Lawn care tools fall into three categories: Basic tools, specialty tools, and tools to rent. The Daleys Turf recommendations are based on average situations – your requirements may differ.
Basic Tools
These are are the ones you should own and have on hand to complete regular lawn care.
Garden Cart or Wheelbarrow: Hauls everything from lawn tools to fertiliser to lawn waste.
Garden Rake: The metal type of rake is useful for preparing small areas of soil for planting or removing thatch.
Grass Shears: A slow means of clipping grass along the edge of a garden bed, but necessary where plants grow too close to use a mower or whipper snipper.
Landscape Rake: A 36-inch aluminium head mounted on an aluminium or wood shaft, which removes debris from prepared soil and used to level the soil prior to installing a new lawn.
Lawn/Leaf Rake: Useful for collecting lightweight material, such as clippings and leaves. Those made from bamboo are usually the lightest and easiest to use, however, they only last a few seasons. Steel rakes and the modern plastics are more durable.
Manual Aerator: Foot-powered and easy to use, a manual aerator is fine if you have a small lawn and time on your hands.
Pruning and Lopping Shears: To cut branches with up to a 1.5 cm diameter use pruning shears. Use lopping shears (loppers) for 1.5 to 4 cm diameter thick branches.
Pruning and Bow Saws: Use a pruning saw for wood branches up to about 8 cm in diameter and a bow saw for larger branches.
Shovels: Round-point shovels are for moving large quantities of fine-textured material, such as sand, soil, or non-fibrous mulches, from one place to another. Long-handled shovels should be selected by weight—the lighter the shovel, the easier it is to dig. D-handled shovels are suited for digging in trenches.
Spades: Often mistakenly called a shovel, spades have flat or gently curved blades and are for planting or transplanting, edging, and turf removal.
Sprayer: Used for dispensing insecticides and herbicides. Sprayers are typically available in canister or backpack styles with 7.5 to 15 litre polyethylene tanks and interchangeable nozzles for varying applications patterns and rates.
Spreaders: Precision is the main difference between the two types of spreaders, drop and rotary spreaders. A drop spreader distributes seed, fertiliser, and other minerals, such as lime, in swaths the width of the spreader. Settings allow you to control the amount distributed. A rotary spreader flings material over a wide area, thereby covering ground faster than drop spreaders. However, it is not well suited for use on windy days or with small, irregularly shaped lawns.
Thatching Rake: Designed to remove thatch from your lawn without damaging the turf. The angle of the rake head adjusts to control the depth of the tine penetration.
Trowel: A hand tool with a pointed, scoop-shaped metal blade and a handle. A trowel is used for breaking up earth, digging small holes, and mixing in fertiliser or other additives.
Turf Edger (Lawn Edger or Stick Edger): A half-moon-shaped steel cutting head, mounted to a hardwood handle, used to keep lawn edges neat. You can use an edger to cleanly separate a lawn from a path or other paved surface, such as a concrete sidewalk or asphalt path. Edgers offer a more finished appearance than can be achieved by merely mowing over the border of the lawn, path or driveway, which frequently permits tufts of low-growing grass to hang over, resulting in an irregular or ragged appearance.
Utility Cart: This cart is a great way to keep your gardening tools organised and take them to and from storage.
Weeder: A forked steel head on a short, hardwood handle that pries weeds from turf.
Next time we will cover the essential tools that are specialty tools and tools you can rent. For more lawn care tips contact the team at Daleys Turf.
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