8 essential gardening tools and their uses
8 essential gardening tools and their uses
You don’t need many tools to garden successfully. I suggest what to look for and why these 8 are my favourites. I am not on commission and have no affiliation fee for any except for the dibber which I designed.
I just want to show you the most efficient, easy way to use these helpful tools.
Music is ‘Homeacres’ by Jacqui Vincent https://jacquivincent.bandcamp.com/track/homeacres
00:00 Introduction to using tools in the garden
01:10 A spade – useful for digging out roots, planting trees
01:33 …in comparison to a shovel
01:53 Looking at two shovels – one plastic, one metal – and comparing their respective qualities
04:02 A fork prong / manure fork – I demonstrate how to use when moving compost
05:39 A hoe – when and why you would need to use one
06:48 A look at different types of hoe – I show you my preference and explain why
09:26 A trowel – I explain and demonstrate its two main uses: removing top roots of perennial weeds, and planting (eg potatoes, and pot plants such as kale)
13:30 The benefits of a copper trowel
14:20 A rake – I demonstrate how to use one for levelling the surface of a bed, and how it can be used to disturb weed seedlings
16:10 Different types of rake, and the benefits of using one similar to mine
16:44 A word on keeping tool handles clean!
17:20 One of my favourite tools – a long -handled dibber – and a look at two types
18:50 I demonstrate how to use the dibber to make holes for transplanting
21:13 The smallest tool of all – a folding pocket-knife; I show you my preference, and demonstrate how I sharpen it with a sharpening stone
23:35 A final word on tools, and distributors *see links in description below*
UK distributor of my long handled dibber https://www.gardenimports.co.uk/product/charles-dowding-long-handled-ash-dibber/?v=79cba1185463
USA & Canada distributor of my long handled dibber https://allaboutthegarden.com
Gorilla plastic shovel https://www.buildworld.co.uk/merchant/gorilla-plastic-shovel-yellow-1-piece-indestructible-a3-1148
Copper tools from Implementations https://implementations.co.uk/shop/
See this earlier video about Tools and Techniques in my no dig garden https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ic0LrNBuSi4
And this one on transplanting techniques: https://youtu.be/JvWSaiMKJx4
Filmed and edited by Alessandro Vitale @spicymoustache at Homeacres 24th March 2022, temperate climate zone 8.
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Fantastic video. Great information.
Charles , I really appreciate how you personally reply to questions we send you! Thank you 😊. I have a question that troubles my early sowing of cold crops each year . We live in a cold climate , high desert , and have had snow off and on all week . Our last Frost dates are May 31 , or beyond . I don’t have a greenhouse nor poly tunnel , so after my seeds germinate , they’re put under shop lights for protection. My question is , should I harden off my spinach , kale , cabbage and chard now , ( snow melted ) and cover them with frost fleece , even though the weather is still cold ? ( lows in the 30’s F ; highs in the mid 40’s F)
This should be interesting, as in the last 60 years of my life, I now have 2 shovels, 2 rakes and a hand trowel. What more do I need?
Loved this, thanks Charles!😄
What would make the divot tool even better would be an adjustable stop so that you can easily have uniform hole depths.
Great! i have my nice dibber too.
I always appreciate how you explain and give examples of your processes and reasoning. I’ve not ever seen copper tools so now have some researching to do. The hoe you showed as your preference I know as a "Hula Hoe." Also, love the long handled dibbler.
🙂de pequeño fabrico mis propias herramientas. 🤕👍🌳
thank you for sharing
Great information, I find most people don’t take care of the handles, I hate to pick up a rough handle tool. I got your dibber and just started using it this spring and I love it.
Nosotros hemos comprado una azada holandesa o horca oscilante y va muy bien para las pequeñas hierbas 🌿, Gracias por los consejos
https://youtube.com/channel/UCqYQZvfJDpQbIy-QBy1b5yg
Hi Charles I had a quick question please. I am starting my first garden right now on my new property. I chose the best area for it and everything is pretty much ready.
