Edge Beds Like a Pro Using Only a Shovel - BEST Technique for GREAT results

If you start out the season with crummy beds like this and you want them to end up like this, it's easier than you might think. And this video is different than my others because there's no special tools, no power equipment at all. In fact we're going to make these beds possible by using a simple shovel, but the difference in this video is I've got a better way to do it and I'm going to show you all the steps to get it done. The first thing to think about before you even start is when is the best time to edge. And it might surprise you that my recommendation is to edge right after it rains out or when the ground is damp. When the ground is dry your shovel will not go in evenly. It becomes a big mess and when you do it after a rainstorm or when there's a little bit of moisture in the soil, the shovel slides right in and it really helps give you a clean edge. Now that we know when, our next consideration is what kind of shovel is best to do edging. Now there's been a lot of tools made over the years, but my recommendation is to use a standard garden spade type shovel. And that's what you're looking at right here. It's sharp, it's got a square edge, and in my opinion works the best. These little half moon shovels look kind of clever and cute, but they really don't do a good job. And if you look at their cutting edge, they only have about one-fifth of the amount of cutting space as a regular spade type shovel. So what I recommend using is this style. And the one I've pictured here is made by a company called Fiskars. It's very inexpensive and surprisingly it's built like a tank. It's welded and it's held up very well for me over the years. And this is the exact shovel that you're going to see in this video. Now that we know when we want to edge and what kind of tool we're going to use, we need to figure out how we're going to edge. And that's all about the technique. And what you're looking at here is the typical way most people will edge. They put that shovel straight in the ground and they push on it with their foot. Sometimes they even jump up and down in it. But I'm going to show you a very different way to use this shovel that makes it a lot easier and I find gives you a better edge. So if you watch how I'm starting here, it's a little bit different. And I have the shovel tilted and I'm kind of balancing on one edge of the shovel. Now this might look a little different but it really works. So let's get a few more close-ups of what I'm actually doing. Let's take a look at the top shot so you can see where I'm putting my foot. Now I'm right-handed and I don't know if that really matters but I like to put my foot on the right-hand side of the shovel as I'm walking it. But the magic that happens is in this side shot. Look at how I'm holding the shovel. I don't put it straight on and in fact I use the very corner of the shovel and I balance my foot on it and I walk it along the bed. Now by doing this, this gives me a real advantage because that edge is razor sharp and it's putting all of my body weight on the shovel and by walking it I can do it much quicker. So as we get a close-up here, what this allows me to do is to just give me an easier time to do this edging job. It's faster and I get a much better result and I find that I'm less fatigued. So as I do this whole bed, it's much quicker, easier and it really works out great. But if you're somebody that can't balance really well, you don't have to walk the shovel. You can still do the same technique, just take your foot off and do each section separately. But if you can balance like this and it's not hard, it comes out much better. Now here I'm just going in and I'm back cutting each of the pieces. Now in my experience, you only have to back cut like this if you're taking off a pretty good amount of the grass. But at least if you do back cut, you can see how simple and easily the grass comes right up. Now the one thing you want to be careful of is never flip that grass up into your beds and leave it. Once you get it up there, you can let it dry out if you want to make it a little bit lighter, but you've got to get all those grass bits out. So one huge benefit to this technique is that you get really big pieces and by doing that you're not going to have these little tiny roots floating all around your beds that are going to start growing. You can just grab these, toss them in the woods or in a wheelbarrow and you're good to go. Now when I'm done, I like to go back sometimes and make a final pass and I'm just trimming off a little bit of dirt and give it a nice razor sharp edge which will work out well when I put new mulch in this bed. This part's optional. If you've got a lot to do, you might just skip it, but this is the time to do this to really trim it up and it makes a big difference in the final appearance. Now we've given our bed a much better edge and we've just got to finish the cleanup. You can see those bits of grass and you don't want to leave them there for long, so let's rake them up. And here I'm using the groundskeeper 2 rake to get all those bits of sod together, but in addition this rake does a nice job of turning the mulch over a little bit and even though I'm not ready for new mulch yet, what's here will look a lot better until that day comes. Now here's some final shots of the bed. Now using a shovel was actually easy. It did a nice job and these beds are all set so that when I do buy mulch, it'll be ready to toss in and it'll go right against that nice clean edge. Now it's early spring here, so my grass still looks a little bit rough. The beds need some cleanup and these plants are barely growing, so things are just starting up. But the sooner you edge your beds, you're really going to save yourself time in the long run and you get to at them and they do look a lot better. So I hope this video was helpful to you and showed you a different technique where you can just use a shovel, get the job done a lot quicker, and give you a little bit less stress doing this so that hopefully you'll be able to do it a little bit more often. So if you like this video, please give me a thumbs up, subscribe to my channel if you're not already, and I hope you come back for more videos.