Ames True Temper Lawn Buddy

Ames Lawn Buddy for my Lawn Butt

 See it at Amazon

Toting all of the gardening tools in the yard couldn’t be easier thanks to the Ames Lawn Buddy and when the day gets hot this rolling cart handles my plants, gloves, tools and most important a tall cool glass of lemonade or icy water (and beer at the end of the day).  Years ago my first garden cart was a Suncast Resin Scooter with a small, simple compartment under a hinged lid – the design of the Lawn Buddy is much improved. It keeps me happy all year. 

Tecnu Oak-n-Ivy Cleanser

No More Itch from the Oil of Poison Ivy

If someone requests your assistance with installing fence posts in a forested area and asks you to prune the roots from holes run. Run and don’t look back – that person is no friend. It doesn’t matter if the land is in Indiana, Colorado or Texas. Poison ivy loves the understories of moist forests and while the vine will climb trees on hairy vines, it is sneaky and aggressive in the forest soil. It’s a sleeper and it’s mean.

Available at Amazon

You will need long sleeved clothing, protective gloves and Tecnu. If the roots break through the surface of your skin, especially multiple times you’re likely to have a very severe reaction. I certainly did and it wasn’t until after meeting the evil side of poison ivy that I discovered Tecnu.

Years Ago

I did a very stupid thing several years ago while helping to install a fence. The fence was going through a forested area on my property and I was determined to keep the trees. Digging holes for the posts required two people, one to dig the holes and the other to prune away the many roots. My hands were smaller than my husband's hands and crashing the post hole digger required more strength (and height) than I could offer. An auger would have been nice, but we hadn’t considered using one.

It was very early spring, nothing was growing yet, and we hadn’t seen any poison ivy BUT it was present everywhere, especially in the soil. My hands kept getting scratched, but working with gloves on was too awkward in the narrow hole. I wasn’t worried about a few scratches. I should have been.

Tecnu is available in convenient foil packs
Available at Amazon

While I had “suffered” small bouts with poison ivy over the years it was mostly a minor inconvenience. The fence installation took several days and in that time I developed a very serious case of poison ivy, as well as a lifetime sensitivity. It went systemic in me, appearing in just about every place you could imagine (and some you shouldn’t imagine). I looked like the ooze monster.

Rather than taking seven to 14 days to go away it lasted for far more than a month, with the most awful blisters and itching. Even with a prescription and shot from a doctor, it took a long time to disappear completely.

Since then, all I have to do is barely touch poison ivy and a similar reaction occurs. My dogs can brush against it and if I snuggle with one of them, I’ve got it. It was soon after the serious reaction from installing the fence that I discovered Tecnu Oak-N-Ivy Cleanser.

Tecnu is a specially formulated detergent that removes the urushiol oil. If you wash vigorously for two

Save Money with Your Sprinkler System

credit:  Seemann/morguefile.com

Taken a good look at your water bill lately? If your home has a sprinkler system, you might be able to trim your bill considerably in the lawn-watering season. While an in-ground sprinkler system certainly makes watering more convenient, if you're not careful they can waste water. If you look at your bill, you'll quickly learn that water is money. With some common sense, research and maybe a bit of sweat equity, optimizing the sprinkler system can save water and save money, too. Try these techniques:

Evaluate Sprinkler Heads

Inspect each sprinkler head: does it spray evenly across the entire area it's supposed to cover? Do your pop-up heads pop up? Are there puddles at sprinklers, brown patches where they should be watering, or both? If you can answer any of those questions “Yes,” you should replace any improperly functioning sprinkler with a new one of the same design. Through time, sprinkler heads naturally become clogged with grit and minerals, so periodic checkups help keep the landscaping alive without wasting water (and money).

Watch all the sprinkler heads as the system cycles (your timer should have a TEST function). Are you spraying water on sidewalks, driveways, or the street? In case you didn't know, they're not going to grow! You can re-aim sprinkler heads to reduce wasted water. If some heads waste water in two directions or more, replace them with heads that have narrower spray patterns. It's a no-brainer: sprinkler heads don't cost much!


