I mean, the manual for the ride-on lawnmower did not specifically state that you couldn’t raise it up with a crane to trim the top of a very large hedge, so that’s just what two lunatics from Cambridge New Zealand did.

“The mower was doing an all-right job, but I reckon it would work better on a hedge that’s not so spiky.”

Maybe they need one of those Zero-Turn mowers with a larger cutting deck instead of a basic lawn tractor. Yeah, that’s the problem with this whole setup. [Stuff NZ via Fark]

The manufacturer says that their Cub Cadet Force S is the first zero-turn riding mower with a steering wheel instead of bars. That’s something that I’m sure will turn on many lawn mowing aficionados. I just want to ride it through Central Park and write “ALIENS, LAND HERE” on Sheep Meadow. [Cub Cadet via Uncrate]

The best part of this the Panthera Leo mower isn’t the electric-powered design, or the recyclable materials it’s made of. No, it’s the LCD monitor and sensors, which work together to tell you what speed and height you should mow at, plus inform you when you’re on too steep a hill or about to hit an object. And the mower lasts two hours on a single charge.

Jalopnik says Husqvarna plans to put something similar into production within five years (basically, forever). But seriously, I would have driven this thing to school every day if I had one. Trust me. Oh, and check out more pics over at [Jalopnik].

Who knew a machine with razor-sharp blades spinning at 200RPM you’re supposed to sit on top of might cause injury or death? Here are gruesome tales of mowing mishaps—from this past month alone!

Lawnmowers, with their spinning, ground level blades, are most dangerous to small animals, young children, and feet. Recently, one Mowing Menace trapped a 4-year-old girl’s foot under its blades of doom, causing enough damage to require amputation. In fact, she was one of 77,000 people who go to the hospital every year, victims of mowing-related violence.

Clearly, in the epic battle of Man vs. Machine, mowers don’t intend to play fair.

A mower in Oregon flipped its rider down an embankment and into a ditch before rolling itself onto some blackberry bushes above the trapped man. The lawn mower’s heat actually set the blackberry bushes on fire, and when they gave way, the mower itself tumbled 15-20 feet to rest on top of its owner, trapping him in the ditch. Though the victim wasn’t severely burned, the crushing weight of his mower caused enough unspecified injuries to necessitate a helicopter airlift to a nearby hospital.

Another one, at a park in Indiana, was being peacefully driven around the perimeter of a lake when it snagged a wire, flipped and slowly dragged its helpless rider into the water like a conniving, hungry alligator. Though the tractor technically did not devour the 59-year-old John McComas, it did pin him in the shallows of the lake, rendering him unable to move. Thankfully, he managed to keep his head above water and shouted for help, and was rescued soon enough to escape with only mild injuries.

A lawnmower in Florida apparently took offence to its owner doing a little repair work on it, and so shot a spark onto the owner’s nearby boat. The spark ignited gas fumes and the boat promptly burst into flames, sending up huge plumes of smoke and the risk of serious fire in the “tinderbox conditions” of that stretch of the Atlantic coastline. The town’s fire commissioner, Fred Link, explained with laughable naivete, “It was accidentally started.” Sure, Fred, that’s what they want you to think.

Lawnmowers don’t just act alone, though. They are capable of teaming up with other terrors to dish out even more devastation. In Texas, the mere sound of a lawn mower was enough to enrage a nearby swarm of killer Africanized bees. That’s right, Africanized bees, the ones the hysterical news media alerted your attention to back in 1999. The killer bees, responding to the mower’s calls, attacked nearby residents, stinging two bystanders and two firemen. None were seriously injured, and another fireman said he “barely managed to avoid being stung,” a quote he probably wishes had not appeared in his local paper. The bees were exterminated, but the mower lived to fight another day.

But just like in Battlestar Galactica, some of these appliances have decided to side with humans—defending them instead of terrorizing them. In Croatia, an innocent man was mowing his lawn when suddenly, his mower detonated a live hand grenade, sacrificing its own self in the process. The man escaped uninjured, but still confused as to what a live grenade was doing in his garden.

