If you are a keen gardener, yet also have a dodgy back, how can you look after your back AND enjoy your garden? Here are a few helpful tips:
1 – Warm up! And keep warm.
A few brisk marches on the spot, pumping those arms, will quickly get the blood flowing more vigorously around your body, and reduce the risk of straining your back.
Also, although the activity of gardening can warm you up, sometimes, eg weeding, you are relatively still, so it is also important to keep your torso warm. I am a big fan of the haramaki – a tube of fabric as an undergarment that keeps your kidneys and your lower back warm – which I discovered at my local health food shop, but is also readily available online, and maybe wear a gilet as well.
2 – Kneelers.
Quite a few gardening jobs involve kneeling, whether weeding, or hand scarifying a lawn – which I witnessed the other day, and yes, he was using a kneeling pad. So, if you do need to kneel, have somethings soft to go under your knees – both to cushion them, and also keep them from getting too cold from contact with the ground. This could be anything from a simple pad, which could be a cushion in a plastic bag to keep it dry, or a dedicated soft rubber one, all the way to one of those fancy jobs that can be kneeler, or turned the other way to become a seat to sit your sit-upon upon. Any variation of these is good news for your knees!
3 – Avoid the 4-letter word: Just.
I am a big fan of what I call Rotation Gardening – you have several jobs on the go: weeding, neatening the edges of the lawn, potting up, pruning, shredding, scarifying etc. It is so tempting to say Now I’ll JUST weed that border, JUST shred that heap, JUST scarify the lawn – and 3 hours later you wonder why your back is aching. So, take a kitchen timer that you can set to ping after say 10 or 15 minutes, and when it pings, you down tools and Change Jobs. No argument, no dispute – I’ll JUST finish this bit – just down tools and change jobs: your back will thank you for it. That way we don’t get stuck into the same position, the same activity, the same potential muscle or ligament strain. Relax, all the jobs will still get done, just in a more piecemeal fashion. Believe me, this works!
4- Short levers.
Following on from the idea of JUST – beware the long handled pruner. Wherever possible keep your levers short. Now I do understand that are times when you have to use a long-handled pruner – but think about it intelligently, plan your line of attack as it were. Rather than reaching for that branch which you can JUST reach, use a step ladder, and move it often to the best place for that particular branch. Yes, more up and down ladders, but your back will thank you for it.
5 – More with Less.
Again, following on from the idea of moving the step-ladder more often – it is better to do more trips carrying less, than to overstrain your back with heavier loads. When we have fragile backs, they do need some respectful care. So – avoid over lifting where possible, and, you know what, it is OK to ask for help. If you do have to do any carrying: be willing to do more trips carrying less, and try to be balanced: think of the Milk Maid with her yoke – evenly balanced.
6 – Watering.
This applies to watering as well – don’t overfill your watering can – in fact, watering the garden with watering can of a comfortable weight, is a very good back strengthening exercise. If your budget runs to it, then investing a seeper hose is a good idea, or even one of those sophisticated irrigation/watering systems. On a green note, if you use an Eco friendly washing up liquid, then you can tip the water in your washing up bowl onto your borders or lawn as well.
7 – Keep your tools sharp and well-maintained.
Gardening in comfort with less effort is about being efficient – so keep your tools, your spades, secateurs, pruners – clean and sharp, and oiled as appropriate so they can work more effectively, and you need less effort to use them.
8 – Raised beds.
Or wall mounted baskets eg under a windowsill, or those wooden plant growers that look a bit like a manger – anything that brings the plants to you, rather than you bending to the plants, is a Good Idea – so long as you have someone to help with setting them up in the first place, as heaving heavy bags of compost is not what a fragile back dreams of…. Again, it’s OK to Ask For Help.
9 – Let the worms do the work…
If you have really heavy soil and want to break it up, scatter some seeds of annual flowers. That way you can enjoy their brief burst of colour and beauty, and lo and behold, their roots will have broken up the soil for you. And if you have worms in your garden, nurture them; and if you don’t, then you can buy them and scatter them around your borders – they are your friends, they will “do the digging for you“, as my aunt used to say. Why break your back doing the heavy work when Mother Nature can supply?
10 – Rest and Enjoy your handiwork.
Ah, another 4-letter word – REST. Yes, you are allowed to sit down sometimes and simply soak in the beauty of nature (or the work still to be done). If you are following my suggestions for Rotation Gardening, then one of the components of that could be a 10 minute sit-down with a cuppa. And sitting, looking, can be very useful planning time, especially if you sometimes sit in a different part of the garden with a different view. Suddenly new possibilities can come to you.
My aforementioned aunt, a delightful and redoubtable lady, Ethelind Fearon (what a fabulous name) wrote several books on houses, food and entertaining, one of which was The Reluctant Gardener (1958) – full of her characteristically pithy advice on how to achieve better results with less effort. The stylish illustrations by Alex Jardine are a perfect foil to her witty way with words – look it up!
I hope these tips have been helpful for you, or if you have some good tips of your own, either way – let me know.
If you are in or near Baldock, North Herts, or Bromley, SE London, SE20, and your back is suffering because of gardening, give me a call on 07535 350 343. Let’s chat to see if I can help, or to book an appointment for some Osteopathy to get you moving better and with more comfort.