Aesthetics? PISHAW! This trowel is serious business and eschews aesthetics. It's a thickish sheet of aluminum, balled up into a handle on one end and sharpened to a shiv point on the other. On top of this balled up handle is thrust a wheelchair handlebar grip in bright, you can't possibly lose this thing in the weeds, red. The benefits of this wheelchair grip are that it's real grippy! I can flail my little muddy arms all over the place, but this trowel isn't going to slip out of my hand unless I'm trying to throw it at a beaver or whatever little ground creatures keep eating my plant roots. I can then hose this mofo off and it looks brand freaking new! BAM! Let's talk about my soil. What I have here appears to be thick clay mixed liberally with gravel and spaced between large awkward boulders that are always where you want your hole to be. 90% of the time I need a hole, I thrust the trowel in the ground, and THUNK it hits a rock, over and over. Most trowels do not care for this type of behavior and either just simply won't cut through the soil to begin with, won't continue after a couple inches, and are distracted from their duty by the presence of any rock or pebble, diverting it off course, or most likely just preventing me from digging anymore. Sometimes they just break into pieces. This wilcox trowel slices through my dirt like it's butter! It does a great job of making a hole exactly the size of the trowel. The trowel does precisely what it is supposed to do. What it does not do that I hoped it would do is pull that same dirt out of the hole I made. This is due to the long length of the tool and the V point at the tip, it does not act in my soil like a scoop to remove the dirt from the hole. My clay soil will not allow for any forgiveness in the size of the hole you dug for soil removal. I purchased a DeWit victorian trowel to do this task. Ultimately, the Wilcox trowel is the correct tool for the job if I want to dig a quick hole or remove roots or a plant, for instance removing blackberry brambles in the forest, or trying to uncover irritation tubing, but I'll probably reach for a tool with a bit more finesse and scooped shaping for planting new plants and tucking soil around them, and in my softer raised bed soil. A pro of the wheelchair grip handle is that it's eminently replaceable-for minimal cost- and can be done by anyone without the need of specialty tools or a woodworking shop. A con is that it's hollow and gets stuffed with dirt which is super obnoxious to remove (again. clay soil). The muddier my soil is, the bigger the problem is. As for cleaning the tool, aside from the hollow handle, I've been using a sturdy nylon brush to brush the dirt off the blade, but I am not sure what I could do to damage it. It's a piece of sheet metal, after all, and in the grand scheme of things, it'll probably outlast me. I could oil it with boiled linseed like I do my DeWit tools, but I'm thinking it's totally unnecessary. I did need to file the edges next to the handle. They're sharp from the manufacturer. I have a ten year old that likes to help dig, and I didn't want the sharp edges to cut his fingers. This took maybe a minute or two but was worth my time for peace of mind. I am a small person and have no issue with the weight or handfeel of the tool, the full length handle creates a balanced tool and I didn't experience any discomfort during prolonged gardening tasks. It's not my only trowel and won't replace the others, but I'm glad to have it as part of my gardening tool team.
