Gardening/allotment tools

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. Email Address. Top 10 essential allotment tools 29th January pm. But without further or do, here are my top ten recommended tools needed to start an allotment.

Spade or a shovel A shovel is great for shovelling, a spade is great for heavy digging and giving the ground a good dig over. Go on, give it a share! Large quantities make sense if you need to pay for delivery — and you can simply pile it up in a compost heap and let it rot down for when needed. My advice is to buy cheap and replace when needed.

The picture of the garden glove shown here is a perfect example. The mud dried around the shape of my hand whilst wearing it, and I was able to take this picture, hand free, by simply placing the glove on the handle of my wheelbarrow. A vital tool. My recommendation is to purchase a hand trowel in as bright a colour as possible. Its uses are numerous, from acting like a hoe to weed from within a row of crops, to loosening the soil around carrots before pulling them up.

My favourite hand trowel task is carving the shallow channels in the soil that I use for planting seeds. This, and harvest time, are my favourite moments at the allotment. There are certain tasks that strong scissors are not strong enough for, like cutting the heads off lettuce or cabbage. I like to grow a lot of fruit at my allotment, and good bypass secateurs make a cleaner cut when pruning fruit stems, canes, and branches. My suggestion is to avoid the cheapest secateurs and purchase a good strong pair.

These will last much longer and will be able to cut thicker stems without fear of breaking. Lots of plants need tying up at the allotment. Twine is useful to mark seed rows after sowing and prior to germination. Wigwams made from branches or canes would not be possible without garden twine to hold them together. Tomato plants would fall over without being supported. Perhaps best of all, garden twine is a natural product that will rot, avoiding the need to worry about needing to throw away or tidy up old twine at the end of the summer.

Scissors are extremely useful for tidying up crops before taking them home, for example cutting the stems off beetroot or the leaves off carrots. I like to use biodegradable weed fabric at the allotment to reduce the amount of weeding I need to do, and scissors allow me to cut this to the required width and length. Allotment plots are often surrounded by grass paths, and it is likely to be your responsibility to maintain those around your plot.

If this is the case, a strimmer can be an excellent time saving investment. Wireless electric strimmers are portable, light, and relatively easy to transport to and from an allotment plot if you are worried about storing it in your shed.

You may want to purchase a spare battery or two for an electric strimmer to ensure you have enough cutting time. Petrol strimmers are more powerful, and cut faster, but are arguably more time consuming. Sometimes they are difficult to start, and you will also need to store the petrol. You may like to see this page that discusses allotment strimmers. Ideally you will inherit a plot with a shed already standing on it. If not, you will need to find a solution to storing your tools.

Some kind of dry storage is vital to preserve the life of your tools and to shelter in on the odd! Our selection of quality Shears and Loppers will help you to keep your plants, shrubs and hedges neat. Including specialist lightweight, swivel, long handled and heavy duty models together with mains and cordless Shears and Hedge Trimmers.

See all Shears and Loppers. Gardening Spades and Planters hand-made in Holland - each Sneeboer garden tool has been hand-forged in the finest stainless steel. It is individually shaped, polished and sharpened by hand before being fitted with a fine quality ash handle.

See all Sneeboer Spades and Planters. A large range of garden hand tools from Sneeboer that are made to the same high standards as the larger gardening tools but are finished with a cherry wood handle. See all Sneeboer Hand Tools. Gardening Tools hand-made in Holland - each Sneeboer garden tool has been hand-forged in the finest stainless steel. A selection of tool sharpeners, sturdy tool racks and garden storage chests to help you keep your tools in tip top condition. See all Tool Care.

A selection of quality Forks and Spades including the innovative Backsaver Spade. Simply select the tool best suited to your requirements. See all Forks and Spades. A selection of quality full size Hoes and Rakes.

See all Hoes and Rakes.