Spring has arrived. You can smell it and feel it. Your garden is planned, and soon you will be digging, planting, and seeding. It is a grand new beginning. This time you are determined to do everything right, and it will be just what you dreamed of.
Along with your vision will surely come those noxious, terrible, pesky weeds. My favorite way to eradicate them is with my trusty Japanese hand hoe. This is a marvelous device-so simple, so lethal, and so aesthetically pleasing. A wooden handle the color of honey is attached to a slim black metal rod 18 inches from end to end. The rod has a narrow triangular 12 x 5 x 9 inch blade and is connected between the short sides at the tip of the triangle. Only the long edge of the blade is sharp. Its use is so easy on your wrists and arm. To use the Japanese hoe, you only have to pretend to "shake hands" with the handle, position the sharp blade behind the weeds, and gently scrape the hoe in the earth and pull towards you. The ever-so sharp blade slices the weeds and gathers them into a neat, compact clean-up pile ready for your bucket. The Japanese hand hoe comes in both right- and left-handed versions, too. It makes the necessary weeding chores of gardening almost a Zen ! meditation.
When you are looking at the glamorous garden catalogues or when you are cruising the nursery stores, be on the lookout for this tool. I'll bet that if you use it, it will be one of your favorite garden tools too.
Toni Gilberts, Smith County Master Gardener
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