Safety Gardening Tips You Should Equip Yourself With
Gardening or growing your flowers, fruits, and veggies is a fun and healthful way to spend time outdoors, get some exercise, and enhance the aesthetic value of your home and neighborhood.
However, hard work, muscle soreness, bug bites, and the possibility of hand, finger, and shoulder injuries are all costs you’ll have to bear in exchange for the gardening benefits. This necessitates guidance on how to garden safely to avoid harming oneself and promote good health.
If you want to avoid accidents, suffering, and discomfort when gardening, follow these safety precautions:
Keep Away From Repetitive Motions
Digging, planting, trimming, pruning, and raking are all activities that can cause muscle strain if performed over extended periods.
To prevent this from happening, it is recommended to take a break every 10 to 15 minutes and swap tasks. By switching up your overall gardening routine, you’ll be able to put different muscle groups to work and reduce the risk of injury.
Wear Gloves
Gardening exposes you to several dangers or risks, like blistering and exposure to pesticides, fungi, bacteria, and infections. Also, pruning roses can be dangerous due to thorns and other sharp objects.
However, wearing gloves will ensure you prevent or reduce your likelihood of experiencing such challenges. The good news is different gloves serve other purposes. For instance, consider latex or rubber gloves for a firm grip, especially when handling slippery tools during soil operations.
Also, rubber-coated gloves can help prevent burns or exposure to pesticides and protect you from fungi, bacteria, and even poisonous plants in your yard.
Proper Equipment Safety
Working in the garden requires several tools: some of which are sharps and, if not correctly taken care of, could cause deep cuts, bleeding, and bruises. Therefore, ensure the safe and correct use of your gardening tools.
Here are some suggestions to consider:
- Gardening tools should include safety features like guards to prevent injury.
- Be sure to utilize the equipment per the manual.
- Don’t remove or tamper with any equipment safety protections.
- Make sure your gear is always in top shape by cleaning and inspecting it frequently.
Do Some Warm Up Stretches and Exercises
As an activity that has similar effects on the body as a moderate-intensity workout, gardening can help you live a healthy lifestyle even if you’re infected with the common STDs.
The exercises target a wide range of muscle groups, from the legs and arms to the core and back. This ensures strong muscles and bones. Also, calories burned during these activities can significantly lower the risk of cardiovascular disease.
Therefore, ensure you perform some exercises to keep you in the mood for your work.
Stay Hydrated
Taking precautions against heat exhaustion and sunburn in the scorching summer months is imperative. When you’re really into gardening, it’s easy to forget to take regular water breaks. Additionally, this could lead to hypothermia in some cases.
Therefore, you should increase your water intake for your health even if you aren’t thirsty. So, keep a container of water handy in the garden.
Conclusion
Gardening can be fun but dangerous simultaneously, especially when you don’t follow safety precautions. Staying hydrated, doing some pre-gardening exercises, donning protective clothing, and learning how to properly handle gardening equipment will all help reduce your risk of injury as you work in the soil.