What is your oldest garden tool?

I've been gardening for 60 years! Guess that makes me an "old tool".

same here!

No clue how old my tools are, largely unused.

If I had inherited my dad's gardening tools I would have some old ones but I didn't so I'm the oldest

Actually, I have a couple of machetes that are thirty to forty years old, though the shorter one is also a kitchen implement, but indeed, I myself am much older.

My father bought this wheel hoe at an auction in 1919. I have done a lot of work on it over the years. Originally had wooden plow handles. Still the most useful tool in the kitchen garden. These handles came from Montgomery ward in 1953.

The oldest garden tools I own are a wooden hand seeder and old scythe. They were retired to the walls of our cottage years ago. The oldest functioning kitchen garden tool is my much beloved TroyBilt pony, "Wanda". She is from the seventies. She can get cantankerous about starting up, especially when wasps get up in her fuel line come Spring, and backfires when you cut her off but she gets the job done.

Honeybee--me too. I still have my shovel that I used digging and clearing archeological sites--back in the 1970s. But since then I have been collecting old tools--I love the patina and story they tell when they have been used for 50 years or more. And most of these you can clean and sharpen the blades, sometimes add a new handle and use again-perhaps for another 20 or 50 years. I have old machetes, I just found a pile in the toll shed that need a de-rusting treatment--motor oil and sand.

Recently I have been finding old scythes and scythe blades at the local flea market. Learning to use a scythe gives you quite a workout--especially those muscles you don't use spending most of your time at the computer!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lygbTKzu47Y

This message was edited Apr 9, 2013 7:43 AM

I have an old corn seeder that hangs on my back porch and an old pitch fork, but most of the tools I use are between 10 years old and yesterday.

My seeder looks like yours, frogy.

I have an old wheel hoe that could be 100 years or more. I have a tile scoop likely more than 100 years. I have a tile finder that is very old. I have a potato fork [very useful for more than potatoes] that is old. A spade might be 75 years. I have a roto-hoe cultivator very old. I have a hand pushed/pulled cultipacker very old.

I have a weed sling that my dad gave to my mom for their first anniversary (real romantic, huh?) it is over 60 years old

I have the hoe that my 74yo mother used as a child in their garden. The edges are rounded off from sharpening, the handle is wood and grainy with age, but I use it every year

Same as the majority ... it's me! But I do have an antique scythe. Don't know the exact age of it though.

I have several tools that belonged to my father and he would be 107 years old now. I love them dearly and always think of him and what a terrific gardener he was when I use the rake, clippers, trowel, etc. Implements were made to last in those days!

An old scythe, marked William Tyzack and Sons and Turner, Shefflield. I haven't been able to find out exactly how old it is, but I'd guess well over 100 years. However, I'm too much of a wimp to use it. I don't want to be forever known as "Stumpy."

Margaret K. see the U tube link under my post above for how to use the scythe. It whittles the middle, and you can really make a lot of progress in a short time! In fact, Ive even started to use my electric weed eater using this motion. A great way to tackle a patch of 3 ft tall grass and weeds.

I for one, don't have any family here that could pass down antique gardening tools. So.. I tend to compensate that by finding them at auctions.

I love going to auctions and some of my most treasured 'wins' are the old tools that many folks pass by. A well-kept tool shed that contains elderly implements says a great deal about the person who lived there and I feel that they would be pleased that I'll treasure their tools and continue gardening with them.

Passed down thru 3 generations, I'm not real sure what you call this tool. I use it mostly for hammering metal fence posts in the ground that I use for vertical garden supports. I think that it's called an axe-hammer. I saw one like it on the internet and it was called a machinist hammer. Anyway, it's heavy, sturdy, and a handy multi-purpose tool.

If knowledge can be included as a tool, then I'd have to change my answer because I don't know the ages of all the people who've shared their wisdom with me — for which I'm very thankful!

We have a few gardening tools which belonged to my in=laws and we inherited them. they are bound to be nearly 100 years old or older. My grand-father-in-law believed in buying things to last. Luciee {;^)

Kinda needed a box for all of the above...I personally have had and used and still use the same shovel for 50years my favorite is a garden hoe that belonged to my Father in Law and he passed away 30 years ago.I use it almost every day in season ....

I finally learned what the "axe hammer" is after looking at several images online. It's actually a wood splitting maul because it has an axe edge and a sledge hammer type edge. There's either a # 6 or # 9 on the top side; depending on which way you look at it. That makes sense because it was last used by the family for splitting wood at their weekend retreat.

They usually came as 6lb or 8 lb.