What is a secateur used for?

Pruning shears, also called hand pruners (in American English), or secateurs, are a type of scissors for use on plants. They are strong enough to prune hard branches of trees and shrubs, sometimes up to two centimetres thick. They are used in gardening, arboriculture, farming, flower arranging, and nature conservation, where fine-scale habitat management is required.

Loppers are a larger, two-handed, long-handled version for branches thicker than pruning shears can cut.

Cutting plants as part of gardening dates to antiquity in both Europe and East Asian topiary, with specialized scissors used for Chinese penjing and its offshoots – Japanese bonsai and Vietnamese Hòn Non-Bộ – for over a thousand years.

The world's first anvil pruners were developed and produced in 1923 by Walther Schröder in Kiel, Germany. The pruners were given the product name "Original LÖWE" and were distributed internationally as far back as 1925. Other companies are producing anvil pruners, include Bahco, Edma, Felco, Fiskars Gardena and Wolf Garten.