When the cold season comes around and the snow starts falling, you might not get as much use out of your John Deere riding lawnmower or lawn tractor. After all, you can’t very well mow a lawn that you can’t even get at under a layer of snow. Before you put your mower away for the season, though, you might want to keep it handy for the inevitable job of snow clearance.
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The John Deere brand sells two categories of optional attachments for its lawnmowers with snow clearance in mind: snow blades and snow blowers. Both of these tool types can be hooked up to your riding mower or lawn tractor to clear away the snow on your lawn or driveway. The precise way they go about clearing that snow slightly differs between the tools, however, which means one might suit your needs better than the other. Of course, you could always just get both, but if you’d rather not, then here are the vital differences between snow blades and snow blowers.
Snow blades are better for shoving light and loose snow out of the way
If you’re not familiar with the concept of a snow blade, that’s probably because you know them by their more common moniker: snow plows. Technically, a snow plow is a tool or vehicle designed specifically for plowing snow, while a snow blade is a physical implement used by a plow (or a mower, in this case) for pushing. It’s not uncommon to use the terms interchangeably, though.
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A snow blade is mounted to the front of your John Deere mower, creating a firm, curved wall that can forcefully shove snow and debris out of the way. It’s simple and low-tech — if there’s a lot of loose snow piled up in your driveway, just equip the snow blade and shove it out into the street or off to the side.
However, there are two major considerations you should consider before using a snow blade. First, there needs to be a place nearby where you can push the snow. If you can’t move it far enough, it’s probably just going to end up back on your driveway. Secondly, and more importantly, snow blades can’t handle large quantities of densely packed snow, at least not without a suitably powerful vehicle behind it. If you try to shove more snow than your mower can realistically handle, you might end up straining and damaging your motor.
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Snow blowers are better for larger quantities of thicker snow
If you’ve got a large quantity of densely packed snow cluttering up your lawn and driveway, then you’re going to need to tackle it with a sufficiently powerful tool. When the heavy snowfalls loom, you’ll want to equip your John Deere mower with a snow blower.
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Like a snow blade, a snow blower is equipped to the front of the mower. A rotating mechanism captures snow as you drive and feeds it into the blower, launching it away in a long stream. The power of the rotating mechanism is great for munching through thick piles of snow, while the blowing mechanism ensures the snow is sent a good distance away from where it previously was. Snow blowers come in several stages of strength, with more powerful blowers able to handle denser piles of snow.
Snow blowers are good for most snow-clearing situations, unlike snow blades, which can only really handle loose snow. That said, snow blowers do have their drawbacks. For one thing, since snow blowers have moving parts, they do require more regular upkeep and maintenance, which can be potentially time-consuming and expensive. Additionally, there’s a little more nuance to their operation — you need to try to blow snow with the wind, or there’s a good chance it’s going to blow back into your face.
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