Garden Gift Ideas for 2017

Each year, Northern Gardener pulls together some ideas for gifts for gardeners. These garden gifts are the kinds of things we’d like to find under our tree this holiday season. This year, each garden gift we chose appealed to the senses and was sensibly priced.

While we cannot list them all (you can find that in the November/December issue of Northern Gardener on newsstands now), we do want to pull out a few favorites from this year’s list. Here are three:

The first one is something I spotted in a gift store at a resort in northern Minnesota — the Herbcicle, a cute and clever way to freeze herbs. Here’s how it works: You pack the container with leafy herbs, twist on the top and put in the freezer. After the tube has frozen, the herbs can be pushed out and grated onto soups, stews or other dishes. How cool is that! It’s available through a variety of online retailers and in some Minnesota gift shops. At $8, the Herbcicle is inexpensive enough that you could give one each for basil, cilantro, parsley and more.

 

 

 

 

If you’d like to buy a tool as a garden gift, an unusual choice would be the  ComfortGel™ Microsnips, a small pruner from Corona Tools. These tiny pruners have padded grips and a double-beveled blade, great for getting in tight spots. At $15 apiece, you could even buy a couple of pairs. I’ve used mine for jobs both in and out of the garden. You can find these and other tools at a variety of local garden shops and hardware stores.

For gardeners working in small spaces, these fiber grow sacks are terrific for growing vegetables. We used them at the  Minnesota State Fair in 2017 for the pepper educational display and they were a huge hit with fair goers. Ours came from Bloem, but there are a variety of companies selling them and most cost less than  $5 each. They are available online and at local garden centers.

We can’t stop at just three suggestions. Tomorrow we’ll have a few more!