The day has arrived: my new Rogue Hoe 55HR arrived today, and it is even better than anticipated. First of all it is much lighter than expected, even with a 54″ wood handle. The head is made from recycled agricultural disc blades which sounds super strong, and apparently means super light.

My forest firefighting buddy recommended I get a Rogue Hoe. It is what he personally uses with his crews. He recommended I go with the 54″ handle to make things easier on my back. He also likes the wood handles over fiberglass as he finds them to be easier on his joints.

Naturally the Rogue Hoe arrived midday so I had to stare at it for the rest of my workday before taking it to the trail. Once work was over I was out the door and chopping away at the trail.

Trail building is basically gardening but you don’t care about growing anything after cultivating the land. This means everything in the trail is a weed and must come out. The RH is perfect for this as it is like a regular hoe but with a big nasty sharp bit that cuts into dirt like butter. It felt like I was giving the trail a shave rather than digging.

Once vegetation is cut the next step is raking the plant material out of the trail. This can be done with the RH, but if there is a lot of grass I find that coming back with the regular rake is much better. Then we can shape the trail by either raking the dirt flat, or use the RH head as it is a tamping tool.

Overall I give my Rogue Hoe 5/5 and highly recommend one for trail building or gardening.

Workout Details

This morning was a slow and mellow one. The smoke from the forest fires are still lingering for a while in the morning. I listened to some podcasts and worked on my pull ups. I managed 4 sets of 3.