A hoe that will not cut is usually the edge
I spent a Saturday morning in late June on the path beside the beans, after three days of rain. The hoe bounced. It folded chickweed and fat hen over and left them lying with the roots still in. I thought I had done the job. By Tuesday they were standing again, and I had packed the crust into a smear.
A hoe that will not cut is not a weak hoe. It is a blunt one. The edge is meant to slice weed stems just under the surface, at the neck, so they wilt on the soil and do not stand back up. On a small UK plot that is the job. You are not digging. A fork and a spade are not the same digging tool, and a hoe is not a third one. If I am lifting or cutting a bed edge I put the hoe down.
The bevel does the work. A Dutch hoe, the push sort, wants a keen face that skims a finger's width under the crust when I walk backwards. A draw hoe wants the same keenness on the pull. Weight does not replace that. I have leaned on a blunt blade until my wrists ached. The weeds still folded. After rain the fold is worse, because a stem you only kinked will root again by the next warm day.
When the hoe stops cutting I would not buy another until I have looked at the old one. Hold it up and look along the working edge. If the bevel is rounded and shiny, that is blunt, not dirty. If it skids on a dry crust and only dusts the surface, same problem. Soil packed on the face will make a sharp hoe act blunt. Brush that off first. Then a file, pushed along the existing bevel only, the way I would dress a spade. I would not try to stone it into a knife. A hoe hits grit. A razor edge chips. A keen, slightly stout bevel lasts.
One pass is enough if you keep it up. I have let a hoe go a whole summer and then tried to file it back in one sitting. You can. It takes longer than you think, and you will leave a wavy edge if you rush the corners. Stop when it catches a thumbnail and will slice a soft stem without a shove. Wipe the filings off. A thin film of oil stops flash rust. That is the same winter habit I wrote about in Winter tools need a wipe and a film of oil. I would also do it after a wet week in July.
Skip the hoe sold as never needing a file. Soft steel is still soft steel. Skip the multi-head set with a hoe, a cultivator, and a tiny rake on one handle. The heads loosen. You spend the session swapping fittings. Skip anything you are meant to use as a pick. A hoe is not for roots you should be forking, and it is not for chopping a woody stump. That is how you roll the edge and then blame the tool.
I would also skip hoeing wet clay. The blade smears. You polish a pan, and the next rain sits on it. Wait until the surface is just workable. Seedlings should slice. The crust should not shine. After rain is the week people grab the hoe. It is also the week you can do the most damage with a blunt one.
It shows through the year. After a wet spell in late spring and early summer, annual weeds come in a flush. Midsummer paths grow a line of grass and bindweed that a blunt hoe only combs. Autumn beds, once the cutting tools come off the hook for September cut-back is a tool choice, need a clean pass between what you are keeping and what you are clearing. A chewed hoe in any of those weeks is the same failure as Secateurs that stop cutting are usually blunt. People bin the tool. The edge was the job.
I hang mine. A shed hook that actually holds a fork will hold a hoe if the hook is meant for a shaft, not a cup. I would not leave it in a bucket with soil on the blade. The rust starts on the edge you need.
If I later add a buy link here, it will be a paid promo.