your favorite garden tools

[Hairy Moose Knuckles]

My Farmall! Without it, I'd tap out. My gumbo get hard! If you don't keep the ground busted up, it gets harder than brickbat. Now along the fence line where a multitude of hackberries live, the ground is soft as butter from the leaves falling year after year. Unfortunatly, nothing will grow there very well, except Moose Knuckle Garlic. Well, I did have a few tomatoes that did ok, but not great. I have tried many times and many different things. I have to scoot back at least 40 feet and that takes me back to brickbat land. My main garden area can be worked pretty easily because it gets lots of leaves every year, but I would kill my self spreading leaves over 50 acres. Plow it and keep it plowed.

My Farmall!!!

[NJGardenNewbie]

Man... You know I am newbie as I use a pair of regular scissors to cut branches and I have just one of those small hand shovels that is barely as big as my hand!....

[greckle]

Right now my fiskar micro tip cutters rank at the top. Mostly because I bought them 2 days ago and harvested 2 basil plants and clipped lots of mint leaves for tea. Over all for this season i'd pick my 7 tine manure fork. Saved me lots of effort puttin' straw out for mulch, turning the compost, and picking up hay off the side of the highway when farmers lose a bale off their trucks. Yes I let it set about a week to make sure no ones coming back for it.

[Little Minnie]

I accidentally dumped my Japanese weeder in the compost pile with a wheelbarrow of weeds. I have searched but cannot find it yet without a metal detector.

[reubenT]

I just about decided those things that are attached to the end of my arms are about the most useful garden tool of all. they grab a hoe and get those weeds, they grab a weed the hoe can't get, they hook up tractor implements, they just do it all. It'd be very difficult to get along without em.

[alina]

Yup, I love my fork, trowel, and ratcheting loppers. I never knew they made hand pruners. I will have to get some. The ratchets are fabulous!

My other favorite tool is a bunch of old thrift store knives, usually serrated. I tuck them in the garden along the edge of the bricks, and I use them to slice slugs when I see them. Also great to prune or harvest something when you see it and don't have pruners with you.

[stephen9666]

I like quality tools, and my garden tools are no exception.

The story Harry Epstein has some really cool garden tools that aren't the average made-in-China tools you'll find at most places.
http://store.harryepstein.com/c/GardenTrowels.html

I've bent several of those cheap garden trowels. Harry Epstein has some that are made in the USA and affordable. I have this one. I sharpened the blade with a file and it works really well.
http://store.harryepstein.com/cp/Gar...19-TROWEL.html


I also have these Bahco pruners. They're made in France.
http://store.harryepstein.com/cp/Gar...els/P-126.html

[Sherilou]

Originally Posted by alina

My other favorite tool is a bunch of old thrift store knives, usually serrated. I tuck them in the garden along the edge of the bricks, and I use them to slice slugs when I see them. Also great to prune or harvest something when you see it and don't have pruners with you.

I really like this idea.. thank you!

[WinterSown]

I have a cobrahead weeder, just love the thing. Slices, scrapes and whacks--nicely balanced handle. Lost it a couple of years ago and it turned up in the compost heap this spring--didn't seem to be effected by the elements.

[Horsea]

I want a Rogue Hoe. It was discussed last year on this forum.

http://www.prohoe.com/index.html

As of now, I don't have a lot of good quality tools, so there is some struggle. I do like this little thing, though: It is called the Ho Mi EZ digger and is Korean in origin.



http://www.greenherontools.com/korean_hand_plow.htm

I am on my third Ho Mi - not because they fall apart, which they don't, they are well-made - but because I keep losing them. Oh, well.