A permaculturist from Crozant organizes courses open to the general public to relearn how to use a tool that has almost disappeared in our countryside: the scythe. A militant approach, but one that also encourages reflection.
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Certainly, the approach is very militant and environmentalist. But it does not lack interest and encourages reflection.
Charles Mignon settled in Crozant where he produces fruit as part of a small agricultural business. He does permaculture, a method based on the observation of ecosystems.
Since he works on small areas, he decided to use a scythe to cut his grass. He thus has the satisfaction of not using oil, and has not had to invest in heavy equipment.
The scythe only requires a little elbow grease and doesn’t hurt your back if you do it right.
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© Rémi Carton
He opened his operation to the general public to relearn how to use the ancestral tool of our grandparents: “You’re going to see what you cut. If there’s a frog or a hedgehog or a slug that you don’t want to kill, you’re going to be able to avoid it.”
In truth, a scythe is more effective than a brush cutter, when it is well maintained and well adjusted. It allows you to be much faster and it makes less noise and it doesn’t hurt your back.
Charles Mignon
Permaculturists
It is true that since the 1950s, farmers have started mowing using agricultural machinery which is very expensive. They very frequently kill the game that has taken refuge in their fields.
And then as Albert Borie, a 93-year-old farmer, explained to us in a report in 2022, “tractors arrived in the 1950s, but people weren’t any happier for that. (…) We had the ambition to buy equipment. But that’s not what allowed us to “go to bed earlier, and get up later. We realize that today we live worse than before, because we are always chasing euros and we never finish paying our loans.”
Albert Borie sadly passed away in June 2024 at the age of 95.
Open to all, Charles Mignon’s training will now take place in the fall and early summer.
This young retiree trained to use the scythe as her husband and father did.
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© Rémi Carton / France Télévisions
Among the trainees, a retiree from Mourioux-Vieilleville (23) who does not hide her enthusiasm: “My husband never used a brush cutter. He always used his scythe. And I would like to continue doing the same thing. It belonged to my father who made the handle.”
“Working without oil” is what motivates Philippe Faron, this activist farmer from Creuse.
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© Rémi Carton / France Télévisions
For the garden, the scythe is perfect, if you add a little elbow grease. But obviously, professionals who own very large plots of land will have difficulty returning to them. Which is not the case for Philippe Faron, farmer in Saint-Marc-à-Loubaud (23). He grows blueberries and is also very militant: “I realized that on this type of operation, I could work without oil.”
