Most gardeners use tools that have remained largely unchanged for centuries - forks, spades, trowels and so on that have stood the test of time. It's not often that a brand new gardening tool comes along, but there's a new one on the market - a trowel that's shaped like a cylinder.
Made of copper, the cylinder shape is the brainchild of Copper & Green founder Paul Yates. "“My customers often said I should make copper garden tools, as copper in the garden is very much on trend," he told us. "I set my brief to develop something that is easy to grip, has an element of colour, is somewhat multifunctional, and shows off the beauty of copper."
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Paul added: "For some gardeners who have joint mobility issues, holding a traditional trowel is not always comfortable with a regular narrow wooden handle, so I decided to expand the traditional handle size using a copper cylinder, as both the handle and the head of the trowel. This is very comfortable to grip but I found it to be a little slippery when gardening in the wet. As such, I 'split' the cylinder and bound the two halves with laces. This increased the grip and gave me the opportunity to experiment with colour. Further, with the split cylinder design, gardeners told me that they could use the trowel in several different ways. Firstly, as a regular trowel, for weeding and planting, secondly digging vertically to make holes for bulbs and tubers, and thirdly, using horizontally to lift out soil to make straight furrows."
The Copper & Green Garden Trowel at a glance
With a 5.5cm diameter and 28cm length, the trowel features a scooped end and robust laced binding in six different colours - deep purple, emerald green, mint green, crimson, sky blue and yellow - and costs £28.00.
Copper is attractive, rust proof and highly durable and Copper & Green crafts every tool by hand, so were were interested to try this attractive new tool out. But is a cylinder a useful shape in the garden - and is it a worthy replacement for a trowel or the hugely popular hori hori knife? We asked two testers to put it through its paces.
"The tool certainly looks nice - it's great to see a tool that's made of traditional materials, and the laces mean that it's an attractive addition to a shed or greenhouse," said our first tester. "It comes into its own is as a scoop - it was handy in the greenhouse when I was scooping compost out of a bag and into small pots." She added: "It could also be useful for making a furrow for sowing seeds on the veg patch."
There were downsides, however: "Unfortunately, I found it uncomfortable to grip. It was simply too large for my small-ish hands," said our first tester. Our second tester, who tried the tool on his allotment, also found it uncomfortable.
Both of our testers found it hard to get any leverage when using the tool. "The cylinder shape might work nicely in light, sandy soils, but on my heavy clay, it barely made a dent. When transplanting a foxglove seedling, I found myself reaching for my hori hori to finish the job," said our first tester. She added: "I found the same problem of leverage when I tried to plant a bulb - the top of the tool has quite a sharp edge, and I had to wear gloves in order to press it down into the soil. Even then, it only went halfway down in dry conditions."
Her thoughts were echoed by our second tester. "I'd say the tool has to be used on perfect, crumbly soil for it to be useful," he says. "If the soil is wet, the tool becomes clogged, and if it's too dry, it can't penetrate."
"I already have some copper plant rings, which I find effective at keeping slugs off my dahlias, and I love the look of the plant labels and blackened copper pots," said our first tester. "I really wanted to love this tool, but for most jobs around the garden, I'll be sticking to my hori hori."
Other great copper tools
Sara Raven's copper hand tools
Buy individually from Sarah Raven at £42.94
Sarah Raven's line of copper hand tools look lovely, with an earthy, rustic feel. There are three classic designs to choose from - a trowel, a spade and a scoop. Hand made in India the tools are rust resistant and have an ergonomic handle design.
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Farrar and Tanner's mini copper tools
Buy from Farrar and Tanner for £10
These beautiful mini copper plated tools are great for pot plants and what's more you can get them engraved too. At 3.4 x 2.3 x 19cm they are easy to store, also helped by the handy loop on the end of the handles.
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Farrar and Tanner's copper and bronze range of gardening tools
Buy from Farrar and Tanner
Farrar and Tanner have a great range of copper gardening tools, alongside bronze tools too. It's well worth a look through their selection, if you're keen on rustic looking garden tools with strong ergonomic designs.
Buy from Farrar and Tanner