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Safety in Your Garden

How to keep from injuring yourself while gardening

MANCHESTER, MAINE, Maine — If you have ever done some outdoor gardening, you know it can be hard on the body. It’s also really easy to injure yourself. 

We met with Al Brown from MEMIC, a worker’s compensation insurance company, which works with nurseries on how to keep their staff safe. The most common mistake people make, he says, is in how they pick things up. 

It doesn’t even matter if it’s heavy, you can hurt your back easily by bending at the waist and reaching forward with your arms. Brown calls it, “The Butthead Maneuver."

Your head, which on average weighs 13 pounds, is down, and that adds pressure to the neck. Your arms are reaching forward and your lower back is now carrying all the weight, which can add up to a thousand pounds of force on your lower vertebrae. Instead Brown says, lift with your legs, not with you back.

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