By Marko Vuorinen
Category: Home & Family : Gardening
Keywords: rose garden tools gloves kneeling pads pruners shove rakes
Summary: Five Basic Tools for your Rose Garden
Gardening Basics - Be Prepared - Five Basic Tools for your Rose Garden
You should always be prepared to do what needs doing in your rose garden. In order to do a good job with your roses, it is essential that you have the right tools. There are plenty of garden tools, and some of them are perfect for rose gardening. When you have the right tools, you will be ready to do anything that your rose garden needs to be healthy and thrive. Here are five basic tools that can help you ensure that you are caring properly for your rose garden.
Gloves
These are essential if you plan to work in your rose garden with any sort of enjoyment at all. Nobody enjoys being scratched by thorns. They can be sharp and painful, and can lead to infection. Thorns are a necessary evil associated with working with roses. However, a good, thick pair of work gloves can protect your hands as you work. Luckily, working with roses does not require great dexterity, and there are few people who are seriously impeded while wearing work gloves in the rose garden. The leather variety adorned with big, fold-down cuffs make excellent protectors while working in the garden.
Kneeling pads
Kneeling pads are another of those things that are more for you than for the roses. However, if you ruin your knees trying to take care of your rose garden, then you will not be caring for the roses anyway. There are knee cups that can be strapped around the leg. They move easily when you do, but can be uncomfortable if their 'one size fits all' really doesn't. There are also large pads that are water resistant and have handles. They are often more comfortable, and can be moved with relative ease.
Pruners
Pruning shears also known as Pruners, make it easier to keep your roses in good shape, pruning back excess growth and getting rid of damaged or diseased portions of the rose. It is important, however, to make sure that you get the right kind of Pruners for roses. Anvil Pruners have blades that fall one on top of the other. Because of the way that the blades of anvil Pruners meet, they are likely to crush your rose stems and canes. This can cause a great deal of damage and invite diseases and pests to take advantage. Always use bypass Pruners on your roses. These are the Pruners, whose blades work like scissor blades, passing each other.
While not needed initially in your rose garden, the lopper, a heavy-duty relative of the Pruners, will be needed down the road. They can be expensive, so plan to save up for them for purchase down the road. Loppers are used much like shears to get rid of thick, old canes that Pruners can't handle.
Shove
The shovel is for digging holes for planting and digging up bushes for transplanting. It can also be very useful for other purposes. Choose one that is both sturdy and lightweight. A fiberglass shovel with a long handle is excellent for this kind of work, as it does not weigh very much, but is very resilient. If you want to further protect your hands, it is possible to spend an extra few dollars and get a shovel with a padded handle. A digging fork is also good to have on hand. It is an excellent choice for loosening soil and turning it in patches too small to be worked on with a shovel. Make sure that your digging fork, like your shovel, has a sturdy and lightweight handle.
Rakes
There are two types of rakes that you should have to enhance your rose gardening. A garden rake is the one that has steel teeth. This type of rake is used to smooth and level your flower bed. Choose a sturdy rake with steel tines (no plastic tines here). The other type of rake is a leaf rake. These are the rakes that make cleaning leaves, clippings, and other varieties of garden leavings much easier. Get two kinds of leaf rake: a regular rake and a 'child' rake for smaller and tighter areas.
Finding these basic tools is relatively easy, and many of them are reasonably priced at most garden and home improvement stores.
Marko Vuorinen
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