My neighbor told me he was standing in the tools aisle of our local gardening center, confused by the wide range of styles, constructions, and shapes of pruners available. He was hesitant to spend his
How do I select a pruner? To select a pruner you should consider the:
- Plants to be pruned- for live plants and delicate cuts you need bypass pruners. For cutting back dead foliage you should choose an anvil style.
- Blade material
- General quality of the pruners
- Safety features
- Ease of repair and maintenance
- Amount of pruning you will be doing
- Weight
- Handle comfort
- Ergonomics
This sounds like a long and difficult task, but in reality, once you have read this complete guide you will be equipped to purchase the best possible pruners for you, your plants, and your wallet.
How To Select A Pruner
It would be impossible to put together a definitive list of “must have” garden tools because the items you need are dictated by what is in your garden and every garden is different. However, one tool that almost every gardener could use is a quality pair of hand pruners.
And I’ll tell you why.
You can improve the health of many plants in your garden with the correct pruning techniques and pruning isn’t just about trimming off dead or dying parts of the plant. By the application of the correct pruning techniques, you can encourage your plant to grow in a certain direction, conform to a particular shape, improve its fruit and / or flower yield, or restrict growth.
For this you need a pruner, but not all pruners are created equal.
Not only are there different types of pruners for particular groups of plant, or the job you want to do, but each type of pruner has a number of variable factors which could make them suitable or unsuitable, depending on your specific needs. If you are wondering which pruner is right for you
Types Of Pruner
Pruners are essentially one of three kinds; bypass, anvil, and ratchet. Each of these pruners is best suited to a particular type of pruning. This is the reason why it is important to know what kinds of plants you will be working on before you purchase your
Bypass Pruners
These are the most popular kind of pruner and probably your best choice as a good all rounder. They have curved blades that slide over each other, in the same way as scissors, with one sharp blade and a second, slightly thicker, unsharpened blade.
Bypass pruners make clean, precise cuts which make them best suited for close cuts on live branches and stems. It is strongly recommended that you do not use them on dry, dead plants… If you do there is a risk the branch you are cutting will get jammed between the blades, causing damage to the blade of the pruner.
As a general rule of thumb, most pruners will comfortably cut through a plant of up to 3/4 inch in diameter. With ratchet pruners you can usually cut up to one inch in diameter. Any larger than this and you will be placing excessive strain on your hands, and the pruners.
For cutting thicker items you will need a lopper. This is similar to a pruner, but requires two hands to use.
Anvil Pruners
The action of an anvil pruner is the same as that of a knife on a chopping board. They have a single, sharp, straight, cutting blade which closes against a flat edge. This edge is usually, but not always, made of metal.
Anvil pruners are most suitable for cutting back old, dead growth. Their more brutal crushing action can cause damage to live, softer stems and branches.
As they are best suited to trimming dead and dry branches and offshoots, anvil pruners tend to be larger than their bypass cousins. The fact that the blade is in the middle of the anvil piece which
Ratchet Pruners
The ratchet pruner is similar in style and action to both the bypass and the anvil, but instead of being entirely “person powered” they use a mechanism which performs the cutting action in stages. This is an advantage for those with small or weak hands or anyone who will be carrying out a large amount of pruning.
In an ideal world you would have a pair of pruners for each task:
- Bypass for live, softer plants, and careful cuts.
- Anvil pruners for harder stems and dead plant matter.
- Ratchet pruners for dead plant matter and harder living stems, but with less fatigue and strain.
You will no doubt also see a wide range of speciality pruners. These will still fall into one of these three categories, but I’ll run through them at the end of this guide.
Selecting A Pruner
Once you know which type of pruner you need there are a number of factors to consider in order to get the best possible pair for you and your garden.
These factors can be divided into the features of the particular pruner you are considering and the features of the person doing the pruning.
The Pruner:
- Blades
- Handle
- Spring
- Repair And Maintenance
- Safety
The User:
- Hands
- Health Issues
Let’s look at each of those features in detail.
The Blades
Pruner blades can be made from a variety of materials, have different coatings and may be more or less easy to sharpen and maintain. When choosing a pair of pruners try to buy the best quality blade you can afford.
