easy planting

[jaci]

Having a very bad back, I manage all right with broad beans and potatoes (I use piping) but plants are incredibly painful to put in and as my soil is very light and sandy, seeds do not do very well so I like to grow in modules, growing on into bigger pots then planting but now it is almost impossible. Does anyone know of any gadgets to do this without bending? (I have an allotment with 6" raised wooden beds and no dig)Please, please? We do love our calabrese but I am the only one with time to tend to the allotment. I thought of an adaptation of some kind of a "helping hand" but am not sure what and can find nothing on the market. Any suggestions?

[lizzie]

Hi Jaci

Have you tried using a long handled bulb planter to make the holes for the plants?

I too have a very bad back and i'm always on the look out for new ways of doing things.

[jaci]

Thank you Lizzie, that is one that I had not thought about and would be better in some cases than using a long handled trowel so I will certainly use it. Once the hole is dug, though, it is the getting of the plant into the hole - but come to think about it, perhaps paper in the bottom of a bulb planter so that a plant in it could not fall out before it reached the ground - a bit of a balancing act - would work, must try it. Wouldn't you think some genius would have invented something specially for the purpose considering that so many people do have bad backs?

[lizzie]

That is one hell of a good idea Jaci. I'll give it a road test. Maybe between us we can come up with a solution, patent it and make a bloody fortune

There should be something on the market cos having a bad back is not an unusual afflication!!!

Maybe someone else could come up with something and take the idea further.

Oooh, how about putting some sort of rope, cord ect under the plant, then when in the hole just pull the rope/cord thingy out?

God, I scare myself sometimes!!!!!

[peter]

What you need is something like a three inch pot on the end of a stick, but with the base of the pot hinged at one side with a spring to hold it shut and a leve with a string to pull to open it, it would look a bit like those things then use for taking a sample out of a wine barrell. Like a J in cross section. Anyone any good at sheet metal work?

[Allan]

I have back troubles and have to put plants in, it can be very difficult at times.
One tool similar to your description is a potato planter which hastwo halves hinged together with longish handles and makes a square hole by pushing the soil sideways. You would still have to get the plant into the hole. I don't think that all long handled tools are up to digging holes, whether trowels or bulb planters as there are too many especially those fashioned out of sheet metal which don't have the strength and are a waste of money. The strongest long-handled trowel that I know is a Wolf trowel head together with the most appropriate handle of your choice. In the end I usually spread a plastic sack or use kneeling pads and somehow sprawl down there with a trowel, the worst part is getting back on my feet.
For much of the work close to the ground there is a seat on wheels called a Move 'n Groove which enables one to move along a crop row while still seated. This has a box compartment to store necesssities. We have one in each poytunnel.
Allan

[sprout]

Hi jaci, I don't dig at all on my plot either (except to harvest). I use a bulb planter now, wish I'd discovered it last year! If you grow in the 2 1/4-inch (6mm) jiffy peat pots, they just drop in, you can plant nice and deep if you want to plant e.g. brassica and toms up to their bottom leaves. Then I just water in and mulch.
http://www.crocus.co.uk/toolsandstuff/r ... goryID=192

I also grow some baby plants in plugs at home, http://www.organiccatalog.com/catalog/p ... ts_id=2037
then make holes with a foot dibber (make one of your own with a long piece of dowel and a cross-piece low down) into which the plugs can drop from a great height!

Good luck

[Johnboy]

Hi Jaci,
I feel that you need the services of an Occupational Therapist as they have all manner of gadgets to help people with all kinds of difficulty.
I was thinking the use of tools as mentioned and about every 5 years the LA send teams out to clean the countryside of litter and they use special gadgets to pick up litter. I feel that something could be adapted to suit your needs along those lines.
I broke my back about 35 years ago and have had several bouts of difficulty since so I know exactly what you are going through.
I wish you good luck and do keep reporting as to how you fair as I feel that your comments would be of great use to a whole host of contributors.

[Tigger]

There are specialist garden tools (and garden designs) for disabled people which might be useful.

I'll try and find out about them and post some references.

[jaci]

My goodness, what a lovely lot of replies today when I sat down to reply to Lizzie! Thank you, Peter, that sounds like a brilliant idea and I know someone who works in metal and is quite ingenious so will run it past him. Thank you too Allan, for your suggestion and you, too, Sprout - I have a dibber like that which I use for holes then use a piece of piping to drop broad beans into them. Much easier. Thank you, too, to Johnboy and Trigger. I was beginning to think I might have to give up the allotment but you have all made me feel a lot more hopeful.

The plants I have grown this year are now in pots too big to use a bulb planter, but I will try it next year. Meanwhile, someone suggested a piece of guttering, which I took to the allotment together with a walking stick. After digging all the holes and dropping in some compost in the bottom of each,I made a depression in the compost in each hole about 2" deep with the end of the walking stick then turned the stick round and used it to guide a plant down the guttering - which was held at an angle of course - into the indentation, so that it stayed upright, then, when they were all in, watered and filled in with my feet. A bit tricky atfirst but once I got the knack got on quite well and found it beat stooping or crouching any day, and saved a lot of pain, which was wonderful.

[jaci]

Sorry for all the smilies, one was meant to be at the end of "more hopeful" but not having used them before thoght they weren't going in!
Jaci

[sprout]

The ingenuity of wimmin!
You're an inspiration jaci

[jaci]

Thanks Sprout. Glad you liked it.

[Allan]

Whatever you do, in the long term try to live with the pain and remain as active as possible or you will make the back worse by inactivity. I am on Glcosamine pills which are recommended for such troubles and I am certainly doing more than I would have considered possible a year ago.
The tool for picking up various articles without bending has reached the mass market under the name Crocodile at £9.99 but there are variants. Gardena market as similar tool rather more expensive, and I have one that folds in the middle from a discount shop.
Allan

[sprout]

This might be of interest jaci?
http://www.johnnyseeds.com/catalog/subc ... tegory=636

I've tried (and failed) to get one from France, since October
http://www.com-nature.com/grelinette/index2.htm