Caring for your Secateurs

Your secateurs are probably the most important tool in your garden kit. They prune, cut and snip and we carry a great selection of high-quality, specialty Japanese secateurs with unique and extremely useful features for the professional gardener. Robust and durable, designed for frequent use and a long life.

The key to a long life for your secateurs is to be sure to maintain them well through regular cleaning & sharpening. As well as ensuring you use them the way there intended to be used. 

Correct use of your Secateurs:

• Keep them sharp & oiled, sharpen before they get blunt.
• Japanese steel is hard and sharp, and can be more brittle than people are used to - it will chip if abused.
• Don’t cut anything with a diameter larger than 1/3 the length of the blade (same with saws). Over-doing it can bend/damage blades.
• Use the base of the blades, not the tips, for heavier cuts.
• Do not twist or apply uneven pressure.
• If you’re using two hands to make a cut, it's too big a cut for the tool.
• Do not cut wire, metal, stone, plastic or any other hard material (bamboo, some very hard woods, old dead wood, knots and burrs) can damage steel edges

Cleaning & Sharpening:

The first rule of thumb is to keep them clean & sharp...

Click here for a detailed guide on how to clean and sharpen your Japanese pruning tools.