There's An Amazon Find That Helps Take The Strain Out Of Digging In The Garden

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If you enjoy doing your own gardening or landscaping work, you probably have developed useful hacks for making it easier to dig out grass or to quickly dig deep holes for root balls with your shovel. Sometimes, though, achieving the best results with a shovel comes down to using the right design. Amazon is offering the Root Slayer Perennial Garden Shovel ($45 for medium size), which uses an unusual design to simplify digging planting holes in a garden. It features a narrower blade with serrated edges along the side that help you slice through roots, reducing the amount of strain you'll feel while digging. The serrated edges move the blade through packed soil more efficiently, too.

The Root Slayer shovel gives you a good value for your purchase price because it makes it easier to do DIY gardening and landscaping work, rather than hiring a professional. One reviewer on Amazon noted that the shovel worked so well, "My landscaper friend borrowed it and said it cut through roots like butter! So he ordered one too!" To give you an even better value for your purchase, the manufacturer behind the Root Slayer shovel, Radius Garden, offers a lifetime warranty for the shovel for as long as the consumer owns the product. Additionally, the Root Slayer shovel is available with handle lengths varying from 44 to 57 inches, allowing you to pick the right product for your height.

Thick tree roots are the bane of any backyard gardener, but if you're not especially concerned with trees and shrubs, you might still find use for this shovel. In addition to easily cutting through roots, the Root Slayer shovel can tackle tough soil conditions. Rocks and gravel might be the perfect choice for managing drainage in a landscaped garden or yard, but such materials are difficult to dig through when you're trying to plant new flowers or install posts. A few different Amazon reviewers say they even use it for metal detecting, since it can handle any type of soil they encounter, from dense gravel to heavy clay.

Manufactured materials aren't a problem either. One of the downsides to using landscape fabric in your garden is the difficulty in digging through it to put in new plants. Some people might take the time to cut through the fabric with a knife before digging a deep hole, but you may not need a knife if you have this serrated shovel. Its toothed edges cut right through. 

Even after more than 10,000 customer reviews on Amazon, only 1% of reviewers give the Root Slayer shovel a one-star rating. However, a few reviewers dislike the product's unusual round handle. "It is a circle, so you have no room for your hands," one reviewer said. One elderly customer said the shovel worked well, but it was too heavy for regular use. The price is also a bit higher than some people may want to pay for a shovel, as an all-metal shovel can be purchased for around $30.