I want to follow all your techniques, no dig and organic, but I am a little bit afraid that my soil is too compacted right now from the previous owners as well as me when I was cleaning the field earlier. Would you advice me to till the ground the first year, one time, and then use the no dig techniques?
Or even if my soil is compacted, should I not even touch it one time? I am a little bit confused on this level …
Thank you in advance Charles and happy season !
My three favs are a hori hori knife, clippers and stirrup hoe. Thanks for all the great tips, I may use my dibber more now!
My dad is a wood-turner. He made me two dibbers – one similar to yours and one short one (10" long). I find the short one is really handy when planting in my few raised beds.
All is good but the production made dibber is too short. I use mine 50% of time for leaning on it to pick something up so it is useful if its the spade handle size
Just ordered one of your dibbers as a ‘reward’ for a week of boring clearing of nettles, bindweed, couch grass, bramble etc at home and at the plot. 6hrs of completely necessary absolute boredom!! Perhaps you might like to talk in a future video about Arborists’ saws and secateurs for pruning fruit trees: my life was transformed by buying a high quality arborists’ saw.
Hello from Brazil!! Great tips about Garden tools. Thank you very much for sharing your knowledges and experience with us.I really apreciate and enjoyed and learned a lot. I subscribed in your channel too. We are in fall season now here .🧡🍂🍁🥰 .Have a wonderful day in your amazing Garden!!
Hi Charles I use to help run a community garden vegetable box scheam in Kettering northants for 6 years finished about 10 years ago due to ill health but my health is better now for starting working again and this year I’m luckily starting new garden for residential care home. I’ve got like blank start as its all just low cut grass lawns . So I be putting in vegetable & fruit garden, herb garden and perennial and annual beds and like Roman style garden and flower garden trail been watching your videos and think it be great project for no dig gardens and looking forward see what I can do. thanks for all tips you put on your videos
Sus videos son inspiradores. Gracias por estar allí y compartir su experiencia. Felicidades.
The Italian zappa is a good tool. Very good for anyone with lower back pain.
Tu experiencia y conocimientos son my prácticos para todos los que tenemos un pequeño huerto.Saludos desde Tenerife!! 👌🏻🥕🥬🌸🔪
This is great info 😎 greetings from finland where we have only a little bit snow left and its already possible to do many things out in the garden 😊 we ve been through an exceptionally long winter 😜
Thanks!
Nice mr purple
Currently on a train headed for a tropical paradise and all we can think about is germinating seedlings, garden dibbers, and how much more our compost will smell like a forest floor when we get back !!!!!!!! No dig gardening truly is a sickness !!!!!!! A delicious, healthy, life invigorating sickness !!!!!!!! No mask or vaccine required though !!!!!!!!!!!
Hi Charles. First of All, thanks for the incredible good Content. I watched soo many Videos and I really love them. I have one Problem :I want to start a no dig Garden and struggle to get nearly enough bio Compost. I could get Horse manure which is 1,5 years rotten and looks very nice "Compost" , fluffy like saw dust. Do you have experience in using it like this? Or mixing it in to Self made Compost. Because you mentioned in one Video that you take "well rottened cow manure". Would really appreciate an answer.
Thank you for sharing your knowledge!💗
Ive lost my knifes at the airport as well. : ) Morakniv makes a Swedish full tang knife with utilitarian sheath and high carbon steel blade for a really great price! I like to carry both, the Opinel folder and the Mora, for different jobs on the homestead. Thanks for all the great videos!!
Interesting in that what you call a spade, we call a shovel, and what you call a shovel we call a scoop. To us a spade has a straight, sharpened tip and is used to dig trenches or borders around a garden area.
I’ve used a plastic snow shovel for years firstly when we had 2 horses snd then for moving compost in the garden they are great as you say light 6o use and hard wearing
Surely BRONZE not copper!
Vic.
"Find a hoe that fits you best" Charles Dowding
Para afilado de cuchillo, va mejor el papel abrasivo (lija) la piedra desgasta mucho y la terminacion es torpe comparada con el papel, que desgasta muy poco, y el borde filoso queda mucho mas fino. 🤕👍🌳
That metal shovel looks like a coal shovel, designed to be used in a smaller area like a cellar, which would explain the weird angle!
