[gardeners] Re: tools
asidv@fbg.net (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Wed, 9 Dec 1998 16:41:02 +0000
Have enjoyed hearing about the member's favorite tools for
planting -- some, perhaps, more exotic than another.
Ice cream forks in the garden, do I not recall, were mentioned by
someone else some many months ago. The problem there is that they
usually come with gold bowls and sterling stems -- and that
seems somewhat excessively posh. (For those of you who
saw and enjoyed "Titanic" and do not know, it is interesting and
significant to note that P O S H originally meant that group of
first-class travelers who insisted their cabins/staterooms be
positioned "Port Out" and "Starboard Home.")
Beyond ice cream forks, may I recommend the Apostle spoon
be used when planting and/or working with Passion flowers or
Easter lilies?
And commemorative spoons (those little trifles oft times favored by
those travelers who did not P.O.S.H.) These should be used for
the unseating of those plants that have "bitten the dust" so to speak
and exist forthwith only in memory.
I confess I can find no useful purpose to which to put the tomato
server, but sugar-tongs would be ideal for handling snails and
slugs on their way to eternal disposition.
A sugar sifter (provided the incised holes are the proper size) is
helpful in direct seeding albeit somewhat too coarse an instrument in
some instances.
There is hardly any piece of tableware, whether goldware, sterling,
silver plate, stainless steel, or plastic that cannot be pressed into
usefulness in the garden. For one last example, what could be more
useful than a carving set for (a) spearing the offending weed and (b)
lopping it off at its pockets? Here one has the advantage of
immediate access to the sharpening steel -- a usual third member
of the carving set.
On the other hand, one must always guard against being too precious.
One Martha Stewart, per generation, is about all one should have to
suffer.
Pat