TOOLS OF THE TRADE; Hard to find gardening and farming tools

Levin to his urban brother after his day of mowing with a hand scythe: "You can't imagine what an effectual remedy it is for every sort of foolishness. I want to enrich medicine with a new word: Arbeitskur. Arbeit is German for work, movement, energy; kur means cure. --Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina, 1876

The repetitive labor of hand weeding and planting--the bending, pulling, up and down rhythm of your body requires tools that prevent strain, frustration and waste of effort. They should feel like well-designed extensions of your hands and feet. The cheap, dull gardening tools found abundantly in common hardware stores are made using porous metals that bend easily, are difficult to …