All things green

I own a lot of different kind of gardening tools. The most unusual one has to be my hand-held rotary hoe.

The single star is the front of the hoe. The handle pivots to allow the tool to be pushed or pulled.

Farmers have been using large rotary hoes for decades. These are non-powered tools, not to be confused with rotary tillers. They were especially popular in the days before chemical herbicides came into wide-spread use.

The design is basically a series of specially shaped discs mounted side by side on an axle 10 or 12 feet wide. There are different configurations; some discs are star-shaped, others have small spoon-shaped ends attached around the circumference of the disc.

To use a rotary hoe, the farmer pulls the hoe behand a tractor at a fairly fast speed. The star points enter into the soil at about  90 degrees — straight down. As it moves forward and  rotates, the point leaves the soil at an angle lifting some soil at the same time. This lifting action pulls up germinating weeds.

It is the weeds you don’t see — those still underground — that get destroyed. By the time you see the first leaves poking up out of the soil, it is almost too late to rotary hoe.

A rotary hoe in action runs right over everything in its path — the crop plants as well as the weeds. The crop plant, usually corn, is well-rooted and can’t be yanked out by the hoe. The leaves get torn up in the process but the corn plant recovers quickly.

Chemical herbicides, increasing labor costs, and high fuel prices caused most farmers to abandon their rotary hoe years ago. Many organic farmers still use them however.

My little hoe is a just a scaled-down version of those large,  farm implements. It actually works quite well whenever I remember to use it early enough.

What’s your most unusual gardening tool?

Bob

There are a lot of different ways to sow seeds  into a garden bed.

Sometimes I use a hoe to form a shallow trench, then drop the seeds in. Other times I use my finger to poke a hole into the soil before dropping in the seed. I find as I get older, my finger has a tendency to get pretty tired if there are a lot of seeds to sow.

This week I finally decided to do something about it; I went into my woodworking shop a made a couple of traditional tools called dibblers — sometimes also known as dibbles or dibbers. These tools are used to make holes for planting seeds.

It took just a few minuets on the lathe to turn a couple of different sized dibbers from a piece of scrap cherry wood.

Most of the dibbers you see for sale on line and in the gardening catalogs have very sharp points. The description usually says something about how easy it is to penetrate hard soil with a metal-clad point. It occurs to me that if you prepared your planting bed properly, you wouldn’t need a sharp point.

I left the business end of my dibblers somewhat blunt. My garden soil is friable so it doesn’t take much effort to poke a hole. The blunt end also leaves extra space at the bottom of the hole for the seed to rest at the proper depth. It does make it more difficult to kill vampires, however.

If you need more space for a seedling transplant or plug, the tapered shape allows a hole to be widened by rotating the dibber in a circular motion.

I suppose I could have just whittled a piece of broom stick with my pocket knife but this is a much more elegant and versatile tool.

Bob

I looked at the calendar a couple of days ago and realized March is almost here.  Since March is always so busy, I planned to get all of my garden equipment in shape by the end of February.

The last big project is the rotary tiller — its carburetor needs work.

My deadline for fixing the carburetor on my tiller has arrived.

I’ve rebuilt a few small engine carburetors in the past.  I’ve even done a couple of auto carbs years ago, so I have a good idea of what it’s all about.

I’m convinced that anyone with a mechanical aptitude and the ability to follow written instructions, can do this job.  It takes a positive attitude and some time.

For those who have no idea where to start, I put together a summary of the steps involved.  It may convince you to take your equipment to the shop instead.  On the other hand, it may inspire you to take the plunge and give it a try.  Remember, if you can’t get it to work, you can always take it into the shop later.  In the meantime, it will give you a chance to try something new– and an excuse to use that new tool set you bought.

I did catch a little break — February has 29 days this year.  That gives me an extra day to finish repairing that tiller before my deadline passes.

Bob