It may be tempting to go for the budget versions, but they do not last as long. Therefore, in the long
Blade Materials
The blades on most pruners are made of either hardened carbon steel, stainless steel, or titanium.
- Hardened Steel
Hardened steel has a higher carbon content which makes the blade more durable but they are also easily stained and corrode more quickly than other materials
- Stainless Steel
Stainless steel blades are less durable than their hardened steel counterparts but that doesn’t mean they are weak. It is just an indication that they may need sharpening a little sooner and may bend more easily if misused.
On the other hand, stainless steel blades have a protective chromium oxide layer and are more resistant to corrosion.
- Titanium
Titanium is approximately half as dense as steel, therefore blades that are coated with a layer of titanium are usually lighter. As the pruners are sharpened the layer of steel underneath is exposed. This provides you with the greater resistance to corrosion that you get with stainless steel blades but with all the strength of a hardened steel blade.
- Other Coatings
On some models the blades are also covered with a non-stick coating designed to repel sap and other sticky substances. There are also low-friction coatings which decreases the possibility of the blades sticking.
Which Blade Material Is Best?
Hardened steel, also referred to as carbon steel, is the best blade material to choose, preferably with a titanium coating. This blade is the most robust most durable option.
When budget prevents you from making this choice then uncoated hardened steel is the next best, just be sure to take extra care when cleaning and drying your blades after use.
Blade settings
One element of construction that is often overlooked when choosing bypass pruners is how closely the blades pass over each other when they are opened and closed. The closer the blades are to each other the better.
Over time the blades can loosen, making them less efficient and more prone to damage. In addition, as you sharpen your blades they will become slightly thinner and this will require readjustment to ensure they continue to tightly pass over each other.
By purchasing a pair which allow you to adjust the tightness of the cutting mechanism you will be able to ensure the blades remain held tightly against each other.
Blade Construction
There are a variety of ways in which manufacturers can forge the metal with which they construct their pruners:
- Drop forging – Hammering hot metal into dies.
- Press forging – Pressing hot metal into a die with hydraulic pressure.
- Roll forging – Pressing hot metal between two rollers.
Some pruners will be marked as being forged and this refers to drop forging.
The benefit of using drop forging is that it aligns and stretches the grain structure of the metal, creating a stronger end product.
This makes a drop forged part a better option than one that is made through casting – where molten metal is poured into a
Handles
The handles on your pruners may be made from a variety of materials from bare metal or metal coated in rigid plastics to those covered in softer elastomers which are a mixture of rubber and plastic. As you might imagine, metal, molded plastic, and hard plastic coated metal handles are much harder on your hands. Meanwhile, handles which have a softer coating will allow you to prune for longer before beginning to experience hand fatigue.
You will see many pruners that say they are ergonomically designed. However, this does not only mean that the handles are shaped in order to be more comfortable in your hand.
Ergonomically designed pruners also have their blades set at particular angles to the handles. This change can prevent you having to bend and twist your wrist thus helping to decrease the possibility of wrist pain.
Another feature you will see is the rotating handle. These are designed to move slightly with your hand and are a fatigue reduction element. The decision on whether or not to purchase a pair of pruners with a rotating handle is a personal one. Some gardeners swear by them while others just do not like the feeling of the movement.
Spring
The spring between the blades on a pair of pruners is there to push the blades apart when you relax your hands. This will reduce the rate at which your hands tire.
You will see either a coiled metal or an open wire spring on your pruners, and they both work in the same way. The difference is that the coiled metal springs tend to be stronger, with more longevity, and they are less likely to become caught in foliage than the open wire spring.
An important item to look for is whether the spring is firmly attached to the handle. If not you are at risk of having it get caught on the branches, you arm trimming and popping off. Corona and a few other brands manufacture their pruners with a spring system where spring is integrated into the cutting head. This prevents those annoying “spring popping” incidents which can leave you scrambling in the dirt for the far-flung spring.
Springs can also detach when the pruners are open as wide as they can go. This highlights the importance of a good locking mechanism, which I will touch on later in the article, and ensuring you always leave your pruners in the closed position when not in use.
