SO, THIS COMING Thursday is Thanksgiving, which means the Christmas shopping season begins in earnest the day after.
Your gardening friends and family love thoughtful gifts as well, so how about a list of great gardening gifts?
1. Atlas Gloves. These gardening gloves breathe, so they don’t stink, and they are incredibly flexible and agile — you can button shirts, plant tiny seedlings or handle heavy jobs. Perfect for the gardener.
2. Amaryllis. (My favorite). A perfect stocking stuffer, superb party gift, a wonderful present, the joy of amaryllis is in watching the bulb grow and bloom in front of your eyes, culminating in huge multiple 4- to 6-inch trumpet flowers of intense color. Better yet, the darkest black thumbs can successfully flower (force) and indestructible amaryllis bud.
3. Load of soil, mulch or compost. Every gardener on the topsoil-deprived Peninsula would cherish a large dump truck load of deep, rich, dark, organic soil. Give the gift few would buy themselves, even though they critically need mulch or compost.
4. Dram water breaker. These water heads are full flow (fast watering) and soft flow (gentle on plants) at the same time. One water head is good for seedlings, transplants, trees, cuttings or pots. Absolutely get the aluminum head and water wand (handle 16-inch to 22-inch is ideal).
5. Sweeper nozzle. This nozzle is the poor man’s power washer. The nozzle is brass and has a wedge-cut groove, which increases velocity and fans the water out into a wide, thin-edged stream. It is perfect for walkways, driveway cracks, washing off tools and machines and spraying down anything. Put it on an 18-inch with hip-high grip, the nozzle is only inches from the ground.
6. Bucket with tool sleeve. A multi-purpose combo, the 5-gallon bucket is perfect for weeds, soil, fertilizer, deadheads or gravel. And the fabulous canvas sleeve holds your Felco pruners, scissors, a hand trowel, small rake, weed hoe, Atlas gloves and an orchard saw (all of which are PERFECT stocking suffers … just saying).
7. A good garden cart. Choose one with air-inflated tires and heavy duty side racks. Few devices are as handy to me as my sturdy garden cart. Get one that can handle at least 250 pounds of firewood, bags of soil, rocks and concrete, and are all easily mixed and moved about the yard with a good sturdy garden cart. I love to fill them with six to eight buckets of mulch, compost soil and fertilizer — a virtual rolling soil machine.
8. Germination inhibitor. The “perfect weed seed blocker,” Snapshot is my miracle time saver! How can you resist giving a 40,000-square-foot location of weed-free existence? Weeds are everywhere. The germination blockers, including various organic varieties, work miracles by preventing weed seed from sprouting.
9. Gift certificates to local nurseries. Here is a gift that comes packaged with future fun. Seek out your favorite plant vendor and purchase a gift certificate. Then, on one of those cold January days, you and your fellow gardener can make an afternoon of shopping. Along with coffee or lunch, stroll through aisle after aisle as the lucky one gets to select the perfect planter garden product.
10. Felco pruners. I just have to include these in any list because they are the No. 1, all-around world’s best pruners ever. Get left-handed, small bladed, pivot handle or air-powered models. I suggest the fine, ornamental No. 6.
11. Grub hoe (maddox). This tool is a pickaxe on steroids and it does the work of an athlete on steroids as well. Perfect for cutting a trench, eradicating a clump of crabgrass or destroying a thistle, grub hoes pound up solid soil. But purchase the highest quality available, because your muscles are the limit of this tool.
12. Be a friend. The best gift you can give is yourself and a day (or two) of work offered to someone in need. This truly is in the spirit of Christmas, so please consider this wonderful gift. There are many who are elderly or have fallen on tough times, and a strong hand and/or back around the garden could be the most thoughtful and appreciated gift possible.
Happy holiday season to everyone and … everyone please, stay well.
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Andrew May is a freelance writer and ornamental horticulturist who dreams of having Clallam and Jefferson counties nationally recognized as “Flower Peninsula USA.” Send him questions c/o Peninsula Daily News, P.O. Box 1330, Port Angeles, WA 98362, or email news@peninsuladailynews.com (subject line: Andrew May).
