Why is it important to clean your gardening tools?
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What is a gardener without a spade? Without rake or hoe? Without pruning shears? Even if the right tools do not necessarily make a good gardener, being well equipped does help!
Your gardener set includes a number of gardening tools and essential equipment for digging, planting, and maintaining the garden. When buying, you should give priority to quality as much as possible, but above all, you must maintain your tools! Irons and handles should be cleaned regularly.
Why clean your gardening tools?
It is really important to clean them regularly, after each use if possible. Some tools are not used throughout the year so you must take special care in their maintenance before storing them for several weeks, several months, late autumn for example, so that we can be sure to reuse them the following year when spring arrives.
This hygiene will prevent the proliferation of bacteria from the tool to the plant in general. Indeed, if you use a pruning shear to cut a plan of tomatoes infected with late blight and do not take the precaution of disinfecting your tool just after with white vinegar or alcohol 90° for example, you run the risk of contaminating a healthy tomato plan or other garden plant with the same tool.
When and how to maintain them?
The maintenance of cutting tools such as pruning shears or hedge trimmers will be different from conventional gardening tools such as spades, rakes or shovels.
For a pruning shear, a shear or a serpette, we will use alcohol or black soap to clean the blade of any impurities and this just after having used it. And you can also grease it with a little oil and sharpen it before storing the tool on the workbench.
As for more conventional tillage tools such as rake, spade or shovel, we will first remove the soil residues with a hard root brush and if the soil remains stuck on the tools despite all your efforts, just let them soak in a basin with water and bleach and wait a good hour before brushing. You then rinse them thoroughly with water and let them dry for a while before checking the handles of your tools. In order to avoid possible cracks or traces of rust, you can coat them with a brush or a cloth with linseed oil (which is found in the trade for 9 euros per liter in general) or also with beeswax. It will also be necessary to check the fasteners of your tools and change the defective screws if necessary. Remember to change the wood of your tools if they are split and use if possible ash wood known for its strength and robustness to all tests.
And finally, hang them on the wall in a dry place, taking care to put the sharp parts up.
On the tarpaulin or canvas side, a slightly soapy sponge and a large clear splash of water should suffice. Allow to dry, and check the general condition of the tarp before folding and storing.
Thanks to these good reflexes, you extend the life of your gardening tools while ensuring optimal comfort and safety for gardening!
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