DIY Network

New Fabric Takes the Ouch Out of Pruning

Master gardener Maureen Gilmer, host of Weekend Gardening, introduces a prick-proof gardening glove.

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	The new fabric is lightweight, thorn-resistant and retains dexterity. (All photos courtesy of Maureen Gilmer.)
	A detachable forearm gauntlet eliminates buying a second pair of longer gloves.
	Proper pruning is essential to successfully cutting roses.
	Hand-and-arm protection relieves the pain of winter-pruning a large rose garden.

Behold: A Breakthrough in Hand Protection

By Maureen Gilmer

Being not a dainty gardener, winter rose pruning never fails to leave its wounds on my fingers and forearms. Reaching into that framework wood, sawing off galls and lopping away aging canes is no place for the bare skinned. Inevitably, I am scratched and punctured, and the thought of wearing a sleeveless gown, or even an elbow-length one, before all is healed was out of the question.

This is the season (mid January) for making big changes with your rose plants. Their twigs and branches, often called canes, are the very structure of the plant. Begin by removing any conflicting canes by pruning out the weaker of the two. Conflicts cause wounds, which allow pests and disease easy entry into the plant.

Aging canes should be pruned out altogether. They will produce less and less vigorous flowering wood with time. Removal stimulates new canes that are guaranteed to be more prolific.

To ensure good health, nip out any canes that appear the least bit diseased to prevent its spread through the plant. Strive to prune the plants into an open, vase-like shape. This form allows every new leaf to receive optimal light and air circulation.

The problem with heavy duty rose pruning has always been the lack of a reasonably reliable thorn-resistant glove. A leather glove thick enough to stop the rose thorns or cactus spine is so stiff it can hinder dexterity. The welding gloves I once used required more hand strength to grasp clippers firmly. The effort aggravated my wrist pain from carpal tunnel, a writer's occupational hazard earned from years at the keyboard.

While I was struggling to prune in welder's gloves, a scientist was working on a space-age fabric to protect hospital workers from needle sticks without sacrificing much dexterity. His Superprotection-brand fabric was said to be far thinner and more lightweight than leather.

Naturally, I was skeptical. I'd seen way too many gloves advertised as puncture- or thorn-resistant that were not. So I took gloves made out of this new fabric to work at a botanical garden proving ground of cactus, succulents and other wickedly thorned desert plants. It has been more than two years in that tryout field, and I'm still using the original pair.

For the first time I can pick up a vicious golden barrel cactus with my hands. I can reach into an overgrown rose right up to the elbow. Certainly, some fine, needle-sharp spines penetrate the fabric, but these are tolerable.

Another problem with leather gloves is that they became infested with broken-off thorn and spine tips. After a brief window of use, the near-new gloves became impossible to wear again. What surprised me about the Superprotection gloves is that these tiny sharp tips did not catch in the fabric.

The glove design wraps each fingertip in the special fabric. This reduces most of the painful fingertip sticks from end-on encounters with rose thorns. Wrapped fingertips also make it possible to pick up potted roses by their container rims without getting stuck at that first knuckle or the sensitive cuticle end of the nail.

For winter pruning that required you to go deep into climbing roses or to target well-established canes, I wear a separate gauntlet of the protective fabric. These keep my arms sheathed to the elbow without buying a second pair of gloves.

I found Superprotection-brand fabric gloves to be a breakthrough in hand protection for gardeners of spiny or thorny plants. There's no longer any excuse for a gardener to be afraid to bare his or her arms at pruning time.

(Maureen Gilmer is a horticulturist and host of Weekend Gardening. E-mail her at mo@moplants.com. For more information, visit: www.moplants.com.

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