There’s a wide variety of garden tools and landscaping supplies to choose from, and each is designed to perform a specific function efficiently. But if you’re a novice, it’s easy to pick the wrong tools which can make your gardening experience grueling and result in poor results. To ensure that your time is well spent while working in the garden, here’s a brief guide to the supplies you’ll need.

What Are the Essential Gardening Tools to Have?

First, separate the hand tools you’ll need into two categories depending on their handle length—short-shafted and long-handled.

Among the short-shafted tools, the handiest ones are:

• Hand pruners: These can snip larger flowers and cut branches less than three-quarters of an inch thick.

• Scissors or shears: Ideal for pruning soft-stemmed plants, like herbs, and snipping dead flowers.

• Japanese gardener’s knife: Also known as hori-hori, it’s a versatile tool for digging, weeding, planting, cutting, transplanting, and prying.  

• Watering wand or water breaker: Unlike hoses, this tool gently showers new plantings and soak older ones instead of sending out a strong stream of water that could uproot them.

Long-handled gardening tools, on the other hand, are used for harder toiling in the garden:

• Loppers: As the long-handled counterparts of pruning shears, they’re used for cutting branches thicker than an inch and located in hard-to-reach areas.

• Digging fork: Sometimes called a garden fork, it’s used for turning unbroken earth. It digs better than a spade on dense soil and can break up clods as well. They’re also used when transplanting bulbs and perennials.

• Rake: Although they come in a variety of styles and sizes, rakes are used to remove leaves, twigs, and heavy debris. They can level the soil when planting and spread mulch, gravel, sand, and compost.

How to Buy & Store Them

Before buying gardening tools, try simulating the actions you would make when using them. A tool that feels hefty or uncomfortable in the hand can cause injury or pain with prolonged use. Choose hand tools that have D-shaped handles since these are lighter on the wrists. Opt for handles made with either wood or metal rather than fiberglass or tubular steel, which are more expensive and heavier. Store your tools in sheds where you can hang long-handled ones to protect them against dulling.

When you need landscaping supplies, like washed stone, gravel, and rocks, contact the experts at LaSalle Sand & Gravel in Kalispell, MT. Serving the community in Flathead County for over 15 years, they also provide top-notch excavation and land clearing services. Call (406) 756-9070 to schedule same-day delivery of landscaping supplies for your garden or visit their Facebook page for more information.