17 Tips & Tricks For Organizing Gardening Tools So Your Green Thumb Can Flourish

Garden care would be lots easier if only your tools were organized. You can lose hours sifting through tools and detangling the unending chords, or realize that the unkempt pieces have developed snags and cracks, rendering them useless, necessitating a trip down to the home improvement store — and not your garden. The ensuing sensory overload of floor-to-ceiling cabinets and tool organizers at the stores don't help either. So, to rescue you from this situation, here's a quick roundup of the different ways you can go about organizing gardening tools. 

Woodworkers will especially have a field day building new shelves and pegboards or customizing stored wood panels into shapes, sizes, and designs that best fit their tools and aesthetics. The eco-conscious individuals can try their hand at repurposing old furniture, including golf bags, barrels, or chairs, into tool storage. The ones who would rather not make the to-and-fro trips from their sheds to the garden can rejoice in stowing their routine tools within their happy space's confines by putting up a mailbox or giving their buckets wheels, turning them into personal caddies. And there's much more, as you'll discover below.

Have a spare 5-gallon bucket gathering dust in your basement? If not, you can always grab one from Home Depot for under $5. Deck it up with a handy tool organizer, available for under $25 on Amazon, and make your weeding chores a tad bit easier. Simply use the numerous pockets to section and store your small cutting and digging tools, like dandelion weeders, Hori Hori knives, hand shovels, wire cutters, snips, and your dearest pair of gloves. That way, you can easily lug around your tools while popping the plucked weeds in the bucket. It's a win-win!

If your household contains a golf aficionado and a gardener, then you're in luck. Grab an old golf bag to organize your gardening tools! Experiment to see how you'll go around arranging the awkwardly-shaped rakes, shovels, and hoes, relegating your twines, chicken wire, gloves, and other hand tools to the smaller pockets. Once done, you're ready to cart your portable tool shed around the garden while you work, returning it to the garage to store when not in use.

The gardening hack that will give you an attractive and easy-to-reach spot to store tools (think pruners and weeders), while also providing some character (playful, rustic, or vintage — let your imagination run wild) to your yard, is to add a mailbox on a plastic pole or a dead snag (if there's one already). The best part, though? You can even use it to pop in seed packets, clippings, cut flowers, or your favorite energy-boosting drink as you make your way through the yard — or as temporary storage for when Mother Nature unleashes her uncalled-for fury.

Avid DIYers have concocted several uses for IKEA's much-adored almost $40 RÅSKOG cart, from turning it into a mini-bar for sunny gatherings to fitting it with baking trays to ensure the survival of their herb garden. But there's another simple IKEA hack that turns a utility cart into a garden caddy on the go. Simply load it with your favorite tools, such as pruners, loppers, sprayers, watering cans, and more. What's more, you can screw a pegboard on its side to nail your bigger tools like augers and tillers for ready access.

Let's face it: Not all shoe organizers and racks are good at what they're supposed to do. However, that shouldn't deter you from putting them to other uses — organizing gardening tools being foremost (creating a vertical garden is a close second). From clippers, shovels, and sprinkler heads to seed packets and rooting hormones, shoe organizers will gladly accept and save your small tools and supplies without a complaint. If the rack is metal-based and deep enough, you can improve the aesthetic by stuffing some of your terracotta pots with the tools and placing them in the rack.

If calling on diverse thrift stores is your guilty pleasure, you've likely chanced upon stacks of filing cabinets sitting forlornly in the corner, selling for dirt-cheap prices. Snag one with two drawers (at a minimum), and reuse an old filing cabinet as a stylish way to store and organize garden tools. Be prepared for intensive cleaning and drilling on a pegboard to the sides for more functionality — such as hanging your hose or gloves. Remove the drawers and lay the cabinet on its sides to lump in your tools. Cut PVC pipe pieces can serve as placeholders.

Sanding, cleaning, and repainting an old chair that lost your favor years ago might not convince you to bring it back indoors for a second stint, but it could help arrange your most-used lawn tools. Besides, you aren't restricted to placing it on your deck or the patio for easier access (or eclectic décor); you can drill holes in it and affix it to your garage walls. Group your tools in wire baskets or toss them on as is. You can also add hooks for gloves and trowels.