A 39-year-old man who was mowing the lawn ran over a hand grenade, which proceeded to blow up. The man was not injured, however, because his trusty mower took the brunt of the explosion.

That’s pretty much the whole story. There are no before-and-after shots of the mower, which may have in fact been the tractor shown below. There’s no photo of the no-doubt dumbfounded dude, a gardener, as it happens, in Croatia. There isn’t even an explanation of what the grenade was doing in the yard, save for the statement, from the Zagreb police, that “someone had thrown the grenade into his garden.”

Know your enemies, buddy. Apparently, competition for this year’s All-Croatia Flower-Growing Tournament is already heating up. [Croatian Times via Asbury Park Press (go Springsteen!)]

Instead of using noisy mowers that run on gasoline and pollute the air, we’ve rented some goats from California Grazing to do the job for us (we’re not “kidding”). A herder brings about 200 goats and they spend roughly a week with us at Google, eating the grass and fertilizing at the same time.

Of course, after the goats are done visiting, they’re mass sacrificed to Larry Page and Sergey Brin. The ritual is said to keep Google’s search engines accurate and Brin’s cheeks boyishly rosy. [Google Blog via TechCrunch and ERIC GAILLARD/AFP/Getty Images]

At the University of South Denmark, Kjeld Jensen has developed a robotic lawnmower called the Casmobot which can be controlled using your Wiimote. Using Bluetooth, the Wiimote communicates to a receiver in the Casmobot. It can be controlled manually, or be completely automated. Jensen says:

“We have been introducing [Casmobot] to the professional workers at the municipalities and the minute they got this Wiimote in their hands and started cutting grass, they were smiling and laughing all the time so I guess I’m not the only one that thinks this is a very good idea.”

“This robotics module could, in theory, be put in to any kind of vehicle. In theory, you could actually take this module and put it in to a wheelchair, and walk your grandma just by sitting inside at the window and using your Wiimote.”

Unfortunately, if I did that, my cantankerous Grandma would probably spit in my face, so why yes, an old-fashioned walk would be lovely. [Gossip Gamers]

The Hustler Zeon is the world’s first all-electric, zero-turn riding mower. With the “Hustler” logo on the back, everyone will think you’re eco-friendly and pretty badass.

That’s “Hustler” as in “Hustler Turf,” not “Hustler Magazine Where You Can See Bewbs” (sorry guys). However, not only is the Zeon emissionless, it also runs silent so your neighbours won’t hate you for blowing out their eardrums. The Hustler Turf designers ditched the traditional steering wheel in favour of two handles that enable a true zero-degree turning radius.

The Zeon is good for 80 minutes of mowing time on a charge and has a 42-inch side discharge deck for maximum grass chopping. No word on pricing yet. [Hustler via Uncrate]

Living in an apartment, my lawn consists of about 60 feet of concrete, sporadically coated in vomit and pigeon poop. But I’d still like a $US12,000 Evatech GOAT Robot 22T lawnmower all the same.

Evatech’s latest and greatest R/C “hybrid” mower can be manned from up to 600 metres away as it takes on 70-degree slopes at 13kph. Its track system not only creates stability—it’s perfect for winter traction as you can plow your driveway with a shovel attachment. Keep in mind, since the 22T can both cut grass and plow snow, you’re really only paying about $US6,000 per function—that’s like half the listed price!

But without a seat and/or cupholder, I’m just not sure that I can justify the purchase. EvaTech]

Okay, so the ball could be considered more a plaything, while the grass disks are perhaps more suited for piling up as ad-hoc lawn chairs. Although there’s always the possibility of a game of giant grass Frisbee… How many sneezes and streaming eyes would that set off, I wonder? Those grass “bails” would easy to pick up and chuck onto the compost pile too.

Nice lateral thinking here, and for once it’s a concept that I’d love a manufacturer to get to grips with for real. [Yanko design]