5 Garden Tools That Will Save Your Back

The other day I dug up a patch of grass (and not a very big patch, mind you) to create a bed for some blueberry bushes I ordered. Next time I'll just dig holes... or maybe I'll get myself a manual sod cutter.

A sod cutter makes clearing out the grass a piece of cake. If you're installing a new garden bed where lawn currently resides, this tool can make the work much easier. It's really a necessity for large pieces of turf.

You can rent a big, gas-powered cutter if you're only going to need to do the work once. If you think you'll be cutting up lots of grass and building several beds over time, it makes sense to invest in one of your own.

I moved into my first house last fall and a good-sized chunk of the backyard was overrun by blackberry bushes. I like blackberries as much as the next person (in fact, I'm planning to make a blackberry wine this summer!), but lest my house one day be taken over by these vigorous (AKA fast-growing mutant) shrubs, I needed to prune.

I started out using hand pruners and just about broke my hand in the process. You see, this is my first yard, and I'm having to slowly acquire all my garden tools from scratch. That night, I went out and bought a good pair of loppers.

To be specific, I invested in the sturdy Fiskars PowerGear 31-1/2-Inch Bypass Lopper because I wanted to be able to cut through those fat old canes without killing myself.

The bypass loppers are a great garden tool, and the blackberry bushes were no match for them. The thickest canes (and those old bushes have some thick ones!) snapped right off, and I pruned the whole mess back to a reasonable enough set of bushes (enough for blackberry wine but not enough that my house is likely to be overrun).

Hunching over and digging up weeds is no fun, and if you prefer to wear gloves, it's especially hard to get a good grip on weeds. Even with bare hands, you can't always dig out the roots of those suckers.

A dandelion digger is a handy tool that lets you get in and pull up weeds by the roots. And, yes, you can use it for all sorts of weeds, not just dandelions!

Grab this Ergo Dandelion Digger & Weeder, for less than $10.

Its handle is designed to fit your grip nicely, making it a better tool than cheaper models I've held. Ergonomics are definitely worth considering if you'll be using the tool often.

A drip irrigation system might not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of garden tools (tools are things you hold in your hands, right?), but this may just save your back more than any other doodad you can purchase for your garden.

Even if your garden beds are close enough to your house to be accessible by a hose, winding and unwinding the hose and watering by hand gets old after a while. And lugging watering cans around? Forget it!

And what if you have a mini orchard out back? Are you going to water each individual tree by hand? Trees need a lot of water in their early years.

Installing a drip irrigation system can make a lot of sense, and unlike automatic sprinklers, it isn't a huge investment that involves totally digging up your whole yard.

You can buy starter systems, such as this well-reviewed Drip and Micro-Sprinkler Irrigation System , for under $70. It can provide water for up to 750 square feet of gardening space.

This is another garden "tool" that is less about something that can be held with your hands and more about saving your back (and other body parts to boot). Kneeling and weeding or planting can be wearying, and if you spend a long sunny morning at work in your garden beds, your back might just protest the next morning.

Keep things relaxed and reduce the strain by investing in a garden stool.

Some of the handier garden stools have wheels, to make scooting along the beds easy. Oh, and don't forget the ones with storage underneath the seat. It's nice to have a spot to put your garden tools where they will stay close at hand (or, as the case may be, under rump!).

The Step 2 Garden Hopper Mobile Garden Stool is just such a tool (includes wheels, storage, and seat, all in one!)