Grass management

Our grass cutting schedule usually runs from March until October. Grass cutting is weather dependent, so sometimes the schedule will start later or end sooner than expected. At the start of the season, it takes some time for our contractors to complete their grass cutting routes, so some areas will have uncut grass for longer than others.

The weather can also have an impact on our cutting schedule. Long periods of wet weather can prevent us from cutting because of the risk of machinery getting stuck and the ground being damaged.

How cutting schedules are determined

Cutting schedules and methods vary between the different types of green space. Formal parks and playing fields, for example, are kept short to ensure there is plenty of room for ball games and picnics. Other spaces are left long for the benefit of wildlife, by creating corridors and meadows for insects and pollinators such as bees.

You’ll find long grass in many of our other open spaces. Many areas are left long for the benefit of wildlife, by creating corridors and meadows for insects and pollinators such as bees.

You can find out more about this on our rewilding page.

If you think an area that should be routinely cut has been missed, contact us and we’ll check.

If you live on a new housing estate, the developer will be responsible for maintaining the green spaces until we adopt the land.

We don’t collect the grass cuttings from most of our sites. The cuttings are beneficial to the wildlife and improve the health of the grass. Leaving the cuttings behind is more cost effective and means the flowers can regrow, as their seeds are left behind.

If the cuttings end up on the roads, our contractors will blow or sweep the cuttings back to the verge or open space where possible. However, if the ground is wet, grass can stick to the machines and cuttings can possibly end up on the roads and paths.

The strimming team is separate from the grass cutting teams. Strimming is done on foot, which takes longer to complete than the cutting rounds using sit on mowers. This means strimming happens less often in some areas than the grass cutting.

We don’t strim around trees. Strimming around trees increases the risk of damage to the trees by ring barking which can cause the tree to die.

We try to keep weed spraying to a minimum and make determinations to use it on a case by case basis. These decisions are also frequently reviewed 

We instruct our contractors to spray around some areas of street furniture to make maintaining them easier.

We don’t use weed killer in children’s play areas.

Any damage caused to your property or vehicle by strimmers or mowers are the responsibility of our contractors. If any damage occurs, please contact us and we will pass them on to our contractors.