Dumb Question

I hated the hoe as a kid. It was always 10:30, the hot sun was always high in the sky, and I could never see the end of the row.

I tried never to use one when I had my own garden and did nearly all my garden work, including hoeing the paths, with a shovel. Then, my back began to give out ...

These days, I use a hoe shaped like a crescent. I started off with a hoe given to me that a gardener had sharpened so many times it was in that shape - pointed on 2 sides. Later, I found hoe blades like that. They are called half moon hoes.

I usually like to go after the weeds, one at a time and those sharp points can do it. If I feel the need for chopping into a bed, a 4-prong cultivator with a long handle can do it. Loosening the ground with a spading fork first ... weeds can't hold on against that cultivator.

Steve

I always figured the correct way to use a hoe was to hand it to DH and have him use it!

I don't use a hoe...however, I do have a tip for you. The part about bending over, that usually hurts your back- is the constant bending and straightening. I just stay bent over for as long as I can and then straighten up. This is how the Native Americans planted, etc. (or so Google tells me.) Also, I agree with the sitting down part. If I have concentrated weeds to pull- I just get right down in the dirt.

How I use a hoe depends a bit on how big the weeds are and which weeds it is. The ideal way for me is to get to it while the weeds are reasonably small and it is easy. I'm doing it in a large garden with the produce in rows. I don't know how you use a hoe in raised beds. The very few raised beds I have I just weed by hand, sometimes using a hand tool of some kind when the soil is hard.

Ideally you first plow between rows, using a well trained horse and a triple foot plow. If the ground is really baked hard you may need to use a double shovel plow. With a double shovel you can get a lot deeper and really bust up that clay but if the ground is soft enough and your horse and skill with the plow are up to the task you can really get in close to the plant with that triple foot. That makes hoeing a lot easier. We always used Ole Bob for that kind of plowing. Painter was too fast and impatient but Ole Bob knew what he was doing. You didn't even have to guide him once he knew which row you were on. That was a good horse. We'd treat a fair sized garden, a separate potato patch, 3/4 acres of tobacco, and about 2 acres of corn this way. Man, was I glad to get that laid by. (Laid by means you don't have to work it any more. It has grown big enough that it shades out the weeds. That was normally three times for the tobacco and corn. We'd use the hoe to hill the potatoes and that took care of any weeds. In the garden it just depended on what the produce was.)

Since Old Bob and Painter (Painter is a colloquial way to say Panther) have been dead for about 50 years, I don't use them. Sometimes I use a tiller for the middle of the rows but usually there is some reason the tiller doesn't work real well. If the ground is soft enough and the weeds and especially grass aren't too big I just use a hoe to get that area. If I need to I use a mattock to clean the middle out and bust it up. If it is just weeds its usually not as bad as it may sound but if the Bermuda grass has taken hold it can be pretty rough. I hate Bermuda grass in the garden.

For hoeing I use what is called a "garden hoe". The handle is probably about five feet long. The blade is about six inches wide, flat and sharp across the bottom with the sides curved at the top. What I do is probably pretty close to chopping but there is a lot of dragging involved too. As long as the weeds are small enough I drag the hoe through them and maybe remove the top half inch of dirt. I try to pull; the weeds out in between the rows, well away from the actual plants. If the roots remain buried and it rains or you water some of them keep living, especially grass. I hate Bermuda grass in the garden. Then I pull in about as much dirt as I removed right around the plant. My reasoning (other than this is the way my dad taught me to do it) is that I have removed the weeds that have sprouted, I have killed any seeds that have started to sprout, I've broken up the surface so any rain that falls soaks in instead of runs off, and I've broken up those capillaries that can wick moisture out of the ground. I'm not sure about that capillary action. Decades ago I heard that when the rain hits the ground and soaks in it forms capillaries that can be a tunnel for evaporation. Maybe it is true, maybe not, but it makes for a good story.

Of course I recommend mulching as much as you possibly can and just skip all this. While this sometimes brings back memories of a younger more carefree life, they are not always memories I enjoy. Two acres of corn, mid 90's, high humidity, no shade, and two acres of corn with the tobacco patch waiting.

That was a great story Ridge.

Ditto Wish my flower beds where laid by !!!!!

journey11 said:

Can't wait 'til my kids get big enough to hoe weeds! I will not pay them though...you know, that little Red hen syndrome.

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Hahahahahahahahahahahaha

I know why Cat is laughing, @journey11, and I agree with her entirely!