Got a weather-beaten rake that's lost its handle but continues to support strong tines? Why not nail it to the wall upside down and turn it into a coat hanger, but for gardening tools? While you might escape some work asserting the rake's patina looks lovely, you'll still be required to drill holes in your tools' handles (think shovels, trowels, spades, or whatever else needs hanging) to loop in twines or ropes to sling them over the rake head. Or follow the DIY video above.

Have a few long-armed gardening tools and a panache for woodworking? Customize your storage! Plus, it's pretty nifty and easy to make too. Just lay down an 8-foot-long, 2 by 4 wood panel on the ground and arrange all your tools over it (upside-down, sideways, or top-down). Consider stacking duplicates (assuming you need that many), keeping the most-used ones front and center, while the less-used gear could be relegated to the sides. Mark the points, and cut another 2 x 4 panel into smaller blocks to create and screw your partitions. It should be able to house upwards of 20 tools.

Don't have enough wall space to suspend your gardening tools? No problem! Set them up in a 50-gallon barrel (food processing locations or restaurants may resell it to you for cheap). Depending on your tools' sizes and how many you own, drill the necessary holes or take a section out for an open arrangement. Don't forget to pile up rocks at its base (around 4 gallons should do) to stabilize it. These drums are best stored indoors (if you've got the requisite ceiling height), but it may work outside if you bore drainage holes at the base.

Another way to create easy hanging storage for the large tools hogging space in your garage is to repurpose PVC pipe cutouts into holders. All you have to do is splice the pipe into 6-inch-long pieces, depending on how many tools you own (maybe it's time to purge a few?). If possible, cut the parts at a 30-degree angle for a better view while drilling and screwing the cutouts to the wall. You can also keep the pieces on the floor to dock small tools.

Furniture or hardware stores often give out wooden pallets for free (or cheap), which can then be mounted on a wall to create storage — the natural division solves much of tool wrangling. However, don't forget to cut them down to size so your long-handled tools have adequate space to sit flush with the wall without blocking your access to other tools. If desired, remove a lower rung and fix it to the pallet's base to create a holding space, or hang hooks. Sand, stain, and repaint the pallets for your chosen aesthetic.

If all you need is functionality, sans ornamental elegance, to keep your leaf blowers, weed eaters, rakes, and their ilk off the floor, drive nails into your wall, and hang simply them. Too crude? Get as many heavy-duty wall-mounted U-hooks or J-hooks as essential and append your garden tools. Do yourself a favor, though, and chalk out the outline of the hung tools so that you know what goes where after you valiantly return from ridding your lawn of pesky weeds. As a bonus, you'll know when a tool goes missing or requires a replacement.

Remember when you hid in your grandpa's garage, loathing the rusted nails in mason jars, yet ogling his tools hung beautifully on a pegboard? Why not give your garden supplies such a home, too? All you need to factor in is how to leave some space at the back (from the wall) so that your hooks can lock in place easily — look for options with pegboard spacers or purchase furring strips. If flying hooks are a concern, get some locks from Amazon for $10. Consider building wooden dowels in case you plan to DIY your own board.

If you're fine with the idea of regular cleaning, consider installing sturdy, open shelves on your walls to organize and hold your garden supplies. Store any pointed tools like spades, garden forks, and cultivators above eye level, facing the wall to minimize risk. Or even better, plant your small tools in pots (like plants!), but with sand for easy maneuverability. Relegate the spare space to corral light-duty items, such as landscape fabrics, knee pads, chicken wire, or other itty-bitty items. Consider adding a few hooks to the side for hanging lightweight tools.

Rather than leaving your irrigation supplies, such as a hose, an unruly mess, give them a vertical home. Employ the chic storage hack to keep your garden hose and cords organized by coiling them around an unused wire potato basket or an old bucket. Now, either leave them in the corner of your potting station or hoop them on the walls using hooks. You can place any attachments within the bucket. Another option is to add a mounting block within your garden space and hang it there for prompt access.

Although an out-of-the-box trick, using Velcro tapes to get a handle on your tools is worth a go if you've got some imagination and time to fiddle — their reusability is a bonus. Easier pickings include wrapping the tape around small-handled tools, such as clippers, hoes, or spades, and nailing them to the siding with a hammer. You can similarly tie up your bamboo stakes and landscape fabrics and stand them on their side. Any hoses or tubes can be bundled together with the straps, too.