The possibility of losing your spring also highlights the importance of being able to purchase the replacement parts for your pruner. Without a spring your pruners will be rendered useless. That is unless you have a style with one large loop handle, in which case, without the spring, you effectively have a pair of scissors. They are still useable, but this style of pruner is significantly heavier and bulkier than straight handled options. They make it far more difficult to get in close to the plant for the more precise or delicate cuts and your arms, wrists, and hands will tire much more quickly
If the pruners you are considering do not have a spring consider this. They will work in exactly the same way as scissors and as such they will require you to both open and close the blades, doubling the work you have to do and the speed with which your hands will tire.
Ease Of Repair And Maintenance
The majority of pruners at the budget end of the market will have minimal, if any, options for repair and maintenance, other than basic blade cleaning and sharpening. While you will be able to wipe the blades clean and give them a basic sharpen, they are not designed to be taken apart and reassembled.
If you are planning to purchase pruners that will last, then look for those which have replacement parts you can order and change yourself. You should also seek out the pruners which are designed to come apart with relative ease in order to facilitate a thorough clean.
Safety
Most modern pairs of pruners have a locking mechanism to keep them in a closed position. This is important to prevent you from incurring accidental cuts on those sharp blades, but it also protects the pruners. Locking the blades prevents damage when the pruners are not in use and also negates the possibility of the spring becoming detached.
Look for a lock that is easy to open and yet doesn’t spring open on its own. Also important is that the latching piece of the lock stays in place when you are pruning otherwise they can lock while in use, which becomes extremely annoying after the third or fourth time it happens.
Some of the higher end, professional pruners do not have a safety latch with which o lock the pruners. Instead they have a loop attached to one handle which you hook over the other handle in order to keep the blades locked togather.
An often overlooked safety point is the point of the blade. Some styles of pruner have blades which form a sharp point at their tip and there are many gardeners that will attest to the fact they have been hurt when reaching out and accidentally stabbing themselves in the palm of the hand.
Hands
We don’t often think of the fact that hands come in all kinds of shapes and sizes but this can have a huge impact on how satisfied or otherwise, you are with your pruners. Some brands produce the same pruner in a range of sizes suitable for the smallest hands right up to those who have giant bear-paws at the end of their arms.
When purchasing at a store take the time to hold the pruners and “use” them as you would in the garden. It should quickly become obvious whether or not you find a particular pair comfortable.
If you are purchasing your pruners online from a store such as Amazon, who have an effortless return process, order several pairs at once. Then you can again “use” the pruners at home, emulating the motion of pruning, in order to discover the pair which best suits you and your hands.
Health Issues
For those gardeners who have less strength in their
It is not just the style of pruner that can ease the burden on painful hands. I have already touched on ergonomic design, in the “handles” section but it useful to reiterate a few points. Look for:
- Cushioned handles to reduce pressure.
- Handles that rotate which minimizes wear on your wrists.
- Pruners with blades that are angled in such a way they allow your hand to stay in a neutral, unbent position.
Speciality Pruners
Gardeners who have a very specific need can, in some cases, find a pair of speciality pruners designed especially for a particular job, or plant. For example:
- Bonsai pruners: Specifically designed for the tiny, exact cuts needed when trimming a bonsai tree, these pruners do not have a spring.
Instead they have a “grip together” style of blade. - Floral pruners: Used when a great deal of precision is needed on a delicate plant but where bonsai pruners are too small. Also good for removing thorns, cutting stems, and deadheading smaller blooms.
- Rose pruners: As you might expect – designed with
rose in mind. Thin blades allow the gardener to get in close and make clean cuts. - Serrated anvil pruners: These have a serrated surface on the anvil in order to hold the stem or branch still as you close the blade. If you are cutting flowers to place in a vase, serrated anvil pruners also roughen the stem which allows increased water penetration.
Left handed pruners: I know manyleft handed gardeners who have adapted to usingright handed pruners. Not always available in local garden centers, if you areleft handed and will be doing a lot of pruning then take the time to source a pair of pruners which have been designed for lefties.
Conclusion
When selecting a pruner, first choose the style of pruner that is most appropriate for the job; bypass or anvil. Then, identify the pruners with the best quality blade you can afford. Finally, test each of the options by gripping them and “phantom pruning” to find which pair feels the most comfortable to you.
