Gardening tools for seniors

Beds that are inches deep and sit on top of the soil can be accessed using long-handled tools, benches, or kneelers. As long as you fill them with lightweight soil mixes that include things like peat moss or vermiculite, working the beds can be done easily from a standing or sitting position.

Personally, though, if you are going to go to the trouble of building beds or hiring someone to do it , opting for a bed style that includes a knee wall that can be used as a bench is an even better bet.

Then, you can skip dragging a bench out to the garden and instead just sit on the edge of your beds to garden. Some people even opt for taller beds that you can stand upright to work in them. A keyhole bed is a good example of this. I love these kind of beds for the ease of gardening for seniors.

You can do what my golf-cart gardening friend does and unload from the seat of your car by opening packages and moving smaller increments at a time. No matter how restricted you are in your movements, a salad table can make gardening for seniors and anyone else much easier. Along with raised bed gardening, you can also consider container gardening for seniors.

Containers full of soil are heavy. You may also want to opt for lightweight containers such as those made out of plastic or grow bags.

With large enough containers, you can grow a lot of food even in a small space. Dwarf fruit trees and shrubs may also be good options. If you do need to move your plants, such as indoors for the winter , consider asking a family member or neighbor for help. Or use a hand-truck rather than lifting. In our post discussing the best wheelbarrow , option number 5 is a versatile workhorse, with an innovative plant mover dolly which is a brilliant way to move heavy pots around.

Still, you would need a strong hand to manipulate the wheelbarrow, so asking a neighbor or friend would still be a good idea. By gardening in tires, you not only reduce, reuse, and recycle, but you also make gardening for seniors easier and more accessible. Tires can be stacked on top of each other creating deep beds. You can place them wide apart to navigate through if you are using a mobile device, even something like a golf cart, or even pile them up to be just the right height for someone in a wheelchair.

We share 13 great ideas tire gardens ideas here, as well as a guide on how to create a tire garden. Or, rather than growing plants in large containers opt for plants that do well in small containers. You can even grow a full edible container garden using annual vegetables with shallow roots, dwarf-sized or compact perennial plants, or grow full-sized vegetables but harvest in baby form. I recently picked up a blueberry plant that can produce abundant fruit in a two-gallon soil pot. I also came across Tom Thumb green peas that get less than a foot tall and still make abundant full-sized pea pods even on a sunny windowsill.

There are also continuous harvest cherry tomatoes that produce in less than 1 gallon-sized pots. Read our post on window box gardening for seniors with ideas on what plants to use, or these brilliant ideas for a hanging vegetable garden.

You may need to grow lots of little containers to get good production. But you can put them on an outdoor tabletop to make tending and harvesting easy. Plus, since they are small in size, you can lift and move them with less difficulty when needed. I have to tell you, water is heavy. Most plants need the equivalent of an inch of rain per week.

An inch of rain weighs about 5. In hot dry weather, plants need even more moisture, which means that weight goes up to 30 pounds or more. You can avoid lifting water by using installed irrigation rather than a watering can. Drip tape and tubes are relatively lightweight. If you buy kits that allow you to install your own emitters, you can even use them for container gardens simply by putting the emitters where your plants are. Irrigation takes planning and access to a pressurized water source such as a house hose bibb.

Mulch can be heavy to haul, especially when wet. Ask retailers for dry bags. Or consider lightweight options such as covering the soil with newspapers before watering. I can tell you that just about every gardener hates lugging around heavy garden hoses.

If you do need to move hoses around your garden, spending a little extra to buy light-weight hoses can save your back and your frustration level! Also, make sure your hoses are empty when you move them. If you are going to grow in containers, then you may also want to consider self-watering planters. A sharp blade works better and is easier to use.

Weeding hoes, also called hula or stirrup hoes, have an open square head and are pushed back and forth just under the soil surface to cut down top growth. Flat hoes are good for turning the soil in rows in vegetable gardens.

Watering Wand Give your plants a gentle rain shower with a water-breaking wand. The extended reach is also helpful to get to out-of-the-way containers, hanging plants, or the back edges of borders. Watering wands come in a variety of lengths, from 10 to 48 inches.

