Print This List    Email to a Friend  

How to Pick a Garden Shovel  
HOW TO 

Tags: garden, shovel, how to, pick, gardening, home

It moves dirt, it's a shovel, what do you really need to know to figure out how to choose the right shovel? Ah, gentle reader, there is science and art that goes with this selection. If you want to get a shovel that you can toil in the dirt with for years to come, read on:

	Shovel construction - open-backed shovels are usually the cheapest and least durable (these are the ones with the hollow depression on the back side).
	Metal thickness - yes, there are grades of thickness that will measure the "gauge" of the steel used to produce your shovel. 14 is the strongest, 18 is not worth owning.
	Open-back vs Closed-back/solid-socket - the hollow back shovel (open-backed) collects dirt in areas that if not cleaned properly will eventually corrode the metal. The best and strongest shovels have heads made of a single forged and tempered piece of steel.
	Tread - this is the slender, flattened area on the back edge of the blade. A forward-turned shovel tread is best but many good shovels have a rolled tread.

Lister: Heather
Source: LAL Editor

Other lists of interest:

Different Kinds of Square-point Shovels INFORMATIVE  (0)

Getting Down and Dirty: Gardening for Beginners TIPS  (0)

Vegetables That May Yield More Than One Crop per Season TIPS  (0)

Kinds of Shovels INFORMATIVE  (0)

Different Kinds of Round-Pointed Shovels INFORMATIVE  (0)

Rate it:
Give your rating for this list. One is the lowest score, five is the highest.

1.  2.  3.  4.  5. 

Add a Comment: Add your comments about the list. Enter your comment in the box below.