Transcript

Hi, I am Charlie Siegchrist for About.com Home and Garden. This segment is about how to edge a garden.
Tools Needed to Edge a GardenFor the task of edging your landscape bed, you will need the following tools:
A pair of wooden stakes
A hammer with which to drive them in
String to connect the stakes
For cutting that edge, either a square-bottomed, sharpened nursery spade or a half-moon edger.A half-moon edger has a step like this and then a half moon blade of steel. Alternately you can rent at home and garden centers a motorized edger that is probably twenty times faster if you have enough garden to justify the expense.
Benefits of Edging a GardenWe undertake edging for a couple of reasons. Obviously a crisp, neat line enhances the appearance. Second, we stop the encroachment of lawn grass into the garden where it can become a weed problem.
Creating a Straight Garden EdgeWe want to establish a clean edge, so we need to work where the grass is thick enough to not look raggedy, and we have to be far enough into the lawn to take up any bald strips. So, we start the stake here. You can tie a loop in your twine and that fits loosely over the stake. We can then execute a simple knot.
Start EdgingWe put this spade to where it is just touching the string, and punch in far enough, a couple of inches are all we need, and move down the string. And then once we are done we can come in from the other side and undercut the sods, and that sod should just peel out as one piece. At then end we are left with a nice clean edge. This is good soil here, so we can cut the roots off and they will not regenerate. We will get most of that soil saved and brushed back into our line, and you can see what a difference in appearance for the time it takes to edge your garden. Thanks for watching. To learn more, visit us on the Web at homegarden.about.com. See you there.