Gardening Tools – Some Quality Tips To Help You Maintain Them

If you are interested in prolonging the life of your gardening tools and care about preventing injuries, then that it is very important for you to learn how to properly use and maintain these tools. For example, properly uncoiling a hose will prevent you from tripping or catching your foot in the coil. Another example would be leaving your backyard rake out so you could step on it and have it come up and whack you in the face, or have one of the tines go through your foot. Tools must not be left where their edges or point may be hidden by grass, leaves, or other material. Keep your fingers away from the blades of the lawn mower: merely hitting your hand against the blades can lead to a brutal injury. A small, slight crack in a wooden handle can be repaired by wrapping the handle with tape. The tape that is made out of glass filament works pretty well also.

Splinters in wooden handles of rakes, hoes, and shovels can be cured by sanding the face until it becomes smooth again; this not only protects your hands, but keeps the cracks from spreading and causing the handle to break.

A really easy way to make your wood handles last a little longer is to put on a few coats of either quality varnish or a good coat of paint. You can definitely paint the metal parts on your tools as well, and when you do just make sure that you apply a coat of primer and a couple of coats of exterior paint on top. You needn’t paint any of the metal parts that are made to work in the ground, as it will come right off anyhow when you use the tool.

Preservation of the tool isn’t the only reason you should paint it though as when you paint  them appropriate colors it makes them much easier to find. So with this being known, you should make a point to not paint your tools in colors like brown and green, but instead florescent colors and blues, yellow, reds, and such will keep them from getting lost in the grass.

The metal edges of shovels, hoes, rakes or other backyard tools may become nicked. You can easily fix these nicks by simply using a metal file. Any rough surfaces should be gone over with steel wool or other abrasive which is good for metal. By using a simple mallet you can easily pound out any dents that your tools may have. Prompt attention always needs to be paid to parts on a wheelbarrow that are broken or cracked be they metal or wood parts. Painting the wheelbarrow helps protect the wood. The moving parts need occasional oiling, to run smoothly. For winter storage, keep tools in a dry spot as dampness could be harmful. Make sure that you clean your tools thoroughly before you put them in storage. If you want to prevent rust from forming on your tools, you can apply a mixture of petroleum jelly and light oil before storage.

If you properly take care of your garden tools they will last you for many many years.

Another way to appropriately take care of your tools is to keep them organized. A garage tool organizer is a wonderful way to do this, and you can read more about my visiting http://gardentoolorganizer.org