Buckinghamshire’s Waddesdon Manor is employing Husqvarna Automowers to maintain a complex grass maze situated in the middle of a wild grass area at the property.

Located in the Aylesbury Vale, Waddesdon Manor is a Grade I listed house and Garden which was built for Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild in the 1870s. The stunning location is owned by the National Trust, and managed by the Rothschild Foundation and is one of the Trust’s most visited garden properties, with over 471,000 visitors in 2018.

This summer, the gardens team of Waddesdon Manor saw the opportunity to install a grass maze at the location and were keen to explore an automated solution in order to keep the walkway section of the maze maintained.

The use of automated technology was important to the team’s plans due to the location and the amount of time it would take to maintain the maze. Because of the distance between the maze and the team’s machinery sheds, this presented a problem. Furthermore, as the maze area was complex to cut, it would take a lot longer for the team to complete.

Authorised Husqvarna dealer, RT Machinery, provided advice on Automower and completed an initial assessment followed by an expert installation which required two robots to be installed in order to deal with the complexities of the maze.

This installation was challenging for the obvious reason of the maze’s layout but also because the machines needed to find their way home to their respective charging points. Typically, the mowers would have guide wires to guide them to their charging station, however blind alleys meant this couldn’t be done - further increasing the challenge.

Over a two-month period Waddeson Manor say the products have excelled. Gardens Manager, Mike Buffin, commented on the performance of the products in light of the challenging location: “We’ve been very impressed with the two Husqvarna robots and they have shown just how well they can handle complex areas by keeping our maze in great condition. The mowers have been out cutting whilst people are in the maze, something which we didn’t think would be possible initially. Children find them fascinating and we’ve seen people follow them as they go about their work.

“The robotic mowers have saved the grounds team a great deal of time, allowing us to focus on other tasks whilst the maze is taken care of. We have asked guests to come up with names for the two robots and people have been tracking them on Facebook, which is fantastic to see.”