Work Gloves

Anyone have favorite work gloves?

Lady hands, long fingers, 5'8", looking for protection from poison ivy and black widows, some light tree work, brush clearing, weed pulling.

cowhide or deerskin fully lined gloves. Look at a large feed supply store or the like. Try pairs on until you find some that fit. I have very long fingers and will never get the finger length and width to match. Guy's gloves usually have longer fingers overall. The pairs I'm using now I got at an online place. They had the guys size I was buying (fingers long enough but glove too big) come in with one batch they labeled 'skinny fingers'. I bought five pairs!  I'll be sad when they all die.

You will appreciate the fully lined gloves. They help prevent stickers and such from going through as fast, and rough stuff will help with rubbing your hands raw. Get a gallon non zipper/slide seal freezer baggie to store your gloves in. That way spiders or other things can't crawl in while you're not wearing them.

I live with black widow (southern, though I caught a full grown northern a few years ago), brown widow, and brown recluse. Especially black widows. Usually they get up my sleeve and get me around where my brasserie is, or go up my shorts and get me roughly at the bend of the leg/groin. There is an antivenom kit I buy off www.brown-recluse.com that does the job in devenoming the wound and stopping the damage. It uses activated charcoal and a herb preparation (liquid) to draw the venom out of the tissues instead of leaving it to necrotize (kill and rot) the tissues. It also will take the firey nail feeing out of a fire ant bite, or a hornet, wasp, or bee sting. Kit is good for about five years if you aren't dealing with a silver dollar or larger hole already eaten away by the venom. I get about half a dozen bites a year (almost all maybe half grown, only taken a few fully grown ones in the last decade) and maybe one recluse every five years.

The baggie to store my gloves is my little bit of sanity there's nothing in the gloves!

Yeah, I was in a large feed store and saw some, that's what made me think about it. Thanks, Deb, that's a great thought about the sealing bag.

I have all three of those nasty spiders as house spiders (I can just manage them) and I regularly run into black widows in the yard and garden. I have to use an inspection mirror (small mirror on telescoping wand, aka a mechanic's mirror) to check some things before I reach. Hitting web means withdraw and check. Those cases you hear about are the extremes and rarities. People can react deadly to a fire ant bite (they just annoy me) and even a mosquito bite. A widow bite is nothing to make light of, just know how to deal and how to avoid it in the first place.

I have been wearing out work gloves since my early teens and that is how I usually find a new pair. If I find a particular brand and style that fits really well I will go through and try all of that size and make, and buy more than one pair if they have them. Then hoard them. TSC (Tractor Supply Company), Big R, Gebo's, and many other feed and tack places, and even a few implement dealers, will have a good rack. Goat or deer skin are usually more supple and better for anything short of building fence or making hay/tossing hay bales. There I would buy split calf. Fully lined is hot in summer but the comfort to the hands plus the extra protection is worth it. I have been known to wear out one or two pairs during an early spring to late fall (about six months). Again another reason to stockpile if you find something that fits. Note, most pairs are stapled to a hang card that allows you to try the left one on. I have to painfully pull the staple and try the right on, and if it doesn't fit, put it back. I have learned how to do it without making a mess but do be aware. If you have some issues with your right hand you may run into this. Most people are right hand dominant and the right hand will be slightly larger. So what feels good or even loose on your left, will be too small to right size on your right.  I have switched dominance fully but the right hand is still the larger sized. So again be warned.

I have a major injury with permanent damage in the corner base of my right first finger and I have an extra challenge of making sure a line of stitching doesn't hit the scar. Hence try on every pair. Stitching seams can vary and one pair can be fine and the next, agony. Or the tips will have one that rubs you bad enough it about takes a fingernail off. Curl your hand and check what is stiff, what isn't, and what checks in as you run your fingertips around in the ends. I had two pairs of sloppy split calf/canvas that had one finger on different hands be messed up. I threw away the odd two (one from each pair) to get a good fitting useable pair. I don't suggest that with $20 gloves, $2 gloves is okay.

You might also get a few different pairs (different construction) depending on what you're planning on doing. The cheap cute cotton or jersey garden gloves? Only if I was shooting a video and didn't want my hands dirty...  And again, the baggie is just the peace of mind. You can trust nothing's in there when you grab them again. If they are wet or otherwise... dry them out by hanging where they shouldn't be colonize-able then put them away in the baggie.

Wow what a brave soul with the spider bites! Yep, activated charcoal helps tremendously!

My favorite gloves are Sears Craftsman men's mechanics gloves. Leather front, web backed with wrist velcro straps. Wash easily and I find them much more pliable than the usual leather garden gloves--plus I like the wrist closure and they are cheap compared to the usual garden glove fare.

Alexandra Clark wrote:Wow what a brave soul with the spider bites! Yep, activated charcoal helps tremendously!

My favorite gloves are Sears Craftsman men's mechanics gloves. Leather front, web backed with wrist velcro straps. Wash easily and I find them much more pliable than the usual leather garden gloves--plus I like the wrist closure and they are cheap compared to the usual garden glove fare.

Then not only do you sound like you have a winner but I want to look at those too. Thank you. (I can span 10 keys on piano without effort. I suffered four years of piano lessons as a result. Hope you didn't have that fate)