I’ve started to, I’m about to, setup my Yarbo-and-Trimmer specifically for fence line mowing / trimming. Intent is to replicate traditional string trimming where you reasonably get under the fence and around each post (which are 15’ apart), from both sides.
It seems to me there are three basic ways to do approach this with current Yarbo capabilities, and I’m looking for knowledge on what might or might not work, and opinions on the best-worst.
Options:
1) Create a Work Area (WA) on each side of the fence
1a) mow WA; trim along the fence boundary
1b) OR - make trimming along the fence a Memory Path (MP)
1c) OR - make trimming along the fence a MP; don’t ever actually mow the WA
2) Create a WA that surrounds the fence
2a) make the fence a NGZ; mow area; trim along NGZ
2b) OR - no NGZ; mow WA; rely on obstacle avoidance to not crash into fence; make trimming along the fence a MP
2c) OR - no NGZ; make trimming along the fence a MP; don’t ever actually mow the WA
3) Create Anchor Areas (AAs…anchor paths but don’t explicitly put into a plan to mow) on each side of the fence. Use paths with stubby Dead-Ends (DEs) to mow and trim along the fence. Don’t ever actually mow the areas, just work plan out the DEs.
Putting this on the end…so it is here but not a distraction if not helpful - for an approximation of more details:
Imagine 800’ of split-rail cedar fence running parallel to the road, 20’ from the road.
The 800’ feet is broken-up into four sections: 100’, then driveway, 300Lines, then field road, 300’, then a crosswise ditch, 100’.
Open area, I’m generally getting 25-30+ satellites.
Not ‘manicured lawn’ - no one is running through this area barefooted - it just needs to look reasonably like lawn from the road.
I’ll continue to mow most of the grass alongside the road, starting from the road, with my commercial mower via 3 passes; that leaves a Yarbo pass or two plus Trimming along the fence (a Yarbo pass or two and Trimming on both sides).
Right now I’m leaning towards (1c) for the two 100’ sections on the end, and I also use the 1c areas as anchors for one side of the dead-ends to do (3) for the middle fence sections
If it does, do a quick experiment by making an area with a few fence posts and 10 or 15 feet in and out of the fenced area. See how the different avoidance methods work.
If any are reliable, then just make one big area, do a straight-line MP along both sides of the fence for trimming and you’re done.
If Yarbo doesn’t fit, then you’re making an area for each side of the fence, and probably using a MP to stick the mower head and trimmer underneath but not the core.
I’d avoid DEs for this purpose if the core doesn’t fit. Yarbo has a habit of running DEs in reverse, which would shear all the antennas off.
I hadn’t thought about the Yarbo fitting under the fence; I can’t imagine the Core would fit under my or many split-rail fences. That is what the trimmer is for.
I made a skinny WA along the side of any fence with trim defined. Did this for each fence/trim area. That way I can trim only/trimmer installed and mow only/trimmer not installed. Mows longer without trimmer installed. Then can add to a plan when needed.
After some more experimentation - my 2025 Yarbo Core Mower doesn’t recognize the horizontal fence rails, at least not consistently. And the unit is way too big to straight-up pass under the rails. Even with smaller competitor mowers I think it would be a tough case for any of them to be able to consistently pass under the rails of pretty much any rail-fences.
Memory Paths are tedious to setup along 100s of feet of fence but the only way to reliably navigate the Yarbo (at this time) close enough to the fence that the trimmer goes under the rails. Especially while reverse-trimmer-bashing is still a thing - with a MP you can control the ‘entry’ and ‘exit’ to a close rail-fence trimming line and keep it ‘out of trouble’.
I look forward to the day when the Yarbo recognizes a rail fence as part of mapping and then handles everything including ~navigating the trimmer ‘under it’.
On another rail-fence topic: it works but I wish the outside trimming edge of the trimmer extended outside the path of mower another inch - I don’t have much overlap from one side to the other of the fence - I think there will be places here-and-there it will miss.
I should have mentioned the point here is rural fence-line mowing, i.e. 100s of feet of aesthetic / property-marking / roadside open-rail fence.
I thought Memory Paths needed to be in a Work Area. I know now they only need to start and end in a Work Area - and a MP can start in one WA and end in another. This means there is a fourth option:
4) Create WAs on each ‘end’ of the fence with MPs along each side of the fence.
After much experimentation #4 is THE way to do this.
Create WAs at breakpoints too where you have them to break-up the long MPs. Keep the WAs at least a couple of feet away from the ends of the fence to keep the Yarbo from bashing into it. You may or may not mow these WAs, I have both cases.
Evaluation of the other Options:
WA on each side of fence: works and is what most people with normal yards do, especially if just trimming along the ‘inside’ part of the fence that is at the edge of a lawn. But fence-line mowing requires a separate WA on each side. And if you are really just trying to trim along the fence or mow a strip along it building all these big-long WAs is tedious, and you will probably end-up doing MPs to get close enough anyway.
WA that surrounds fence: doesn’t work. I found out the hard way that if you have a WA that surrounds the fence you need to have a NGZ around the entire fence or eventually there will be some situation where the Yarbo will try to go ‘through’ the fence, even if you never mow the WA. And putting a NGZ around the fence prevents the Yarbo from getting close enough to the fence (fixable with MPs - but why bother then just go to 4).
Paths and Dead-Ends: would probably work but adds fragility to an already fragile process*. If you have a number of fences the Work Plans get complex to make sure you get every Path and are always going the correct direction. Also you need to make sure Paths don’t offset etc. I never actually implemented this - too much work.
So there is a right way for exurban / rural fence-line mowing - #4 - anchor WAs on each ‘end’ of the fence with MPs along each side of the fence
*The use of the trimmer is “fragile” - it is not as rough-and-tumble like the rest of Yarbo. I don’t mean physically per se, I mean unless you are trimming a croquet court the trimmer contacts the ground too often, errors-out, and the trimmer stop trimming but Yarbo keeps going, and it not very communicative thereof. But that is a separate topic and is presumably mostly addressable when Yarbo completes their Trimmer software implementation.