try and use the trimmer to cut some of the REALLY tall grass and then mow. I took out my Stihl trimmer that I bought from someone and it wasn't working worth a crap as it seemed like the line wouldn't feed. Ugh! So I finally just went back to mowing and a job that I thought would take me 1 1/2 hours ended up taking me 2 hours today.... BUT guess what??? I didn't finish. It got dark on me and I have about 45 minutes left to do tomorrow morning. LOL How pathetic. So I got home and started looking at trimmer and looks like line was almost gone. I hope that was the problem. The trimmer is what added on all the time. It should have only taken me about 2 hours. Now even though this was somewhat of a mistake it was VERY valuable. See below for some things I've learned. - I know that if a lawn is overgrown that I should basically almost double the price of what I normally would have charged. - If I buy trimmer from someone before I use it to go work check it to make sure it has line even though the seller said they just put line in it. - Save up ASAP to get a bigger lawnmower. Small walk behinds are going to kill me. So all in all. Lady was very happy with what I had done. She is going to love it when I finish everything tomorrow. Felt like an idiot that I couldn't finish it before it got dark, but oh well. Best way to learn is to get out there and DO IT! Matt (The rookie/newbie/noob/etc...)

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Austin Organic Lawn and Landscaping Care

[MAKLawnCutter]

Lawn care business tips

OKay, let me put my foot in my mouth... BEFORE YOU SPRAY, please google and find out the restrictions in your state, city and county on applying chemicals. Florida/Volusia County and ALL other counties are EXTREMELY RESTRICTIVE on this. If you are caught spraying "high risk" chemicals with out a license you will be highly fined and they will take all of your licensing and equipment from you while you stand with a 1500$+ fine (i have seen them as high as 5700$). I dont know the restrictions in your area but, in the state of FL you must hold a BACHELORS in some kind of agricultural business (i have one in business so, this turns out to be useless, lol). OR you must have atleast 3years of background with a company that applies chemicals or have an employee with 2+ years of licensing. Matt *foot in MOUTH*

[jklawncare]

Originally Posted by MAKLawnCutter

OKay, let me put my foot in my mouth...

BEFORE YOU SPRAY, please google and find out the restrictions in your state, city and county on applying chemicals.
Florida/Volusia County and ALL other counties are EXTREMELY RESTRICTIVE on this. If you are caught spraying "high risk" chemicals with out a license you will be highly fined and they will take all of your licensing and equipment from you while you stand with a 1500$+ fine (i have seen them as high as 5700$).

I dont know the restrictions in your area but, in the state of FL you must hold a BACHELORS in some kind of agricultural business (i have one in business so, this turns out to be useless, lol). OR you must have atleast 3years of background with a company that applies chemicals or have an employee with 2+ years of licensing.

Matt *foot in MOUTH*

Does this apply to organic mixtures as well?

[picframer]

Originally Posted by jklawncare

Does this apply to organic mixtures as well?

Depends on the Material Safety Data Sheet, one thing I notice around here and now in some stores is companies are throwing the word Organic into their marketing to gain business when they are using synthetic compounds and let's just say heading into a gray area. We are a chemical free city, the fines are very stiff and by-law enforcement is out in full force during the season however it doesn't seem our city has taken some of these marketing approaches task, other chemical free cities in Canada have taken on a few of the national companies that spray and the fines are staggering for false advertisement.