Essential Gardening Tools for Beginners

If you’re new to gardening, you may be wondering where to start. Before you can plant your garden, it’s helpful to have all the essentials you’ll need to ensure that your garden’s preparation, maintenance and harvesting are easy and hassle-free. Our list of the top 12 essential gardening tools is an excellent guide for first-time gardeners looking for a place to get started:

Gardening Gloves: 

Keeping your hands clean, dry, and safe while you work. A good pair of breathable and waterproof gardening gloves is a must-have for every new gardener.

Garden Hoe:

A garden hoe is a useful tool for cultivating the garden, stirring up and mounding soil, and dislodging weeds. You can buy multiple types of garden hoes, each better suited to a specific task.

Garden Fork:

This tool comes in handy when getting your vegetable plots ready for planting. Garden forks come in different shapes and sizes but are generally used for breaking up stony soil, aerating sod and digging up root crops. 

Shovel:

Shovels serve many purposes when gardening or working around the yard. A sturdy, long-handled shovel is perfect for digging large holes, moving and turning soil, digging out perennials to divide or transplant, and so much more. This is one tool you’ll definitely want to have on hand!

Garden Rake:

A long-handled tool with a wide head and teeth on the end, a garden rake works well to break down soil into a fine tilth that’s best for planting seeds. These rakes are also useful for getting rid of debris in your soil. 

Spade: 

Garden spades are essential tools for landscapers and come in handy in the garden, too. Used to break through ground and chop through tree roots and tough soil. Spades are helpful when excavating gardens, removing clumps of grass or roots, and cutting garden margins. These tools can also be used for soil aeration and turning soil. 

Hand Trowel:

An invaluable tool in the garden, hand trowels are perfect for digging small holes for seeding and transplanting, turning small amounts of soil, and digging up weeds. Try finding a trowel with depth measurements to help you out when planting!

Hand Cultivator:

While these tools are available in various sizes, keeping a small handheld cultivator in your gardening tool kit will be helpful when you first start out. Great for reaching smaller areas where large tools won’t fit, hand cultivators have teeth that are perfect for pulling up pesky weeds between plants and digging or breaking up soil.

Pruners:

A good pair of hand pruners is perfect for trimming small branches, cutting through roots, and dividing root balls. There are various hand pruner options, with certain types better suited for specific tasks, and some even designed to minimize muscle strain and discomfort while using them.

Scissors:

A good, sharp pair of scissors serves many purposes while working in the garden. You can use them to deadhead flowers, harvest vegetables, snip herbs, cut twine or ties holding up plants and even cut open packages of seeds or fertilizers! The uses for this tool are endless!

Zip Ties or Twine:

Useful for securing plants to a support system like trellises, stakes, cages, fences, etc. 

Hose & Watering Can:

Once you plant your garden, watering your crops as they grow is a daily task. A garden hose and nozzle with multiple watering settings are essential to ensure that your plants get the water they require to grow. A watering can is also beneficial to supply water to areas where your hose may not reach.

Having the proper tools on hand will make your time in the garden more efficient, precise, and safe while ensuring your plants’ health and maintenance. Stop by your local Feeds’ n Needs to view our selection of various garden tools, Vesey’s seeds, soils, and fertilizers. Let our Experts answer any questions about getting started in the garden!

For more expert advice on getting your garden started, check out our related blogs:

Garden Planning for Spring and Summer

Gardening Tips for Beginners

What Type of Garden Best Suits your Needs

How to Successfully Grow a Vegetable Garden

Sources:

https://www.farmandfleet.com/blog/10-must-garden-tools/

https://www.gardeningknowhow.com/garden-how-to/tools/beginner-tools-for-your-tool-belt-or-apron.htm

https://www.gardenersworld.com/product-guides/growing/essential-gardening-tools-list/