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More garden safety tips

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As with just about anything you do around the home or in the workplace, it’s important to practice gardening safety when you garden. There’d be nothing worse than seriously injuring yourself while you’re gardening and then ending up being unable to maintain your lovely garden.

Health Precautions

Since one aspect of gardening is digging in the earth, possibly working with thorny plants (roses anyone?) and sometimes working with tools that have a little rust on them it’s important to make sure that your Tetanus shots are up to date. Most people only require a Tetanus booster every ten years, but if you are an avid gardener your doctor might recommend that you get booster shots a little more frequently.

You can get some nasty infections from the fungus on rose thorns or the bacteria in your garden soil so if you are working in the garden and end up getting slivers or thorns stuck in your skin try to remove them as soon as you are finished your tasks. Wash the puncture wounds and any other wounds that you acquire while gardening and then apply an antiseptic to prevent infection.

Tool Safety

One major aspect of gardening safety is the safe use of gardening tools. Be sure to store them in an area where children or possibly even pets can’t get at them. When you are using your gardening tools also try to be mindful of where each tool is located, especially if you have friends or family members out in the yard with you. I’m sure everyone can either remember stepping on a rake that was placed on the ground the wrong way and being hit in the face or watching someone else do it.

Perhaps store you smaller gardening tools in a gardening belt or tool belt so they are handy and close to you at all times. A bucket with a handle would also be a great place to store tools as you work in the garden.

Dull gardening tools often make worse cuts (on plants and on our skin!) so make sure your pruners and other cutting tools and blades are sharp and kept free of rust, and handle with care.

Chemical Safety

If you use chemicals in your garden – fertilizers, weed killers or other chemicals please make sure that you are storing them safely and using them as directed. Of course you can make it really easy on yourself and be like me and just not use any chemicals in the garden at all!

Some chemicals are quite toxic when being used and require that a mask and safety clothing be worn when applying them to your plants. Be sure to read the directions before starting to use a chemical in your yard and where appropriate protection if necessary. Also be sure that family members, friends and neighbors or pets aren’t nearby when using potentially toxic chemicals and keep pets and people away until the level of toxicity goes down whether that be an hour or a few days.

Also remember to read the label when it comes to disposing of used chemical bottles or left over chemicals. Sometimes you can simple put the containers in your recycling and other times you might have to drop them off at a special depot.

If you always make sure that you practice garden safety you, your family, pets and friends will be able to enjoy the time in the garden.

Don’t forget to read the first article on Gardening Safety that I published earlier this month in order to avoid injuring yourself while planting new plants in the garden and more.






The Brick Works – nature in the heart of the city

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Last weekend we went to The Brick Works. It’s an old brick factory that’s been turned into an eco-preserve and I suppose tourist attraction. Likely the bricks that make up my 1927 Triple Brick house were made at this old now defunct factory.

The quarry where the company dug into the earth to get the clay to make the bricks has been turned into hiking paths, ponds and is surrounded by forest. All in the heart of the city (BTW Toronto is the 5th or 6th largest city in North America). It’s gorgeous!

Native plants grow at the Brickworks and you can find flora and fauna that are rarely seen elsewhere in the province thanks to the protective nature of this eco-preserve.

I took close to 200 photos during our few hours at the Brickworks last Saturday. It’s taken me two days to go over them, crop them and upload them to my Flickr account. That’s why my GTS posts are more than a little late today!

The first photo is a blue dragonfly (I don’t think that’s it’s main name, that’s just what I’m calling it). Apparently there are 11 species of dragonflies that make their home at the Brickworks. Dragonflies are losing their nesting grounds so this area is one of the few places in Ontario where you can see so many different types of dragonflies (and other creatures).

This is native Malva. I grow some of this in my front boulevard garden as well. It’s very pretty and under the right condition spreads moderately.

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I used to know the name of this plant, but for the life of me I can’t remember what it’s called at this moment. It’s lovely, especially when it spreads throughout a field and mixes with other wild flowers.

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I’m not sure what this lovely yellow flowered plant is either. It stands about two feet tall and is covered in tiny yellow flowers – at least at the beginning of July it is. Any ideas?

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This is Sumac. It’s a small tree that can be seen all over Ontario. It’s leaves turn red in the fall and it’s fruit (the reddish spike) grows fuller and turns a bright red. It puts on quite a spectacular show.

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I’ll have more flowers from The Brickworks on two of my other blogs – Tricia’s Musings and You are in My World Now in a few minutes if you’d like to see some more great nature photos. You can also see the whole series of “Brickwork” photos by visiting my Flickr account.

Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information. GTS participants remember to check in at As the Garden Grows each week so that we’ll know you made a new post!

Finally

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All of my annuals are planted!

I can’t believe that it took me so long to get it all done. I bought the majority of the plants at the beginning of May. It’s never taken me this long to get them in the ground or in their planters before. Tsk tsk.

The good news is that the majority of the plants somehow survived in their tiny little cells of earth or peat moss – whatever that stuff is that dries out so very quickly. They even managed to grow and bloom. I think they will take off now that they are in the ground or their new containers. Their roots can spread out and they’ll finally be happy for the rest of their short lives.

I even managed to divide my Cannas that I had growing in pots. Two large and over grown cannas became 5 plants.

I did buy one more plant today. It’s a Star Jasmine. Well at least I think it’s a Star Jasmine. I purchased it at Home Depot and if you are a gardener or home owner, and you’ve ever purchased plants there, you know their labels aren’t very specific as to species or even care guidelines. The tag said jasmine and it definitely is a Jasmine. It’s viney so I’m assuming that it is a star Jasmine. When it blooms I will find out.

Now my garden will be really smelly. But in a good way. Roses, two jasmine, fragrant Nicotina, and white four o’clocks that also smell a bit like jasmine. Mmmm I can’t wait for all of them to start blooming and giving off those luscious scents. Well my roses are blooming … but I’m dying to smell those jasmine and jasmine like scents. That fragrance makes it so enticing to sit in the garden in the evening and relax.

I hurt my right knee very badly on Saturday and my leg is wrapped with two tensor bandages from just above my knee to my ankle. So it was quite a feat to accomplish the task of getting about 300 plants installed into 16 plus planters and into the ground – considering I can barely walk. My husband helped … if he hadn’t the job would still be waiting and I fear the plants would soon die. We are going to have a heat wave in the next few days and the job just had to be done.

Now all I have to do for the rest of the summer is feed, water, occasionally trim and most importantly enjoy the garden.

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