Choose an appropriate length for your needs - longer for high hanging baskets, shorter for tighter spaces. Built-in shut off valves in the handle conserve water and allow you to adjust the flow. Watering Can There are 2 basic types of watering cans, plastic or metal. Metal cans should be galvanized to resist rusting. Consider the size of the can relative to your strength, a gallon of water weighs just over 8 pounds.

The handle position should allow you to carry a full can and also tip it to pour easily. Two-handled designs allow for better stability for children or elderly gardeners. You may need two: a larger one with a sprinkler head for outdoors, and a smaller, long-necked version for houseplants.

Wheelbarrow If your backyard has extra soil to be moved around, compost or mulch that needs to be added to garden beds, or any other heavy lifting and moving project, a wheelbarrow can help you haul hundreds of pounds! Traditional dual-handle, single wheel styles can be harder to balance heavy or unevenly distributed loads. Single-handle two-wheel models are easier to balance, better for those with limited strength or when pulling over uneven terrain. Single-handled wheelbarrows can be pushed or pulled with one hand.

Store it clean and dry to prevent rust. Keep the wheels inflated properly for easier wheeling. Leave a comment. Post comment. Customer Service. Follow Us. Contact Us. All Rights Reserved. Stand-up weed pullers take bending and kneeling out of the equation, which in turn can mean less joint and back pain. This tool allows you to uproot those pesky weeds without moving between kneeling and standing, which can also reduce the risk of a fall.

It's also effortless to use: place the device over the weed, step down on the foot platform to plunge the tool into the soil, and then press on the handle to pull the weed out think of it as a very adjacent version of the claw machine, and the prize is a fully-weeded garden, but without the back pain. Want all the benefits of a rolling garden seat, but with a little bit more reach for deeper flower beds? A garden rocker is a stationary version of a rolling garden seat, except the rocker allows the user to swivel instead of roll.

The swivel function increases your range of reach by allowing you to rock forward and reach more plants. The garden rocker is even more applicable to deeper garden beds because it will enable you to lean further over the bed without fully folding your back at the hips, which would require you to use a garden seat. The garden rocker is especially great for those who suffer from chronic pain, osteoporosis, or any condition that can make kneeling and bending difficult.

To aid in your comfort and access, the rocker's seat is also adjustable, so you can adjust it based on the height of the plants you are tending.

This makes the garden rocker great for planting, pruning, weeding, and deadheading flowers without having the backache that comes with bending low for long periods. As a bonus, the bottom part of the rocker can be used to hold your small tools. Of course, no matter how ergonomic your handles or how well-positioned your flower beds, it's essential that you protect your body while you're out enjoying the sunshine.

And that includes taking care of your skin. Sun protection is vital for people of all ages, but when you get older, your skin becomes much more fragile and susceptible to sunburn. This vulnerability, combined with the physical activity demanded by gardening, high temperatures, and direct sunlight, can make for a dangerous mix. All of these factors, as well as being dehydrated, increase the risk of heat-related illness, including heat cramps, heat exhaustion, fainting, and even heat stroke.

In order to decrease your risk of falling prey to the sun's UV rays, consider investing in a wide-brimmed hat, which not only protects your scalp, back of your neck, and eyes. Just like your skin, your eyes are also significantly impacted by sunlight. And in seniors, there are changes in the eye structure that can cause poorer eyesight and peripheral vision.

Exposure to harmful UV rays can cause any number of things, from mild irritation to permanent damage to your cornea and conjunctiva. You can avoid harm caused by exposure to the sun by wearing plenty of sunscreen, drinking water, dressing in looser fitting, light-colored clothing, and lastly, investing in a quality wide-brimmed hat and maybe a pair of matching sunglasses to tie it all together.

The kneeling pad is an "oldie-but-a-goody," and for good reason. These cushion-like pads are simple, easy to use, easy to store, and, above all: they work. Kneeling pads lessen the hard ground's impact on your knees by providing support and a comfortable surface from which to position yourself while tending to your garden.

If you're looking to lessen the effect that kneeling in the soil or gravel can have on your knees, the answer might lie in a simple foam cushion.