I’m wondering if you have any unique Christmas gift ideas for the gardeners in my life. PC

Gardeners can be a difficult group to shop for; primarily because we can be so picky about our plants, tools, and accessories. However, I do have a few suggestions for some things your gardener friends may not know they need but will wonder how they ever lived without, so here goes.

First on my list will be something I am guessing a lot of gardeners have not heard of; a butterfly puddler. Butterfly puddlers are similar in concept to a bird bath but are not for bathing, they are for drinking. Yes, butterflies get thirsty.

Butterfly puddlers are more shallow than bird baths and have rocks or something in the water the butterflies can stand on while getting a drink. For butterflies, a standard bird bath is too deep and without something to land on, butterflies will search for water somewhere else. But, if you have flowers and love watching the butterflies, a puddler is another feature for your garden that will encourage butterflies to visit.

While we are on the topic of water, you can also get a bee watering station for their garden. Bee watering stations are similar to puddlers but tend to be filled with smaller stones so the bees can stand on these to get a drink. You could actually make one of these out of a shallow dish by adding marbles to serve as landing sites.

Last week we talked about several native bees and mentioned mason bees and their unique homes. There are a variety of mason bee homes available commercially, but they are pretty easy to build yourself. Rather than go into great detail of how to build them, just look online for “building a mason bee house.” There are a lot of variations on a theme. Just pick out what looks good to you and get to work. Or, if you are not the crafty type, they are not very expensive to purchase.

No one likes getting eaten up by mosquitos while they are out working in the garden. Since we know bats love to eat mosquitos, how about giving your favorite gardener a bat house? Bat houses are fairly inexpensive and again, not that difficult to build if you are so inclined. They do have some special location requirements though such as needing to be in the sun, about 15 feet off the ground, and near a water source. But, attracting bats to your yard to deal with mosquitos is a much more environmentally friendly approach to controlling this insect than spraying your yard with insecticide.

As we know, gardeners spend a lot of time watering their gardens. And one of the things that is the least fun about this is spooling out the hose and then putting it back where it belongs. I was gifted a retractable hose reel last year and it has made my garden life so much easier.

If you are not familiar with these marvels of modern life, you pull out the amount of hose you are going to need (I think my hose is 75 to 100 feet long), water your plants, return to the retractor, give a little tug on the hose and voila, the hose winds itself back onto the spool. It’s magical. Now, these are not cheap, but it will change your gardener friend’s life.

Next on the list would be gardener claw gloves. I received these as a gift a couple of years ago. I accepted them graciously, assuming I would put them on the shelf and that would be the end of it. But one spring day I decided to give them a try and now they are my favorite gloves. Here’s why.

Each fingertip of the gloves (not thumbs) has a plastic claw-like attachment. When pulling weeds, you use these claws to rough up the soil where the weed is located and then you are much more likely to pull out the root of the weed and not just the top. This strategy is much less invasive than using a hoe or some other standard weeding implement. However, don’t overdo it your first time out with these gloves since it will probably take your fingers a while to get used to this type of workout.

Pruning can sometimes be difficult, especially since we tend to wrap the pruners around the largest possible branch we can get in our pruner. On a standard pruner, once the branch is securely in place, we apply the appropriate pressure to cut through it. On larger branches this can be difficult, increasingly difficult as we age and lose some of the strength in our hands. This is where ratcheting pruners come to the rescue.

Ratcheting pruners use a little bit of physics to apply strong cutting pressure with less effort. And in the process, rather that needing to cut all the way through the branch in one pass, these ratcheting pruners cut a little bit at a time, making the process easier. When I first purchased a ratcheting pruner, I thought it would maybe make pruning a little easier in some instances, but it would not replace my favorite pruner. It has now become my favorite pruner.

So, there’s some ideas to get you started. Happy gardening.

You can get answers to all your gardening questions by calling the Tulsa Master Gardeners Help Line at 918-746-3701, dropping by our Diagnostic Center at 4116 E. 15th Street, or by emailing us at mg@tulsamastergardeners.org.