Finding that perfect gift for the gardener in your life can be a challenge, but there are certain items that every gardener needs. Regardless of whether growers keep fruit, vegetables, flowers or houseplants, the green thumb gifts in this guide are sure to be a hit!
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15 useful gardening gifts that gardeners actually want
Not every gardener has the space for a new raised bed planter and many gardeners may want to choose their own gardening galoshes. But the homestead gardening gifts below will suit the tastes of most gardeners and many of these gifts are eco-friendly too. If you want to find a gift that gardeners will love and use during the growing season ahead, the items listed below are hard to beat.
1. Seed catalog gift card.
During the holiday season, it can be hard to find gifts to suit every person on your gifting list. But if you have a gardener in your life, one of the most satisfying gifts you can give them is a gift card to their favorite seed company. With seed planting time just around the corner, seeds are always a hit and gift cards will allow gardeners to choose exactly what seeds they’re most interested in planting!
Tip: If you’re new to ordering seeds and need a place to start, I always order bulbs, vegetable and flower seeds from Fedco Seeds and Fruition Seeds and herb seeds from Strictly Medicinal Seeds.
2. Curated seed kits.
If gift cards aren’t your style, but you still love the idea of gifting seeds, you may want to purchase a premade kit of curated seeds or make your own. Curated seed kits typically include an assortment of “themed plant seeds,” like culinary herb seeds, pollinator plants seeds, natural dye plant seeds or even moon garden seeds (like evening primrose, moon flowers and dusty miller). Once you’ve compiled your seed packages, tie them up with some colorful cotton twine or pop them into a reusable gift tin!
3. Gardening books.
Part of the fun of gardening is learning new gardening tips and techniques to help flowers and vegetables grow better. And one of the best ways to learn more about gardening (aside from gardening blogs like this one!) is to pick up a gardening book or two. I have a full guide on my favorite gardening books to inspire you, but if you’re looking for gifts for gardeners who have everything and don’t know what books to choose, you can always give a subscription to Audible or Kindle!
4. Garden planner.
One of the best ways to improve a garden is to keep track of what grows, what doesn’t grow, what pests occur and other gardening successes and failures that occur throughout the year. This can be done by jotting down gardening notes on a computer, but cute recycled notebooks and gardening logs can also help gardeners keep track of their gardening “experiments.” Plus, these little log books make great gift ideas for gardeners!
5. Hand tools.
Every gardener needs a good trowel, cultivator and pair of pruners, but my favorite gardening tool is the hori hori or Japanese gardening knife. This handy tool can be used to dig, cut and weed and it’s small enough to fit in a gardening belt too. No matter what types of plants gardeners grow, hand tools are always useful and they’re much easier to ship in the mail than larger gardening tools!
6. Gardening gloves.
A good pair of gardening gloves protect a gardeners’ hands from scrapes and cuts and they’re essentials for gardeners who grow thorny roses. Gardening gloves come in all sorts of fun colors and patterns, although I prefer eco-friendly bamboo gardening gloves. Standard gardening gloves work for most gardening tasks, but leather gardening gloves are the best choices for protecting tender hands from sharp thorns!
7. Seed starting supplies.
Around the holidays one of the absolute best gifts for gardeners is a gift basket full of seed starting supplies. Many vegetable, herb and flower seeds are started indoors in January through March, so you know those seed starting supplies will get put to good use soon! Some seed starting items you may want to include in your gift basket include seed starting mix, a heating mat, seed starting trays and a small fan to prevent damping off.
8. Bird feeders.
Bird feeders are always fun to watch in the garden, but they also make fantastic gifts. Different bird feeders attract different birds, so you may want to select a feeder that will draw in a particular bird type that you know your gardening friend loves. For instance, hopper feeders attract cardinals, tube feeders attract finches and, of course, hummingbird feeders attract hummingbirds!
9. Bee hotels.
Did you know that honeybees are native to Europe and most of the bees that are native to North America are actually solitary species that don’t live in hives? Bee hotels are specially suited for solitary native bees and installing them in gardens can help out pollinators and make gardens more biodiverse. For more unique gardening gift ideas, consider butterfly houses, bird baths and butterfly puddling pools.
10. Bluetooth speaker.
Some gardeners may prefer to garden to the sweet melody of songbirds or the twinkling tones of windchimes. However, if the gardener in your life loves music, they may also enjoy taking a small, portable Bluetooth speaker into their garden and jamming to their favorite tunes as they pull weeds. Some Bluetooth speakers even have handy clips that can attach right onto a gardening belt!
11. Cute garden goodies.
Cute “gardening goodies” are some of the most popular gifts for plant lovers and they make fantastic stocking stuffers. Recently, I spotted a mug shaped like a terracotta pot at the store and it made me positively squeal with the sort of delight only a gardener would understand. Candles scented with a favorite flower or herb, botanical print tote bags and the quintessential straw gardening hat also have plenty of charm!
12. Grow lights.
Grow lights may not be the most unique gardener gifts, but they are certainly practical! Grow lights can help boost the growth of houseplants in low light homes, but they’re also essentials around seed starting time. I prefer LED grow bulbs and LED grow lights since LEDs use less electricity than incandescent bulbs and they typically last longer too.
13. DIY plant label supplies.
Plant labels are always handy and they can help gardeners keep track of what seeds they planted where. DIY plant labels can be made out of all sorts of items, including old silverware handles, pyrographed wooden stakes or air dry clay. But for that timeless, Victorian garden feel, copper plant labels stamped with metal letter stamps are hard to beat.
14. Food dehydrators and other food preservation supplies.
If you’re looking for something for a gardener who grows and preserves vegetables, you have tons of potential gifts to choose from. Canning equipment and pressure canners are always useful and a FoodSaver can help prevent freezer burn on frozen produce. You may also want to explore food dehydrators and fermentation kits… and, of course, no food gardener can ever have too many canning jars!
15. Natural hand balms and other natural beauty items.
Garden soil can be very drying, so gardeners often utilize hand balms and hand creams to keep their skin soft and supple. Nail brushes can make another nice gift and they are the perfect solution for getting all that hard to reach soil cleaned up after a long day’s work in the garden. A basket with natural beauty items especially curated for gardeners would make a very thoughtful gift… especially if you throw in some loose leaf herbal teas and tea balls too!
