Small Tools you would not be without

Today I was collecting a pile of grass clippings from my friend's garden (no pesticides), using my little hand fork with the tines bent at a 90 degree angle. It was so easy dragging the fork through the pile, bringing the grass against the trowel held in my left hand, then transferring the clumps to a plastic sack supported by a wire frame. It took no time at all filling seven plastic sacks and transferring them to my fall compost pile to await all the leaves I will be collecting.

The wire frame itself will again be useful when I collect the fall leaves.

So the combination of the small fork and the wire frame really makes those two gardening chores pretty painless.

What small hand tools would you not be without?

Scissors..... I would not be found in my garden without my scissors.  

A small hand trowel & hand fork , a light weight pair of secateurs and a 1 & 1/" gallon  plastic bucket for carrying compost or weeds  .

Scissors is something I rarely go to the garden without and a orchard bucket to bring what goodies make it home in.

My $2 scissors.  I have a small shoebox-sized plastic container with scissors, pencil, small spade, gloves, green stretchy tape, a rag, tape measure, labels and small clippers. I also have straws cut in half at a diagonal to measure out 2 tiny seeds and place in pencil holes in the seedling pots or the beds.

A very lightweight small plastic basket to gather my pickings in, and also hold things like twine and clips and scissors as I walk around.

Also, this season I have fallen deeply in love with zip ties. They've helped me put together fencing, hang a topsy-turvy planter, assemble a self-watering 5-gallon set of buckets and secure a PVC trellis inside it very firmly, hang a wasp trap at the insistence of family though I didn't really want to, secure all manner of posts and wire frames and tomato cages to each other. and who knows how many other things. Using zip ties has made doing things the usual way feel like the hard (and kind of lunk-headed) way. Why did it take me so long to fall in love with these things?

Lots of ideas here; keep them coming.

Definitely good scissors and a trowel to start with.  And with a trellis I found that zip ties are nice to keep the netting tight.  I found some green tomato ties at HD this year and gave them a try and they worked great!!!  First they are very flexible to ties peppers, toms, etc., to the netting or string and they are reusable as I have take all mine off and placed them in a small bag for next year.

My essential garden tools are my garden fork, cultivator, trowel, hand shears, pocket knife, spool of sisal twine, buckets and wheel barrow, camera and my harvesting basket.

Fingers and a loose enough shirt that I can gather up the bottom edge to put harvests in.

My tools; garden fork, snipers, bent kitchen fork, hori hori garden tool, my old timer pocket knife, and not in the photo is my garden hod and garden scissors. 





Bill

Turan wrote:Fingers and a loose enough shirt that I can gather up the bottom edge to put harvests in.

Can you get those finger things in nettle proof versions..

David .......... with really tingly nettle stung hands

plantoid wrote:

Turan wrote:Fingers and a loose enough shirt that I can gather up the bottom edge to put harvests in.

Can you get those finger things in nettle proof versions..

David .......... with really tingly nettle stung hands

David, have you ever heard of using stinging nettles for arthritis in the joints?
I just saw this article about that.  http://www.motherearthnews.com/natural-health/natural-remedies-for-arthritis-pain-zmaz02fmzgoe.aspx#axzz2gyO1k9re

I've got both  

 I can honestly say that ever since I was  kiddie on a hard tyred kiddies cycle with no brakes in a pair of swimming trunks  that I have always had probs with nettle stings .

 I was racing my brother,  me on my little bike him on his big bike with brakes ...
 he managed a back wheel slide on the gravel road to turn the corner into the farm yard.. I didn't.
 Consequently this wee mite naked except for his swimming trunks flew eight feet off the un walled bridge/roadway in a half summersault still on the bike to end up in a six foot deep ditch full of four foot tall nettles .
 I was seriously stung to say the least and was very very ill for several days .
 I've have had intense painful  reactions to nettle stings ever since. (It's likely something to do with pain gates being knocked flat and never recovering the assault )

Even now 57 yrs. later , a single sting feels like I've plunged the area into very very hot  water.
 
I tried beating my bare arthritic knee with a small young nettle a couple of years ago ...  it made no difference whatsoever to the arthritis pain or incapacity of the joint  but boy did it sting like B****ery  for a few days .


 In history lessons I was told " The romans used to beat themselves with nettles to keep them selves feeling warm when they arrived on the shores of this damp dark land we call great Britain "
 Knowing a few Italian males who used to be my neighbours  ..... I'm thinking it was for another  reason    

 

Hmmmmmmm,,,,,,,,,,I think I will continue to keep my distance from stinging nettles.

Good lord, I too fell into stinging nettles when I was small; it was so painful, near indescribable. If I ever see them in my travels, I give them a very wide berth.

Turan wrote:..a loose enough shirt that I can gather up the bottom edge to put harvests in.

My wife does that too...and ends up wearing a dirty shirt the rest of the day!    

I keep a couple restaurant-grade aluminum colanders  around the gardens to collect harvests in.

I keep old pruning shears in the garden to cut thick stalks on broccoli, collards, etc.

Also, my cell phone. I can be out in the garden and before I know it, hours have passed and I'm late for something(like making other people dinner). So my phone stays with me to keep me from becoming totally lost from the world for too long.

I have a plastic tote with my small garden tools in it for now until we get time to make some additions to my garden and then they will be in my garden mailbox. My collection of small tools are pruning shears, scissors, trowel, garden scoop, garden fork, garden velcro and sisal twine. I also like having a small bucket for dipping compost tea and for holding my small tools while working in the garden. And while they may not be considered small tools I love my watering can and watering wand...makes it so easy to reach the base of the plants. Hubby and I both decided after trying mixing MM on a tarp that we actually prefer the way we started out doing it...in a small plastic pool with a hoe. Now I need to find just the right basket to hold my harvests.

TxGramma wrote:I have a plastic tote with my small garden tools in it for now until we get time to make some additions to my garden and then they will be in my garden mailbox. My collection of small tools are pruning shears, scissors, trowel, garden scoop, garden fork, garden velcro and sisal twine. I also like having a small bucket for dipping compost tea and for holding my small tools while working in the garden. And while they may not  be considered small tools I love my watering can and watering wand...makes it so easy to reach the base of the plants. Hubby and I both decided after trying mixing MM on a tarp that we actually prefer the way we started out doing it...in a small plastic pool with a hoe. Now I need to find just the right basket to hold my harvests.

You are one well armed granny!