Best Garden

Best Garden is the yard brand for the hose, the sprinkler and the shovel you need this weekend: a heavy-duty hose that does not kink, sprinklers sized to a real lawn, fiberglass-handled long tools, hand pruners and planters, all picked to do the job at a fair price. In a valley with a frost-free season that runs from about May 19 to September 22, you do not have the summer to fight with a bad hose.

Best Garden is a house brand of lawn and garden products, more than four hundred items across tools, hoses and nozzles, sprinklers, planters and plant stands, carts, greenhouses, grass seed, wild-bird supplies and yard decor, each chosen to put a sound product at a competitive price.

Which garden hose to buy

The two to know are the FlexiMAX and the NeverKink.

The FlexiMAX Heavy Duty Hose is the 3/4-inch by 50-foot hose for the main run to the garden. The 3/4-inch bore moves more water than a 5/8 over the same length, which you feel at the far end of a long yard or when an impulse sprinkler is on it. It is nylon-reinforced, five-ply PVC rated to 390 psi, crush resistant, with a Forever Flow inner tube against blockages, a spring strain relief at the faucet so the hose does not break at the bend where every hose breaks, and heavy-duty aluminum couplings. It carries a limited lifetime warranty. It is not rated UV resistant, so put it on a reel or in the shade of the house between uses rather than leaving it in the July sun.

The NeverKink Heavy Duty Garden Hose is the 5/8-inch hose for the beds, the planters and the dog. Its Reflex Mesh construction is the anti-kink feature, and a hose that does not kink is the one you will use. It is reinforced vinyl rated 350 psi, crush resistant and UV resistant, with lead-free aluminum couplings, female brass threads at the coupling against corrosion, an ergonomic grip at the faucet end, and MicroShield against mold and mildew on the jacket. It stays flexible down to 45 F, which covers the cold mornings of May and September when you are still watering.

Neither hose is rated safe for drinking water, so neither is the one for filling a stock tank or a kids’ pool you would drink from. For the faucet end, a 6-foot leader hose with male and female couplings saves the main hose from the bend at the spigot, and the 300-foot-capacity metal four-wheel hose reel keeps a long run off the ground and out of the sun.

Hose	Size	Rating	Notes
FlexiMAX Heavy Duty	3/4 in. x 50 ft.	390 psi	5-ply nylon-reinforced PVC, strain relief, lifetime limited warranty, not UV rated
NeverKink Heavy Duty	5/8 in.	350 psi	Reflex Mesh anti-kink, UV resistant, flexible to 45 F
Leader hose	5/8 in. x 6 ft.		Male and female couplings, takes the bend at the faucet

Sprinklers for a lawn

Pick the sprinkler by the shape of the lawn. The metal impulse sprinkler head throws up to 86 feet in diameter, full or partial circle, with adjustable range and distance, on a standard 1/2-inch connection. That is the sprinkler for a big, roughly round lawn and for the long throw a 3/4-inch hose can feed; a metal head takes a season of being dragged across gravel. The spike version covers up to 5,600 square feet.

The poly oscillating sprinkler covers about 2,600 square feet and is made for large rectangular areas: an Easy Click dial sets the watering pattern to the yard’s width and length, 19 nozzles give even coverage without puddles, a planetary gear train and cam drive run it, and a wide base keeps it from tipping when the hose tugs. The plug at the end of the spray tube unscrews to reveal a clean-out tool for a clogged nozzle, which matters on well water. A stationary turret sprinkler handles the odd corner.

Montana lawns are watered against a dry summer and a short season, and the best time to run any of these is early morning, before the wind comes up and the sun takes the water. In Great Falls, the windiest part of the state, an oscillating sprinkler set low beats an impulse head throwing into the wind.

Shovels, rakes and hoes

The long-handled tools share one idea: a fiberglass handle with a vinyl grip. Fiberglass does not soak up water and split the way a wood handle does when it spends the winter in an unheated shed, and it is light enough to use all afternoon.

The 46-inch round point shovel has a tempered steel blade, 8.5 by 11.5 inches, on a fiberglass handle with a steel collar strengthening the socket, and it weighs 1.7 pounds. It is sold as a light-duty tool for digging, planting and moving loose soil, mulch and gravel, and that is how to use it: for planting a bed, moving bark, or setting a shrub, not for prying boulders out of Polson moraine. It carries a one-year warranty. The 46-inch square point shovel is the one for scooping gravel and cleaning out a trailer.

Round them out with the 48-inch fiberglass hoe, the 14-inch steel bow rake with 14 tines for leveling topsoil and raking gravel, the 8-inch poly shrub rake for getting under junipers, the 14-inch planting mattock for the clay and cobble a lot of Montana beds sit on, and the 12-foot fiberglass pole pruner with a 1-1/4-inch cut for the lower limbs on a spruce.

Pruners and hand tools

The 8-inch anvil pruner has a 3/4-inch cutting capacity, a nonstick-coated steel blade, a zinc alloy anvil, large vinyl grip handles and a locking safety switch. An anvil pruner crushes slightly as it cuts, which makes it the tool for dead wood and dry stems; use it on the dead canes of a rose and the brittle growth a hard winter leaves on a shrub. Lock it before it goes in a pocket.

Planters, greenhouses and the rest

Best Garden’s planters, plant stands, trellises and fountains dress the yard, and the 4-shelf greenhouse, 27 by 63 by 19 inches, is the Montana gardener’s answer to a May 19 last frost: start the tomatoes under cover and move them out when the valley stops freezing. A 15-gallon compost bin, a fruit picker basket, 50-foot heavy-duty garden wire, twist plant tie and a 46-inch shepherd hook for a hanging basket fill in the rest. Carts move the mulch and dirt, and the grass seed goes down in the spring window.

Why Best Garden

Buy Best Garden for a hose that will not kink, sprinklers that fit the lawn you have, and fiberglass-handled tools that survive a winter in the shed, at a price that lets you buy the whole set instead of one of them. It is the yard brand for a short season where the work has to get done the weekend you have.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the best garden hose to buy?

For the long run to the garden and a sprinkler, the FlexiMAX 3/4-inch by 50-foot: five-ply nylon-reinforced, 390 psi, strain relief at the faucet, limited lifetime warranty. For the beds and the planters, the 5/8-inch NeverKink: Reflex Mesh anti-kink construction, UV resistant, flexible down to 45 F. If kinking is what drives you crazy, the NeverKink is the one.

What is the best time to water a garden in Montana?

Early morning. The water soaks in before the sun and the wind take it, and the leaves dry off before evening, which keeps mildew down. Set an oscillating sprinkler for a rectangular bed or an impulse head for a round lawn, and let it run long enough to wet the soil deep rather than a little every day.

Is the Best Garden hose safe for drinking water?

No. Neither the FlexiMAX nor the NeverKink is rated safe for drinking, so use them for the lawn and the garden and fill a stock tank or a pool from a hose that carries a drinking-water rating.

What are the best garden tools for a beginner?

A round point shovel, a bow rake, a hoe, a hand pruner and a good hose. Best Garden’s long tools come on fiberglass handles that do not split in a cold shed, and the NeverKink hose couples with brass threads against corrosion. Add the greenhouse if you want tomatoes in a valley where the last frost comes in late May.