The greatest know-how and devices on your backyard

By Jonathan Margolis | Published – 4 Jun 2026

A scorching composter wasn’t essentially the most romantic current my companion may have given me for Christmas. It has no electronics, no app, nothing very thrilling by my requirements, just a few somewhat wonky plastic panels that clicked along with some problem and lots of swearing on my half.

Eighteen months on, although, I’m completely thrilled with the Indian-made Aerobin (1, RRP £199.99). The directions weren’t nice, however if you electronic mail the corporate for recommendation, a chap referred to as Vincent – Aerobin’s chief working officer, no much less – comes again neatly with good, clear info.

So from Christmas onwards, I began piling in vegetable waste, mouldy fruit, fallen leaves, espresso grounds, weeds, bits of paper and cardboard, being cautious to make sure no protein primarily based gunge discovered its approach into the combo.

I feared the native rodent inhabitants would begin to get as our meals scraps rotted away simply by the kitchen door, however the Aerobin’s design appears to exclude them. It additionally nullifies any hint of unhealthy odor, which was spectacular.

What I didn’t see, although, was any worm motion – or, certainly, really feel any warmth. There have been clouds of busy fruit flies inside, so it appeared one thing was proper. I often syphoned off the ‘leachate’ – or compost tea because it’s referred to as – which is a form of selfmade Baby Bio.

This spring, I extracted my first compost and it was very good – fluffy, clear and odourless. I’m unsure what I did proper, however I adore it. The smallest, 200-litre model, at £200, was large enough for us as we don’t have a garden or grass cuttings, however others will want greater sizes.

My latest favorite backyard gadget is a high-pressure washer from Germany’s Kärcher. The new K5 WCM FLEX eco!Booster HOME (2, RRP £379.99) is seemingly 50% extra highly effective than earlier fashions – simply don’t do as I did and attempt to check how highly effective the jet is with a hand.

It’s extraordinarily painful. A implausible machine with many, many makes use of, it’s particularly good at rooting out weeds and moss from between paving stones. Kärcher fashions begin at £219.

The backyard gadget I’d most like to have for this summer time, to look at the World Cup, Wimbledon and the Test collection in opposition to New Zealand and Pakistan, is a backyard TV. These are available in full-sun and partial solar variations from an organization referred to as Sylvox (3) and, though they’re dear, you will get a 32- or 43-inch mannequin full with all of the mounting equipment for lower than £1,500. Good high quality out of doors TVs are usually thrice brighter than indoor units – they’re nonetheless fairly new however have a rising variety of enthusiastic homeowners.

Soil testing devices are one other advantage of know-how that wasn’t obtainable to Percy Thrower’s technology. Professional fashions reminiscent of Atom Scientific’s pH tester price £140 or so, however Chinese makers produce completely good alternate options. The Rootabest (4, RRP £16.32) measures plant moisture, pH, fertility, soil temperature, humidity and daylight. Hard to go flawed, actually.