CobraHead Precision Weeder and Cultivator

The most environmentally-friendly way of dealing with weeds is to remove them by hand. However, it can be hard to pull deep tap-roots, and it's easy to make a mess of your lawn when using hand forks and trowels to weed.

We like the American-made CobraHead garden tool because it allows you to pull out deep tap roots with a minimal amount of effort, and very little impact on your lawn.

The CobraHead® is recommended by and has received the Seal of Approval from the National Home Gardening Club after testing by 200 members.

Features & Benefits

• It weeds, cultivates, scalps, edges, digs, furrows, plants, transplants, de-thatches, and harvests with ease.
• The CobraHead® out-weeds and out-digs all similar tools.
• The time proven blade design breaks up almost any soil.
• The comfortable handle allows easy left-hand or right-hand action.

Construction

The CobraHead® is made in Wisconsin, USA by Noel Valdes and his family. It's made of knife-blade quality self-sharpening steel and environmentally friendly wood fiber reinforced recycled plastic. The way the steel is set into the handle ensures it will never come loose.

Q&A with the inventor, Noel Valdes

Q: What makes CobraHead® different from other tools that look almost the same?
A: There are lots of tools that have a similar blade head shape to CobraHead®, but they are not the same. The CobraHead® blade is thin, and wears to knife-like edge. Other similar tools are flat and thicker along the cutting edge. While this may seem to be a small difference, it makes a huge difference in soil and weed cutting ability. The CobraHead® cuts through all soils easily. What weeds it cannot pull out it chops off below the soil.

There are similar weeders that do have a sharp blade. The most popular tools are made under various names such as New England Style or Cape Cod Style weeder. These tools have a blade that is sharp on one edge only and can only be used for right hand weeding. The CobraHead® out-performs these tools in its weeding capability, it can be used right-handed or left-handed, and it has many other uses besides weeding.

Q: What makes the CobraHead® a "precision" weeder?
A: The relatively narrow blade head and the pointed tip let the CobraHead® work as though its blade were a steel fingernail®. You can get right next to delicate plants and grab the weed and pull it out.

Q: Is the CobraHead® effective on all weeds?
A: While I doubt there is such a thing as a universal weeder, the CobraHead® appears to be as close as you can get. I find it the best tool for grasses of all types. It does a great job on low-lying weeds such as purslane and spurge. It is great on dandelions and tap-rooted weeds. And because of its scalping ability even the weeds that can't be pulled out can be cut off quite deeply underground.

Q: How do you "grab" weeds with the CobraHead®?
A: I think everyone who uses this tool will develop their own style, but I find that if I push the blade into the ground just beyond the root and crown of the weed and pull the tool towards me, it pulls the whole weed loose. Usually I can pull dandelions and similar rooted weeds out in a single motion, with minimal disturbance to plants around the weed.

Q: What about cultivation? Why would I want to use a single bladed tool as a cultivator?
A: The unique blade shape of the CobraHead® has proven itself for years as an extremely efficient soil-cutting tool. What it may lose in width covered with a single pass is more than offset by the ease with which it cuts soil. You don't kill yourself trying to break hard soil. I find its ability to break up soil and pull up weed roots at the same time to be the best way to cultivate my beds.

Q: What else does CobraHead® do well?
A: I use it as a transplanter. I almost never use a trowel anymore. I use it as a seeder to either dig a small hole or make a furrow line. I use it to de-thatch very weedy areas that need to be cleaned up. I use it as an edger both in the garden and along walkways. I find new uses all the time. The CobraHead® is the first I tool take with me when I go into the garden.

Q: I'm a flower gardener, does the CobraHead® work for me? A: Flower gardeners will find this tool invaluable. Its ability to be extremely precise makes it ideal. It is a great bulb transplanter. It is great in rock gardens.