By mid-October the light comes in flat over McKenzie Mountain, frost holds in the shade until ten, and every lawn in St. Armand is buried under a week's worth of leaves. Uncommon Earthworks, LLC handles the ground itself and what grows on it — mowing through the season, trimming and edging where lawn meets gravel and stone, grading out the low wet spots, seeding the bare patches, and clearing yards down to open turf before winter. Working soil in the Adirondacks means arguing with sand, ledge and a season that does not really start until late May, so a lawn that comes in thick is a genuine result rather than a given. The last cut of the year is a good one: short, even, blown clean, ready for whatever comes down out of the north. Everything after that is waiting, and then it begins again from the mud.