Why you should use cheap pruners

-

If you have a garden like mine, you're always pruning something. That is, you're always using your clippers. I've gone through a lot of them in the past twenty years and I decided a long time ago to buy 'em cheap, and replace them regularly.

I'm talking about hand pruners here. I started with some expensive old-fashioned "secateurs" - you can still get the classic kind that can be resharpened, and cost a lot of money. My experience with these was poor as they tended to lose their ability to stay locked shut because of the little metal piece in the middle not quite catching. I'm sure it was the latest thing 100 years ago, but technology has changed.

Old-fashioned secateurs. Very expensive, can be resharpened, and I hate them. The little metal catch is a major pain to try to use. Still, they look nice, and would make a nice expensive gift for your gardening friend. Don't get one for me, please.

The reason I like the new ones is that they flick open and shut so easily. There is no temptation to leave them open, with the blades exposed. I kind of like my fingers, and I hate the idea of accidentally cutting myself. So I unlock the pruners when I'm cutting, and I immediately close them. And the types I like the best are the ones that require just about no effort to do that. If you gotta pay attention to it, it's a waste of energy, and there's the temptation not to close them. No. No.

So I buy them cheap and replace them often. And I always have several on hand. My favorite nowadays is the one pictures at the top of this post, made Fiskars, and they're really more like "heavy duty scissors". They're a little bit smaller than average pruners, and I find that I can get better leverage and a cleaner cut with them. Note the plastic lock that you can operate with a flick with your thumb (I sound like a commercial here!) I use pruners a LOT, so they start to go dull after a couple of seasons.

They are cheap. And not just inexpensive, cheap. I've purchased some that immediately broke. The spring sometimes falls out on brand new ones. I guess quality control is a bit of a problem with these! So don't expect to impress your gardening friend with these as a gift. But for me, it's what I want, and what I use. My birthday is coming around soon (it comes every year) and it would make a great gift for me - hint, hint!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to tell if your cycad (sago palm) is alive or dead

-
Image
Cycads are strange plants. They're beautiful, and look like small palm trees, or large ferns. They grow very slowly, and can be very expensive, even common ones like "sago palms". But sago palms, in spite of their common name, aren't palms at all. They belong to a group of plants called cycads. They are wonderfully weird, and grow in strange ways. And sometimes they lose all of their leaves. Of course, if it were a palm tree that lost all of its leaves, you would know that the plant was dead. But it's not true of cycads. So don't dig that cycad up and throw it away! Not yet. If you've recently transplanted a cycad, and the leaves have all faded away, hang on. Take a look at the top center of the plant, at what I call "the pucker". There you will see some stubby, soft fronds, no more than an half-inch or so. At least that's what you should see. That means that the plant is still alive, and has dropped its leaves to focus on building r...
Read more

Rooting sago palm pups for more plants

-
Image
Once a sago palm ( cycas revoluta ) reaches a certain level of maturity, it starts to create pups. Like agaves, these are little plants that are exactly the same as the parent plant, only smaller. And yes, you can trim them off and grow them into new plants. This is how to do it. Cut them off from the parent plant with a sharp knife. If there are any roots at the bottom, try to save them, but chances are there won't be any. That's not a problem. The next step is rooting them. Douse the cut part and the bottom of the plant with some garden sulfur and some rooting hormone powder. Rooting hormone powder is pretty easy to find at your local Home Depot. I had to go to a real nursery to get garden sulfur. Anyway, the idea is to keep the little plant from rotting while giving it time to grow its own roots. Sago palm pups being rooted Bury them fairly deep in some free-draining mix. It should include volcanic pumice, if you can find it, and if not, you can use perlite. I ...
Read more

Growing sunflowers from Pennsylvania in Arizona

-
Image
It's October 21st, and I just received some sunflower seeds from a friend in Pennsylvania. Their season is ending and the season for planting here in Arizona is just beginning, and I'm kinda wondering if the seeds are wondering what's going on? It's spring again already? If you're new to the Phoenix, Arizona area, and are from back east it must seem kinda strange that fall and winter is our flower season, but it is. By springtime it will start to get so hot here that the flowers will die, and of course back east the season is just beginning.  Sunflowers growing in Peoria, Arizona, about a mile from where I live I've seen sunflowers blooming around my neighborhood of Glendale, which is a suburb of Phoenix, in the winter, and although I've never grown them I understand that they're easy to grow. I guess I'll find out - I learn best by doing! The seeds arrived safely, and it's my understanding that they were still connected to the spent flower (I do...
Read more