We’re going to do a three part mini series this year. We’re going to call it the “work horses of our gardens” series. In it, we’re going to feature our top, most used and favorite tools that we use in our gardens.
The term work horse, sometimes called draft horse, have a long history in agriculture. In the pre-industrial era, work horses were responsible for tasks like plowing, transport and other heavy lifting tasks around the farm or garden. The post-industrial era hasn’t made those tasks any easier, but their roles have been replaced by things other than horses!
Today’s topic will be possibly our most favorite garden tool, our tiller. The amount of work this thing does for us is off the charts. We have a small mini tiller from Honda (model FG110) and it does everything we need it to and then some. Unless you have some serious land to till, this mini-tiller can do pretty much everything most gardeners would ever need.
To prove our point, the wide raised rows that we established at our community garden were entirely done with this mini tiller. Sure, it was a metric ton of work, but a bigger tiller wouldn’t have made it any less work. Beyond basic tilling, you can move soil, build up beds and break up root structures just like you can with a big tiller.
If you’re in the market for a tiller, we’d steer you towards a small, mini tiller like this. The big ones do have their advantages, but the small ones have more. You can easily prep smaller beds, it’s much lighter weight and at the end of the day, you’re going to hurt a lot less. Tilling is hard work, but we don’t long for more width. Agility is king! Unless you’re tilling many thousands of square feet, there’s nothing you can’t do with a small tiller.
You can rent tillers, but for us, we decided it was worth owning one. We use one every single season and eventually, the rental rates will pay for a tiller. If you’re a consistent gardener that uses one every season, it’s well worth the purchase. The ongoing maintenance on it is extremely cheap and pretty easy to do, it’s one of our lowest effort power tools that we own. On average, if you rent a tiller about five times, you’re better off owning one. Plus, there’s no late fees and you can do things when you want.
We know there’s not a universal acceptance of tilling practices in gardening and there are many who practice “no till” methods. Respectfully, we disagree. But, that’s coming from an extreme northern perspective where organics don’t work the same as they do at lower latitudes.
Honestly, we can’t envision ever going back to more traditional ground preparation with a spade or shovel. The physical exertion this tool saves us alone is worth the money, not to mention the vastly improved soil that we get from it. We know it’s a semi-expensive tool. And it’s been worth every penny!
