HOME ADVICE TOOLING UP FOR SPRING
It doesn’t matter whether you have a window-box or a garden stretching as far as the eye can see you’ll need proper gardening tools – you can’t use your fingers!
Spring is the peak time both to check what you have and decide what you will need as everything starts to sprout.
Basic gardening tools – spades, forks, rakes and hoes – remain unchanged for almost ever. With a little loving care, quality implements can last longer than a lifetime. But garden tools with motors – mainly lawnmowers – have shorter lives, can and do go wrong. It may often be better and cheaper to replace rather than repair.
The first task is to see what you’ve got already. Hand tools work better if you clean them after each use. Buy new if handles are damaged or the tines of a rake or fork are bent.
Tools with moving parts such as shears, secateurs, and tree loppers work better with a quick oil spray squirt on blades and mechanism. Which? has a list of good buy and don’t buy secateurs on its website – the research showed the best and the worst were all around £20 to £25. And you certainly don’t need to spend almost £100 on the priciest.
A fine file can sometimes substitute for a suitable carborundum stone as you need to get rid of blunting plant residue. Some garden centres offer resharpening – for saws as well. Replace cutting items if the blades are bent or badly chipped. Gadgets with motors are more problematic – as well as suitability for the task, gardeners need reliability – you won’t be happy spending half an hour each time getting that old petrol mower to spark into life. You can buy a basic electric lawnmower for under £50 – or spend thousands on a battery mower programmed to cut the lawn on its own. Besides affordability, the basic choice is power. Hand pushing is only for the tiniest lawns. Mains electric-powered mowers are cheapest but you might worry about cutting into the lead, and distance from the socket can be a concern as electrical power tends to weaken the further from the mains outlet. Batteries have become more common – though they are pricey to replace. But for bigger lawns, petrol driven works well. Self-propelled mowers are more expensive while ride-on ones are only for the largest gardens. Other powered items include hedge trimmers, strimmers, leaf blowers and shredders. These come in huge varieties so you’ll need to find something to suit your garden – and needs.