Alan Savage had to abandon a talk on garden safety when he fell off a stepladder while pruning his hedge.
Mr Savage, 43, suffered a deep cut above his eye and a gash to his ankle. It meant he had to postpone his trip to a local school to advise the pupils on how to stay safe while doing chores in the garden.
He had been fretting over his talk, and did not make a basic safety check on his ladder.
Mr Savage, who runs a council's community garden in Cramlington, Northumberland, fell off the steps while trimming a 15ft beech hedge, and cut himself with a saw.
His wife Pauline, 39, said: "It was quite funny in a way.
"But I was worried at the time, and he has a hell of a black eye."
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