Hoedown

Today Carol at May Dreams Garden is the hostess with the mostest hoes and wants us all to show our hoe collection. If you don't have a hoe collection any garden implement that you adore and use a lot will do. Carol is a great afficionado of hoes and their affect on her garden. She has related some Lessons to hoe by. She has most interestingly ammassed quite the collection of hoes too.My small yet useful collection amounts to two hoes. I must say the old fashioned hoe, the one with the down turned blade that everyone either has or has seen in ones parents or grandparents garden is not used a whole lot by me. Its heavy wooden handle is made for larger hands and stronger backs. Of course it is ideal for chopping down tough grass and weeds.
I prefer the other hoe in this picture. It has a slim aluminum handle that is long which gives me extra leverage to get after weeds. The aluminum is light weight and the yellow handle makes it easy to spot when I set it down in the garden. I can leave it out over night without any ill effects too. As a matter of fact it sits outside most of the summer so I don't have to go into the barn or garage to look for it. As you can see the head on this hoe is a little different. It is flat. This works so well when going through mulch. We have a lot of mulch in our garden. Those little weed seedlings get a good start in the mulch but this hoe is ideal to just take them down. Not only this but it easily fluffs the mulch so that it doesn't get compacted.I also use the width of this blade as a measure when I run it around the edges of flower beds. I try to keep this distance between the beds and lawn so that the mower man can easily whip around the flower beds with the mower.This particular brand of hoe handle you can change the head to various implements such as a cultivator claw, a more typical down turned hoe etc. I have only the one head, this flat hoe and am quite pleased with it. I hope to see other hoe collections and hear what type of hoe you use. Have a nice weekend hoeing up a storm no doubt.