Snow & Nealley Trowel

About five years ago, I was wandering around out in the Beaches in Toronto, and passed a store called Gardenscape. Went in, looked around and found a totally wicked awesome cool trowel from Snow & Nealley. Bigger than the average trowel, and smaller than an army surplus entrenching tool. Solid, sturdy, good size scoop, good sized handle, and still a manageable size and weight. Me want.

It seems that whenever I go on a canoe trip to places that have designated campsites, we always end up rebuilding the pitiful firepits into engineering marvels. Filled with mountains of ash and an awkward hodgepodge of stones that a rack or a pot can’t balance on very well. Not only for our own sake, but we figure it’s a nice thing to do for anyone that follows us. Trying to scoop out months, possibly years of ash or lever stones around with one of those plastic trowels, doesn’t work very well. I’ve also built quite a few dakota holes, and have a few caches here and there.

This thing looked to be the perfect size. Not too small to be a nuisance to use, not too big to be a nuisance to carry.

And the price was decent too. Less than $25. Sold.

It was so sharp looking I was almost reluctant to use it for a while. Seemed a shame to mess up that nice black anodized finish...

Hickory handle.

After oohing and ahhing over my shiny new toy for a while, I went out and put it to good use.

First time I stuck it in the ground, it bent like the proverbial wet noodle.

Uuuhhhh.....what.....?

This was nice soft soil, not rock hard, stone impregnated soil.

To quote two philosophical geniuses...“Thith thucks!”

Snow & Nealley had stopped making their range of garden tools by this time, so...what could I do. Their offer to replace faulty tools didn’t mean much when they didn’t have any to offer. Sent them an email, told them I wasn’t thrilled with their product, and never heard back from them.

Very disappointed, I put it aside.

Later, I was helping friends dig some roots out of their yard, so I figured I’d use it. It worked all right, as long as I kept bending it back into shape every few scoops. I could see a crack developing and in time the scoop fell right off.

“We are so confident that you will be satisfied with our tools that they come with a Lifetime Guarantee.”

Nope, not satisfied with your tool, and since you don’t make it any more, I can’t very well take advantage of your lifetime guarantee to get a replacement to see if I just got a bum model. Can’t say it gives me much confidence in any of your axes either.

“We are proud to make ‘The Tools That Last For Generations!’ ” 

I don’t think this trowel lasted for more than a few hours, let alone a few generations.

If I had a few bucks to spare I’d mail it back to them, but it just seems like a waste of money compounding a waste of money.

Not impressed.

Dig’mups

Very simple pouch I made for a folding trowel. From Lee Valley, but this particular trowel is no longer available. (If you can’t tell from the picture the pouch that came with it was a really pitiful afterthought.)

I can’t tell you too much about it. Who made it, where it’s made, what it’s made out of, etc. In the years I’ve had it, it has served its purpose just fine. I won’t be digging up pirate treasure or burying a body with it, but for what I’ve done with it, it’s been okay.

One handy feature is the fact that it locks at a 45º angle. This has proven useful when constructing dakota holes.

The locking mechanism has proven durable up till this point, but I wonder how much abuse it could really be subjected to. It is always going to be the weak point in anything.

I know there are those who will argue that you don’t really need a trowel, that all you need is a stick that you cut at an angle that you use as a digging stick. Piss off. That may be fine when all you want to do is form a divot in the ground, but if you have to actually move some earth, it’s ludicrous. Whenever we go canoeing, Jay and I always, at every site we get to, clean out and rebuild the fire pit. Most of them contain huge piles of ash that needs to be cleaned out. I don’t see myself doing that with a angled stick.

A neat feature of this is that the handle is hollow. I chose to put strike anywhere matches in it.

Simple, not very pretty, but it works. CLASP on the back.

The trowel can be put in either front or back facing.

It’s about 5½" high, 2½" wide, and about 1½" deep. Made from 1000D and 420 D Cordura.

I eventually want to get a U-Dig-It trowel to replace this one, as I’ve heard nothing but good things about it, but for the time being this will suffice.