Tools for Clearing the Garden

[digitS']

What do you use?

For the last few years, I have used what I called a Corn Knife. I guess that it is not known by that name to others.

I've done some searching, but still don't know. It looks like a Weed and Brush Blade (link) but as far as I know, was never sharpened on both sides. That seems odd that it would be sharpened that way. It works fine with only the hooked side sharp.

I learned that people who know how to use it don't worry much about dulling the blade by hitting the ground. The hook hits first and stops the blade. I once saw an ad for one with a "knob" at the end of the hook just to protect the blade. Seemed like a good idea but I no longer know where I saw that ad.

I never worked on a crew clearing brush or for a landscaper but I'm wondering how well I can sharpen the old thing I have and the handle is loose. I'd like to find the one with the knob but coming up with a name for the search looks like the trick. Any ideas?

Steve

 

[digitS']

Oops.

Obviously, this should have gone in the Tools forum.

@sumi or Rob should feel free to move it ...

Steve

 

[Beekissed]

What do you use?

For the last few years, I have used what I called a Corn Knife. I guess that it is not known by that name to others.

I've done some searching, but still don't know. It looks like a Weed and Brush Blade (link) but as far as I know, was never sharpened on both sides. That seems odd that it would be sharpened that way. It works fine with only the hooked side sharp.

I learned that people who know how to use it don't worry much about dulling the blade by hitting the ground. The hook hits first and stops the blade. I once saw an ad for one with a "knob" at the end of the hook just to protect the blade. Seemed like a good idea but I no longer know where I saw that ad.

I never worked on a crew clearing brush or for a landscaper but I'm wondering how well I can sharpen the old thing I have and the handle is loose. I'd like to find the one with the knob but coming up with a name for the search looks like the trick. Any ideas?

Steve

In these parts that's called a brush hook and I'm well familiar with using one...used to have the callouses to prove it. Never cut corn with it, though. Mostly multiflora rose, small brush, etc.

If my garden has grown up so bad as to need a brush hook, I've got bigger trouble than what tool to use...it's time to stop gardening and just run the brush hog every now and again.

For my garden clean out, it's usually hands and hoes...this year will be the scuffle hoe. Back when I used to till, it was just a run through with the tiller a few times, then reseed with white dutch clover to put it to bed.

 

[valley ranch]

Never used one~but like the look of them~I've seen them~pictures of them~but```

 

[flowerbug]

i just dig a hole with a shovel and scrape stuff in there and bury it. takes me about a week to get through all the gardens.

any weeds that might grow back from roots will get the dirt knocked off the roots (leaves pulled off and left for worm food) and put in a bucket for the weed pile. if the weed has a lot of seeds the whole thing goes to the weed pile. most of the gardens inside the fence are in pretty good shape now so there aren't too many weeds.

the bigger wilder garden out back i try to trim back a few times a season with the electric hedge trimmers. i neglected it this year because i was working on another large garden and it is getting to be a mess so next year i'll be digging through it again and that will knock it back. there's a lot of garlic in there that i can use as green garlic, but it is also full of alfalfa and birdsfoot trefoil that i planted to use as green manure. it has worked very well so far, but i'm now to the point where i grow other veggies in there. it isn't fenced so most of what i grow is rabbit, groundhog or deer food.

i'm hoping to eventually get it covered with strawberries and other things we like to eat. it is a pretty big garden and the last of my priorities so i don't really mind if i get much out of there. i like the wilder look of it and don't mind sharing with the critters (we have fenced gardens for the critical stuff) and i don't put all that much time into it so whatever comes from there is very close to free.

the field on the other side of the ditch i should get someone to brush hog it to keep the poplars and other scrub from taking over.

 

[Nyboy]

I bought some gas powered machine like a weed wacker with wheels used on CL. Never used myself nephew has once commented to me he makes a lot of money with it.

 

[Ridgerunner]

This is the closest I was able to come for what we used as a corn knife. I don't know why this has that notch in it, it is not a folding knife. Yes, you only sharpen the inside.



We'd use it to make shocks. After we hand picked the dried corn ears we'd leave three or four stalks standing and tie them together with bailing twine to form the base, then stack the cut stalks around it. When we were done adding stalks we'd tie it together with more bailing twine, we always had plenty of used bailing twine. Since they were standing off the ground they would not rot. These were used as fodder to feed cattle and horses during the winter.