Thank you Charles for another great informative video on gardening tools. Sharing your own experience is most helpful when it comes to understanding which tool you really need to buy if you want to make your life easier when gardening. I also would like to share my experience using those module trays you designed as I already recieved quite a few of them for this season. I got 60 cell trays. They are very sturdy and can be used multiple times. I find most manufacturers in the world make their trays very flimsy so the trays break within one or two seasons and you have to buy another set of flimsy trays. Another good feature of 60 cell trays is the size of each cell. It really helps to save potting soil and gives a seedling enough room to germinate and grow in the cell for 3-4 weeks to be transplanted into the garden right after. The feature I like most is how easy it is to take out a seedling from the cell. The soil does not stick to the walls of the cell and the hole in the bottom of the cell allows to push the root ball out of the cell easily. Those are simple very important features that make 60 cell trays to be more superior in comparison to other trays. I was not yet able to check if the plastic of 60 cell trays was UV resistant. I hope it is. In conclusion I would like to say that investing money in good cell trays will pay back. The only inconvenience was to get the trays quickly as I live in the Pacific Northwest and it took quite a while to receive the parcel. Otherwise I am very satisfied with the product. Thank you.
I have a little spade that was my father’s, and I just love it. Over the years I’ve used it for many projects in the garden, I can’t use any other! It’s funny how you become attached to certain tools! And if my little spade goes missing, I become very cross 😆
I never thought I’d be sentimental about gardening tools, but I guess I am.
I used your trowel method on a prolific ‘crop’ of docks. That satisfying crack as the root broke is strangely calming 😉 Easy too.
Always number one, Charles!
Thanks for these useful tips and the joy you bring to gardeners!
Grazie 😊
Great video! Thank you Charles!!!!
Excellent vid Charles, and thanks for the links! However it’s your pocket knife that I’d like info on, I’ve searched for one in vain for a long time! Please could you clarify, and where to buy in uk, or just the make and I’ll find it. Thank you!
I was really hoping that a hori hori would be on this list. That an a really good pair of pruners.
Have you thought about ‘the ergonomics of working in a kitchen’, Charles? With all our 30 years of ‘women are discriminated against’, I have to say that kitchen design really discriminates against tall men! Absolutely terrible for the back having to work with kitchen tops which are about 18 inches too low for us men!!
I love an Opinel knife
I know worm castings isn’t a tool but it is a supply but I have a fair bit left over of from when I would grow vegetables in containers on my apartment balcony.
Is there anyway to find a use for it with your method? I would just hate to waste it. Unless I continue to use it with other container plants.
I’ve repurposed my son’s used wooden drumsticks as dibbers for smaller seedlings and they are really handy for row markers and other various uses, but because they are rather pointy, I think I’ve made a few transplants with airpockets below. What’s the harm and outcome of air pockets under seedlings? Are they doomed?
I’ve found horsetail weed in my vegetable raised beds, does anyone have any advice on how to deal with it and will i still be able to eat the produce?
My favourite tool is a victorinox knife used in the kitchen. They come in bright colours, orange and pink my favorite for the garden. The blade is 110mm with a fine serrated edge. It will cut to the bone, so take care..
It is great for slashing flax and grasses, small branches, harvesting produce, edge weeding under electric fencing. I cut weeds off at ground level for a quick tidy up, remove seed heads when they get away from me, rip through carpet(weed mat) open & trim plastic mattress bags( I use as a makeshift poly house over my container plantings also helps to ripen those late tomatoes). I rip through tough boxes, tapes and when the blade wears out I poke into the beds for use as a bulb marker, dibber,weeder-push in & twist, used in gravel and around pavers as I have worn off the serrations. They are just so useful. 🤗
Great video as always. I try to buy mostly old tools, becauseI find them much harder to break than the new ones and the angel i almost always right. I love my old shovel, garden fork and manure fork. All second hand bought, and lovely to handle and hold.
Hey Charles, where is your greenhouse from please. And is it 3m x 5m? Many thanks.
très intéressant, merci