TAKING CARE OF YOUR BACK: GARDENING
The same rules apply to gardening jobs as to household ones: lift and carry carefully, using your legs and body weight; work upright whenever practicable; do not do too much at once, and change tasks often; keep the work as close to yourself as possible; get help when necessary. Avoid working in the cold or cooler weather.
Avoid prolonged bending and stooping by kneeling down or using a long-handled implement to do the job whenever possible.
For pruning and fruit picking, long-handled implements which allow one to avoid reaching high up above, should be used with care. While they may not be heavy items in themselves, when they are lifted or lowered they put a stress on the back.
Try to keep the sweeps of action in a forward or backward direction, with the minimum of twisting. Avoid any sweeping action across the body: it needs a good deal of work from the muscles of the trunk, and unless they are in working trim, your back may be strained. The secret is foot position, so that every action is a use of balanced body weight. Where space is too cramped, you may do better by getting down on your hands and knees.
Kneeling is a very sensible posture for many jobs in the garden. For a gardener who can neither stoop nor kneel nor squat, raised borders for flowers or a greenhouse with shelves would be possible outlets.
Digging is a traditional back-breaker for those untrained to it. Do not attempt to dig too much at one time. Stand over the job and try not to overload the fork or spade.
The wheelbarrow puts considerable stress on the spine because it has to be lifted and at the same time pushed – all very well if the ground is hard and level, but a great effort when the ground is soft and steep or uneven. If you need to make use of a wheel-barrow, choose one which takes the load well forward over the wheel; then, when you load it, make sure to place the load over the wheel so that the lifting effort needed is small. Be sure to lift the barrow correctly: stand between the shafts, bending at the hips and knees to reach the handles, then straighten at the hips and knees, lean forward with your body weight – and move off. It is better to make two journeys with small loads than to struggle with one.
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