You can find tools specially-designed to make short work of testing and removing worn-out or malfunctioning spray heads.

Learn to Use the Timer Did the sprinklers run today even though it rained two inches yesterday? You’re wasting water! Check the timer manual (find a copy onnline if the previous owner didn't leave one) to learn how to use the RAIN setting to turn off the sprinklers by hand. Research the grasses that are planted in your lawn. Talk to your county extension agent or a good local garden shop to determine out how much water your grass, flower beds, and other landscaping needs. Don't bother asking the "landscaping company" who mows your lawn, many of them know little or nothing about plants.

Know Your Lawn

Almost everyone overwaters the lawn; watering too much, too often or both. Grass should be watered well and rarely so that it grows strong, deep roots. Almost no grass species requires water daily: if your system runs that often, water simply runs off the lawn and into the gutter, or evaporates in the hot sun. It's a good idea to take a look at your soil as well. Most people can shorten the length of time the system runs and schedule it less frequently.

credit: kumaravel / flickr

Morning is the Best Time to Water

If you water in the hottest part of the day you'll lose water to evaporation, especially if the sprinklers put out a fine mist. Bright sunlight can also burn tender plant leaves when water droplets act like magnifying glasses; sort of like mean little kids burn ants. You shouldn't water late in the evening, either, because plants that are constantly wet at night are more prone to rot and disease.

Follow these simple suggestions, and you could save as much as half of the water your sprinkler system dumps on your lawn. Like it said at the top: "Taken a good look at your water bill lately?"

copyright © 2015-2017 scmrak

Dremel 675 Lawn Mower Sharpener Kit

Praise, at Least a Little, for Dremel's Lawnmower Sharpening Kit

If you have a family member who grew up in the Depression era, you've likely heard something like, "Use it up and wear it out. Make do, or do without." Now that we have a disposable society, about half of what we Americans buy ends up in a landfill within weeks. In reality, though. getting more use out of your purchases looks more like a good idea daily. Take lawnmower blades: they're simple pieces of steel that the local Wal-Mart says should be replaced every year, if not more often. That's not really true: you can sharpen them, after all. Even the most mechanically-impaired among us can remove a blade and clamp it down somewhere to attack the edges with a file. Or you could use a Dremel Lawn Mower Sharpener if you have a Dremel rotary tool.

I do own a Dremel rotary tool, and I have a Dremel 675 Lawn Mower Sharpener Kit, too. It's a two-part affair: there's an ABS guide that fits on the nose of a Dremel tool, with an included mini grinder fixed in the collet. The guide is molded so that blade touches the grinder only within its narrow slot, thereby limiting the cutting angle. You simply run the grinder along the blade until it's sharpened, making certain to keep the blade balanced.

You can also use this kit to sharpen other tools like shovels and hoes, and cutting tools such as hedge trimmers. You simply need to be careful to maintain the proper angle.

Mexican Fire Bush - Hamelia Patens

The nursery people promised the Hamelia was root hardy -- it is.

An unusually cold winter surprised not only me but my garden's plants. Weather always wreaks havoc on borderline plants, those that should be in the next hardiness zone, either up or down, and those that are drought tolerant or that need lots of water. Even native plants suffer when the weather becomes unusually different for a couple years. Some years my lantana is great, other years it’s obviously struggling and in Houston this is considered reliably tough.


My butterfly and hummingbird garden has been anchored by Hamelia patens and during the first four years the plant grew and flowered all winter. This made early arriving hummingbirds gleeful as they surfed the southern winds on their way to northern states. Like everywhere else in the United States, the winter of 2013-2014 was hard including south Texas. We had multiple freezes and longer periods of non-typical cold. My hamelia, also called Mexican fire bush, did what the nursery people said it would – it froze to the ground. I needed to remove years of woody stems (up to eight and ten feet tall) and then waited.