How to Care For a Garden Hoe

David: Hi I am Dave Epstein. This is growing wisdom and I am with Howard Anderson and we are at Johnny’s Selected Seeds and I will be in Maine. We are at one of your tool shops. Howard: Yes. David: And you know a lot of folks have your tools, they can buy them online, important to sharpen. It is also important to oil the handles every season but sometimes even after you have sharpened and sharpened and sharpened, it is time to replace, is it not? Howard: They do wear out from time to time. David: So we are going to show you today how to replace a blade on this, what is this, a little hoe here? Howard: Yes. David: And we will also touch on oiling and if we get a little bit of time, we are going to show you just how to quickly sharpen some of the existing tools. Howard: Okay. David: All right so what do you need to get the blade off here? Howard: You need a nut driver or a ratchet like this and a screwdriver. This comes right off the end of the handle here. We will put the screwdriver in the end in the screw. David: Make sure you do not lose those, the nut and the screw, right? I usually put it in something and I have not been able to find it. Howard: Dave, Lucky for you we send you new blades with the new screws on there. David: Oh look at that, if I lose the screws. Johnny’s thinks of everything. Howard: We think of everything. The blade is going back the same way it came off. So we get it finger tight. This is a lock nut so we will have to drive it on with a nut driver or the ratchet again. So there you go, you are all set. David: So how do we have this blade, now we replaced the blade but let us just say that we wanted to sharpen this blade. How would you do it? Howard: It is just sharpening a knife so keep this bevel the same as it was before. It is about 30 degrees. Hold the blade somewhere secure and we just draw the file across the bevel. Eventually you will have a nice new sharpened blade again. Hey David one more thing. David: Yes. Howard: The good thing to do is to oil the handle. We oil ours on a regular basis. You can tell this is kind of an older tool, a nice finish to it. We use Tried and True linseed oil, a little dab on the rag. You rub it on and you rub it off. David: That is going to preserve this all winter especially, right, when these tools really are not in use, since they dry off? Howard: Right. David: All right so we have replaced blades, sharpened blades and we have oiled the handle. You follow these directions, your tools are going to be with you for a long time and we hope you are with us for a long time here at Growing Wisdom. You can check out all of our videos and also you can check out a whole line of tools at Johnnyseeds.com. Thanks a lot Howard. Howard: Thank you Dave.