Springtime in the garden
I have been a bit rubbish at writing daily blog posts over the past few weeks. I have been busy with work, boot sales, eBay and, most of all, the garden! Garden money saving has been most on my mind. How can we make it look fabulous without spending a fortune in the garden centre?
It is a busy time of year in the garden. I have been weeding, chopping stuff back, sowing seeds and moving things about.
We have a large garden at the back and a biggish one at the front as well. I love that we have so much green around us, but it’s hard work!
My ideas for garden money saving
I don’t have lots of cash to splurge so I save money everywhere that I can. I am not an expert and I am sure there is plenty I need to learn, but this is what I have learned about garden money saving:
Boot sales and supermarkets are excellent places to buy cheap plants (Aldi in particular).
The reduced section in the garden centre is worth a browse for perennials. They might look a little sad but can be revived!
Most things can be grown from seed extremely cheaply. Share packets and seedlings with friends and family to save even more.
You can grow great plants from cuttings for free! Mr S pinched a bit of a multi-coloured wallflower from a garden we visited. It grew spectacularly and this year he has taken cuttings from that.
You can also divide plants such as grasses to create new plants. I have a geranium that spreads and is good for filling a gap or two so have just divided that.
Places like Home Bargains and B&M are good for cheap compost. Even better, make your own. We use a bit of both.
Pots, planters and containers can be expensive but other gardening friends often have too many. Ask! Failing that, boot sales can be a treasure trove. But you can also be creative – old tyres make good planters, for example.
Boot sales are great for old gardening tools, as well as Freecycle if you have a group in your area.
Bird scarers can be made easily from aluminium containers on strings – they make a great clatter!
How about raised beds from old bottles? We saw this recently on an allotment and thought it was a great idea.
Several water butts around the garden will save you money if you are on a meter. You can also use ‘grey water’ from your shower or bath to water the garden.
Your garden saves you cash
As well as finding ways to save money in the garden it can save you £££S. Gifts from your garden cost very little: home made jams and chutneys are often appreciated presents, or a hamper of seasonal fruit and vegetables. How about growing your own pot plants as gifts?
Finally, of course growing your own fruit and veg can save you a lot and is also free exercise.
What are your garden money saving tips?
I’ve mentioned before that I don’t do gardening. Fortunately, my husband does and he grows a few different vegetables. We (I use this term loosely) have also grown plants from cuttings; I think this is the very cheapest way to fill a garden , if a little slower than buying expensive plants. I love summer fetes and there is usually a plant stall. I have some lovely shrubs that were bought in this way.
Ooh yes, a summer fete!
I’m growing my confidence in gardening as well as growing stuff. I try to grow things from seed and also have a composter but only a small veg patch and the rest in tubs but I get by.
I love the idea of the bottles being used to make a garden bed border. Genious!
My hubby and I are also on a tight budget when it comes to gardening. I buy my seeds on sale and share them with my grown kids and friends. I try to add something new to the garden each year and this year it was to be plum trees. I lamented at the cost of them and was praying about it when I noticed that the birds had answered my prayers by dropping some Italian Prune Plums into a side area of our yard and low and behold, 3 little seedlings had come up. I transplanted them to an area where they will get lots of sunlight and have room to spread out. In the Fall, I had layered some of my thornless blackberry branches under the dirt and have many new plants started. Last year I gave my mother about 8 starts that I had done this way for her garden. This year some of them will be given to my son Chris’s mother in law for her garden. We have a rain barrel that we hook up to our gutters once the threat of freezing has past and use that water for our garden plants.
I really want to start on my garden this year. It’s really small, and has my daughters trampoline in it, but I want to get some flowers in there. I have some seeds that I got last year from Lidl but I want to make some raised beds I think.
I have thinned out snowdrops and given some (‘in the green’) to our new next door neighbours and am harvesting salad leaves which I have grown in our compost in a fish box in the cold frame. We have protected brassica and lettuce seedlings, already planted out in the ground, with very old but large squash bottles which we brought with us from ‘down south’ when we moved here nearly 9 years ago. Unfortunately they are nowhere near as attractive as the bottle edging in your photo! We also brought our milk bottle tops on fishing line with us when we moved (efficient bird scarers!) and Gold (remember that spread?) containers as they have clear plastic lids and make excellent miniature trays for starting seeds off. We did invest in nursery grown fruit trees to ensure that we got varieties that would thrive in our very exposed garden and have not been (too!) disappointed. The apples have more than earned their cost over 8 years, for example we didn’t need to buy apples from August to Christmas last year. The plums have been less successful…..
Debbie’s plum story reminds me of the time when my several year old plum tree produced a plum (note I say A plum). I checked on it daily and watched it growing like a mother watches over her baby. Then one day my young son came in and said, “Mummy, you know that plum that used to be on the tree….” Enough said.!!