
A swathe ( British English, rhymes with "bathe"; or swath American English, rhymes with "cloth") is the strip of cut crop made by a
scythe or a mowing-machine. A mower with a scythe cuts a swathe along the mowing-edge leaving the uncut grass to the right and the cut grass laid in a
windrow to the left on the previously mown land. The swathe width depends on the blade length, the nature of the crop, and the mower, but for grass is usually about wide. When mowing in a team the mowers start at the edge of a
meadow
A meadow ( ) is an open habitat or field, vegetated by grasses, herbs, and other non- woody plants. Trees or shrubs may sparsely populate meadows, as long as they maintain an open character. Meadows can occur naturally under favourable con ...
in a staggered line, then proceed clockwise, leaving a series of swathes with windrows and finishing in the middle.
The scythe has generally been replaced by machinery, such as a mechanical
swather or a
combine harvester, which cut much wider swathes while forming windrows. Early in the introduction of machinery, when horses or tractors had to precede a towed cutter, it was still necessary for mowers with scythes to open up a swathe wide enough to take the machine before it could start.

''Swathe width'' may also refer to the width of any repetitively cut, scanned or sampled strip such as in
aerial mapping,
lidar
Lidar (, also LIDAR, an acronym of "light detection and ranging" or "laser imaging, detection, and ranging") is a method for determining ranging, ranges by targeting an object or a surface with a laser and measuring the time for the reflected li ...
,
radar
Radar is a system that uses radio waves to determine the distance ('' ranging''), direction ( azimuth and elevation angles), and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It is a radiodetermination method used to detect and track ...
or
sonar scans or
multibeam echosounder bathymetric surveys collected by a moving satellite, aircraft or ship.
See also
*
Combine harvester
*
Scythe
*
Swather
References
{{Reflist, 1
Agricultural terminology
Geologic maps
Remote sensing