Readers Tips: Repurposed Tools in the Garden Used to Great Effect

Winning Tip: From the kitchen to the garden

Several time a year a visitor to our garden is shock to notice a rogue steak tongue pierced downward in one of the layer , as if it were an escapee from our kitchen tongue block . I ’m always quick to narrate them that it ’s indeed where I meant to place it , and that I have n’t find any shaft as great as a serrate knife when it comes to transfer grass or root system of rules . It ’s perfect for butt on modest areas or pulling up intact sheets of green goddess ; all I have to do is initiate on one side and draw in up as I carefully saw back and forth . It can be a cheap purchase from a thrift computer storage — or in my case , the fashion I finally win over my husband that we needed a new set of kitchen knife .

— Erin Lang Norris , Mazomanie , Wisconsin

Easy weed disposal

I am always looking for ways to work fresh in the garden . Of all the various gardening tasks there are to do , one is ever present — weed . Whether I ’m weeding in the morning with a loving cup of deep brown or in the even with a glass of wine , it seems I ’m always able to gain a sizeable chain reactor of weeds in no time at all . I do n’t require to make unnumbered trips throughout the mean solar day to dispose of the gage , so I gather empty black or browned shaping flora containers throughout the garden . ( I find that black or chocolate-brown containers without logos are easiest to hold in among the vegetation . ) Now when I conglomerate a smattering of weeds , I simply drop them into the penny-pinching container and move on to my next task . It takes a surprisingly long time to take these empty containers , resulting in far fewer trip to the trash can or compost batch .

— Katherine Coker , McDonough , Georgia

Daylily scapes as stakes

I was gifted ‘ Stella d’Oro ’ daylilies by my female parent . They are now engraft in my front yard next to my driveway . After the pod are mature , I let the scapes dry out out and gently pull them to take out them . I start collecting them in the belief that surely I could find a purpose for them before dumping them in the compost pile . When I started potting up some of my plants into vintage pottery , I establish that the scapes make nice stakes for the plants until they get establish . The scapes also add a whimsical rude design element to the potted plants .

— Ruth Welch , Castelton , Virginia

Protect potato plants

I mature potatoes in freehanded pots because I just do n’t have elbow room in my garden beds with all my flowers . I have noticed that when there is a really lumbering , beating electric storm , the potato plants get drop and break . I use half hoop and peony hoops to prop them up . I call up the half hoops are easier to forge with , and it urinate all the difference in the world in the works . support the plants like this is helpful whether you put your potatoes in the ground or in pots .

— Carla Z. Mudry , Malvern , Pennsylvania

Resurrect your rhodies

Winter kill got your rhododendron ? We had a very dry , nonsnowy winter last year in the Northeast , following a severe drought the summer before — a double curse , peculiarly for evergreens . If your rhododendrons have a substantial amount of dead wood , my advice is to hard clip the bushes in one-half , apply a sluggish - spillage plant food for acid - loving shrubs , sprinkle a tablespoonful or two of epsom table salt around the base , and mulch . If you water cautiously this year , you will be rewarded with dense new growth that seem healthier than ever . It usually takes one or two seasons for these shrubs to fill out completely and return to full bloom world power . I have plant it very square to renovate and restore rhododendrons and azalea .

— Lisa Matey Bergeron , Melrose , Massachusetts

Cure potatoes in nursery trays

Here ’s a handy way to repurpose the baby’s room trays that stack up from season to season : dry your potatoes before warehousing . As the pic shows , the individual section are ideal for keeping the potatoes from touching one another during the curing cognitive process . This method also work well for dry onions .

— Julie Horney , Huntertown , Indiana

Balance support from broken tools

It ’s always unsatisfying when a long - handle garden tool jailbreak , but if it ca n’t be repaired , I love to drop down the handles into select parts of my garden . Apart from offer a agrestic aesthetic , these grip are invaluable living when I ’m turn away down to do some weeding in a heavily planted area where I do n’t want to lose my balance .

— Alex Szumilas , Ottawa , Ontario

Lavender to the rescue

When I saw suspicious minor moths fluttering near my closet , I used a needle to put hole in moldable sandwich cup of tea , occupy the bags with dried lavender flowers , zip the bags , and hang them with clothespins from my cotton and wool garments . The moth break coming , and my closet smells great . salvia result work too , but I like the smell of lavender better .

— Mary Crum , Fort Myers , Florida

Keep that herbicide where it belongs

After I discovered poison ivy acquire up a tree in my one thousand , I could n’t find any professionals to remove it . I knew that I could n’t pull it down on my own , but I did n’t want it to spread out . I was concerned about child in the neighborhood touch the poison ivy , but I also did n’t desire them being exposed to the Roundup product for toxicant ivy I figured I would have to utilise to get rid of it .

I give out to a local flower store where I used to mould and got two extra - tumid water tubes for heavyset orchid stems . These look like rich , opaque , shaping test tube , but they have a rubber cap on the top with a slit for the stem . I rolled up some paper towels and put them inside each underground so that they would wrap snugly around a poison Hedera helix stem . Then I fill up the tubes with Roundup and put the chapiter on . Avoiding the slits in the rubbery tops , I taped the edges of the caps to the tubes for a trusted seal .

I ignore the two poison ivy vine at about 6 inches from the ground , leaving the vine attached to the tree . I slew a Roundup - filled underground onto each of the stems and leave alone the tube there all wintertime . This put the Roundup only where needed — but exactly and continually where needed — and it did n’t wash off in the weather . Sure enough , no poison ivy returned in the spring .

— Gwen Drury , Stoughton , Wisconsin

Photos , except where noted : courtesy of the contributors .

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