Buy This, Not That: The clever $15 tool that gardening pros say is a must for your home garden

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Let your health blossom.

Gardening — as well as other moderate physical activities like dancing and walking — can cut your risk of mortality significantly, according to a new study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, which looked at more than 88,000 adults over more than 11 years. Indeed, people who engaged in moderate physical activity like gardening for 10 to 59 minutes a week were at an 18% lower risk of dying than those who didn’t exercise — and the more you do it, the lower your risk.

What’s more, gardening has plenty of other health benefits. It may reduce your risk of dementia; boost your mood and increase your Vitamin D exposure, which helps boost overall health, according to numerous studies. (Want to get started gardening? This $14 pack of 30,000 wildflower seeds is one of Amazon’s best-reviewed best-sellers, as is this$13 pack of 30 kinds of seeds for a variety of vegetables like corn, cucumbers and tomatoes.)

With that in mind — and spring in the air — MarketWatch asked gardening gurus what their favorite inexpensive gardening products were. Here are three of their $15- to-$20-and-under picks.

1. Bypass pruners, which “are a must-have for any gardener due to their multi-use aspect,” says Pol Bishop, a gardening and landscaping expert at Fantastic Gardeners. “They are an awesome tool that can be used on different types of plants and trees all around your garden area.”

– These roughly $15 bypass pruners are one of Amazon’s best-sellers with one verified user noting they are a “really good quality pair of shears” that are “light weight, sharp” and get “the job done with very little squeeze of the hand … which is much appreciated with my arthritic hands.”

2.A garden kneeler to ease stress on your knees, says Lewis Peters of e-commerce landscaping firm Online Turf: “Repetitive tasks like planting flower beds can be rough on the knees … Garden kneelers offer a flat, soft surface to kneel on to make tricky gardening tasks more comfortable.”

– This roughly $13 garden kneeler is a best-seller and gets 4.6 stars with more than 1,000 reviews. with one user writing, “They are much more comfortable than the kneeling pads I see at the garden center.”

3.Leather gardening gloves, says Bishop, who calls them an “all-purpose” glove that “lets your hands breathe and keeps them cool and dry.”

– This roughly $20 pair is one of the best-priced, best reviewed options on Amazon — with 4.7 out of 5 stars with hundreds of reviews. One verified user raves, “Well made real leather. Comfortable and tough. Wonderful for pruning roses or any thorny or caustic bushes.” Want a cheaper option? This roughly $15 pair gets 4.4 stars.

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