Assure Your Plants Health With Clean Pruning Tools
There is a job in the garden that is required to be performed all year round. Pruning is a task that most gardeners enjoy doing because it is a part of the job that allows the gardener the chance to make his or her mark on the way the garden looks.
In order to be most effective with the pruning chore, you have to ensure you use the correct tools for each job at hand. There are a number of different circumstances in which pruning is required and a different pruning tool will be need for each. Not every hand pruner is the same. In fact they all carry some difference or another with size and the shape of the handles changing from one brand to another.
The important differences, as far as your plants are concerned have to do with the two different types of hand pruners that you use. Bypass hand pruners are designed to cut live stems so that the surrounding bark and tissue is not overly damaged. Anvil hand pruners are designed to be used for cutting dead wood and twigs from the plants. It would be a good idea to buy one of each of these types of pruners so you don’t damage your plants or your pruners by using the wrong one.
A pruning saw is also an essential tool for cutting off larger branches. Pruning saws are thin bladed saws that cut when they are pulled back as opposed to normal saws that cut when they are pushed forward. A pruning saw won’t cause a lot of trauma to the tree as long as you don’t let the branch rip away from the trunk due to its weight.
Other pruners such as pole saws and telescoping pruners are variations on the tools mentioned above but have been adapted to allow you to reach higher branches. In all other aspects they work the same way as your hand tools.
Keeping your pruning tools well oiled, clean and sharpened will ensure that your pruning will help to improve the health of your plants rather than threaten it by introducing disease.