Nature Strip

Nature Strip

Every pass leaves a stripe.

A lawn-mowing business game. Take jobs in your own suburb or in made-up Coolamon Bay, load the ute, and mow, snip and blow your way from one push mower to a zero-turn.

  • No ads
  • No account
  • Nothing to buy
  • Light and dark
Play in your browser
iPhone beta on TestFlight Android beta on Google Play
The Jobs board in dark mode: a street map of Coolamon Bay with a fee on every pin, and the selected yard, 96 Ridge Rd, above it with a Load the ute button.
Mowing a backyard in 3D: the operator in a hi-vis shirt behind a red push mower, light and dark stripes across the lawn behind, a Hills hoist and vegie beds by the fence. The HUD shows the clock, Mow 50%, Pick-up 3 of 4, and the Blades button.

How a job works

Four steps. The fourth one pays.

  1. Pick a job

    The Jobs board is a street map with the fee on every pin. Tap one to see the yard itself, how fiddly it is and roughly how long it takes. Neglected yards pay more.

    “Kikuyu’s gone feral out the back.”

    The Jobs board in dark mode: a preview of 96 Ridge Rd, marked Slow going and Neglected, fee times 1.3, over a map of Coolamon Bay with fee pins, and Load the ute for $363.

  2. Load the ute

    HQ sits on the next yard you’re due at. Pack the mower, the snipper, the blower or the rake for the job; a trailer takes five tools instead of three.

    One screen. No scrolling.

    HQ for Smithy’s Mowing in light mode: cash $8,420 and Rep 2 at the top, the next yard behind frosted glass, and a card for 96 Ridge Rd, Gumtree Heights, a full-service job for $363, with a Load the ute button.

  3. Mow, snip, blow

    One thumb steers, the other holds the blades. Set the cut in millimetres, snip the edges, blow the clippings off the path, and pick up the toys before the mower finds them. In 3D or straight from above.

    Mind the Hills hoist.

    Mid-job in 3D: stripes across half the lawn, the clock at 2:32 of 4:46, Mow 50% and Pick-up 3 of 4, the cut height at 60 mm.

  4. Get paid

    Past 90% thorough, every point adds 4% of the fee as a tip, up to half as much again. Neat stripes add a bit more; anything you hit comes off. Then drag the slider and have a look at it.

    Before on the left, after on the right.

    Results for a Kerbside backyard: three stars, a before-and-after slider over the yard from above, and the invoice: fee $412, a tip for 99% thorough, a stripes bonus, $35 off for three things hit, $546 paid.

Your area

Mow the streets you actually live on, or the town that doesn’t exist.

  • Your suburb

    Type a suburb or postcode, or use your location. The board fills with jobs on your real streets, ovals, parks and bowling greens, drawn from open map data, and the map is kept on your phone after that.

  • Coolamon Bay

    The made-up beach town: Kerbside, Gumtree Heights, Federation Drive and the footy oval. No connection needed.

  • One address

    Type any Australian address and it becomes a yard. The lot boundary, the house and the pool come off open maps; the backyard is a guess, and the game says which is which.

What you type goes to our server for the map lookup, and only for that. It isn’t stored or logged. “Use my location” sends a point rounded to about a kilometre, once. Read the privacy policy

The area sheet over HQ, headed Where’s the round?: Coolamon Bay, the made-up town, is ticked; below it Choose another area by suburb, postcode or your location, and Mow a specific address.

The shed

Entry, Mid and Pro in every category, and the price buys capability. Turn each one round in 3D before you buy it. Every brand is made up, and the dollars are game dollars you earn mowing.

Push mowers

Mow rate: deck width × walking pace

  • EntryRedgum 46$49946 cm · 4.6 km/h. You start with one.
  • MidRedgum 46 SP$89946 cm · 5.2 km/h · self-propelled
  • ProRedgum 53 SP$1,29953 cm · 5.8 km/h · self-propelled

Ride-ons and zero-turns

Mow rate: deck width × speed

  • EntryRedgum Rider 96$6,90096 cm · 10.3 km/h. Opens the ovals.
  • MidJarrah Iron ZT-106$9,999106 cm · 13.8 km/h · zero-turn
  • ProJarrah Iron ZT-137$21,500137 cm · 16.1 km/h · zero-turn, catcher on the back

Whipper snippers

Run time on a charge

  • EntryCoolabah S100$1091 minute. Does a front yard.
  • MidCoolabah S300$3492 minutes. Does a backyard.
  • ProCoolabah S600$5994 minutes, for the long jobs

Petrol: Redgum Snip 26, $279. Loud, but runs all day.

Blowers and a vac

Reach of the air

  • EntryCoolabah B200$991.6 m. For doorsteps.
  • MidCoolabah B600$4992.5 m. For driveways.
  • ProRedgum Gale 65$7494 m petrol backpack. Shifts bark off an oval.

Garden vac: Coolabah V450, $499. Walk over the leaves and they’re in the bag. No tarp.

The Shed’s Shop in dark mode, on Ride-on: Entry $6,900, Mid $9,999 and Pro $21,500 across the top, the Jarrah Iron ZT-137 zero-turn in 3D on a turntable, and rails for deck, speed, grunt and tank.
The Shed’s Gear tab in light mode: the Redgum 53 SP push mower large in 3D, with rails for engine, blades and fuel, and Refuel, Sharpen, Service and Sell buttons.

Gear wears. Engines want a service and blades want a sharpen, fuel costs money, and anything you sell goes for 70% of what you paid, less the wear. A trailer takes the ute from three tools to five.

Drive it your way

Keen, casual or eight years old: everyone gets the stripes.

  • Driving assists

    Like the helpers in a racing game. Throttle, steering, blades and cut height each have their own switch. Some minds the machine while you steer; Full drives the lot. Touch the stick to take over. The pay is the same either way.

  • 3D or top-down

    Swap mid-job with one button and the lawn stays exactly as you left it. The camera follows the mower, or shows the whole yard, like a maps app.

  • Drive or Map steering

    Steer like you’re behind the handle, or point where you want to go on the map. Both work in both views. A self-propelled mower walks on by itself while you steer.

The pause sheet, Smoko, in dark mode: Assists set to Full with Throttle, Steering, Blades and Height switched on, the View toggle between 2D and 3D, and Steering as Drive or Map.
The same backyard from straight above: stripes across the mown half, garden beds along the fences, a shed and a trampoline, with the HUD over the top.

It mows like mowing

  • Long grass bogs it down

    Push into knee-high kikuyu and the engine labours. Lift the deck or slow up.

  • Neglected yards

    Some places haven’t seen a mower in months. They pay more, and they fight back.

  • Scalping

    Cut too low and it shows, in tan scuffs along the pass. A bowls green will not forgive it.

  • Garden beds

    Along the fences and the walls. Snip the edges, don’t mow the roses.

  • Things in the grass

    Toys, a lost thong, the odd surprise. Pick them up before the blades find them.

  • A crew

    Hire a hand when the round gets too big for one, and send them out on their own jobs.

Get the beta on your phone

Free, no account. The browser version is the same game.

  • iPhone

    1. Install TestFlight from the App Store.
    2. Open the Nature Strip beta link on your iPhone, tap Accept, then Install.

  • Android

    1. Join the Nature Strip Testers group with the Google account your phone uses. It's just a list: nothing is posted to it.
    2. Open the Play testing link, tap Become a tester, then Download it on Google Play.

    If Play says the app isn't available yet, the Android beta is still in Google's review. Stay in the group and try the link again in a day or two.

First job’s on the board.

The kikuyu won’t mow itself.

Play in your browser
iPhone beta on TestFlight Android beta on Google Play