You started me thinking on knives. This photo is pretty close to what we used for a tobacco knife. Some people used one that looked more like a hatchet and was easier to use but Dad didn't like the hatchet type, you'd knock off the dried dead leaves at the bottom of the stalk and lose them. Those bottom leaves, called trash, we very thin and a lot of people didn't bother that much with them. The per pound price for that trash was the highest price but they were so thin it took a bit to get a pound. We grew burley, not dark-fired, and that trash was prized for high quality tobacco, like cigars. The leaves towards the top of the plant were a lot stronger and were used for cigarettes or chewing tobacco.




This photo is fairly good on how we harvested burley. You'd use that knife to cut the plant and spear it onto a stick, then hang those sticks in the tobacco barn to cure. Dark-fired tobacco was harvested differently.

Back to your question Steve. I generally use a mattock to clear the garden. Where I let the grass and weeds get out of control I dig out the grass roots, that's a pain and is really slow. Where I had it mulched pretty heavily or maybe dug sweet potatoes late in the season it's pretty clear. It doesn't take long to get that ready to plant, it's mainly just digging out what few plants managed to grow and working what's left of the mulch into the ground. To me that's another huge benefit of heavy mulching, it makes it a lot easier to prepare for the next year, plus you get all that organic stuff in the ground. If that mulch is still in fair shape I might rake it to the side and use it as mulch for my cool weather crops. It will be gone by early summer, say the time you harvest those crops, and can be worked into the soil for the next planting if you follow with a second crop. I usually don't follow with a second crop so those are the areas that get overgrown as keeping them clear is a lower priority, there is too much else going on. If I were smart I'd take the time to clear those areas and spread a lot of mulch to keep them clear. I generally use wheat straw over newspaper for mulch.

I use a tiller to level it and work any additives into the ground before I plant. If the area is cleared but I'm not ready to plant, I'll run the tiller when weeds and grass start sprouting to keep it clear. It doesn't take long for hose things to get out of control.

 

[digitS']

Hey! Look at that!! While I am rambling on with the following, @Ridgerunner has an answer. I need go back and read it a 2nd time but I'm pretty sure he is right on the tool!

Plants that fall to the "corn knife," besides the corn, include sunflowers and dahlias. Really, it is most things in the big veggie garden. Peppers are so long dead that they are quick and easy to pull. Tomatoes are already flat. From the way the property owner is acting, I'm pretty sure that the tractor guy will show up soon. Some of the property will go on the market and they will want zero garden plants to look at if that happens this winter.

The tractor won't have any trouble getting through what is there. Only one other year has he been called at the end of the season. I'm not the one who has to look out of the windows there but I wish that tractor work would be left until spring. I will have to go over every square foot of the garden with the rototiller if the tractor shows up now.

Kale plants have heavy stems and almost too many roots to pull. They fall easily to a sharp corn hook. Sunflowers, I have used the chainsaw but that thing is dull also and even tho a small one, almost overkill.

I have run the lawnmower over some plants in other years but I'm not confident that the one I have now has a high enough setting to be used comfortably. Yeah, the handheld weedwacker - but that thing isn't much fun to use.

@flowerbug , yours is my preferred method . However, the tractor guy can't be relied on to keep his wheels on my paths. Several times, he tilled my garden separately and the tractor fit almost perfectly but there is no other reason than my preference for him to have used two different tilling patterns since there is no physical separation between the owner's garden and mine. Hell for Leather! Nearly always he does the tilling when I'm not there ...

Yeah, in the other gardens I can move all plant material where I want it. Dig out beds and bury it. Nearly all my Gardening is On Other People's Property. I have to GOOPP as I think that they would like it. Whether they do gardening and set some sort of standard or not, they really have to look at the garden much more than I do. Often, I don't do more than catch a glimpse of it as I drive by for months at a time.

There are still some dahlias to dig but the plants are whacked down. Coarse stuff now, everything that isn't a viable root will all but disappear over the winter no matter where it finds its final resting place. Hopefully, every root carried downstairs will prove to have vigorous life to it in the spring.

Steve
who has the winter to figure out how to sharpen this thing or buy another

 

[Ridgerunner]

Steve, I put knives like that in a vice to hold them steady and use a file and leather gloves that cover the wrist to sharpen them. I forgot you asked about sharpening them.

I don't like to use a grinder to sharpen them. The heat that builds up changes the temper of the metal so it gets dulled a lot faster, but a lot of people use a grinder to sharpen them. That could be something like this



or maybe something like this but I'd think this would require a real steady hand, steadier than mine.

 

[digitS']

Ha! I tried googling "corn blade" and it was all about pedicures!

There is a picture of a Corn Knife on this webpage but it's quite a bit bigger than the one I use.

http://www.simplyappalachian.com/blog/2014/10/20/shock-ingly-beautiful

Steve