Many people love to spend time in their garden as it offers an open space with fresh air surrounded by greenery where you can exercise, read a book or enjoy dinner al fresco. However, creating and maintaining a garden requires some research, hard work, and tools.
Garden tools are essential to garden upkeep and maintenance whether by watering the plants, digging holes to plant new trees, trimming bushes, or weeding.
To help any budding gardeners who are excited to improve their garden, here is a list of garden tools you will need to help make your plants flourish.
Watering Hose
Making sure your plants are getting enough water is probably the most important part of gardening and when it doesn’t rain you will have to get out a hose. Using a long watering hose is much easier than carrying a heavy watering can around, so a durable and retractable garden hose can make a useful gift for those who love gardening. The majority of garden hoses you can get are on reels which can easily be mounted onto a wall for storage.
Gloves
Pulling up nettles or trimming thorny bushes can damage your hands when working in the garden, so it is always a good idea to have a pair of gloves handy. Even using tools constantly for a few hours will cause blisters to bare hands, however, a pair of thick work gloves will reduce friction.
Rake
If you have dead leaves, twigs, or bush cuttings all over your lawn then the most efficient way of removing them is with a rake. Rakes with longer and thinner prongs are better for moving leaves, whilst rakes with shorter and thicker prongs are useful for breaking soil up and leveling the ground.
Hand Trowel
For planting out saplings, seedlings, or transferring adult plants then a hand trowel is vital as it allows you to dig smaller holes whilst giving you the leverage to break through thicker pieces of soil. For those who enjoy gardening with their children then, you can even get garden tool sets for kids including miniature hand trowels.
Hand Fork
Hand forks are small but crucial gardening tools that are excellent at breaking up more solid and lumpy soil into a finer material that can be mixed with compost to help give your plants all the nutrients they need.
Digging Fork
Similar to a hand fork but bigger, with a longer handle and stronger and straighter prongs, a digging fork is particularly useful for loosening and breaking up larger areas of soil.
Secateurs
Ideal for trimming and pruning bushes and trees, secateurs are one of the most-used gardening tools. Good quality secateurs will do the job of chopping through most branches and stems, however, when cutting anything over three-quarters of an inch thick will likely blunt or break them.
Lawn Mower
Nearly every garden has a lawn or at least a small patch of grass that will need cutting regularly to stop it from becoming overgrown and hiding the other beautiful things in your garden. The size and type of lawnmower you get depend on the area of your lawn, for smaller lawns you can get away with using a smaller electric model.
Gardening is a hobby that anyone can pick up, however, to make your life easier and create and maintain an amazing garden you will need to kit yourself out with some essential gardening tools first.
