Recycling Tips for the Budget Gardener

British people tend to spend an average of £30,000 on their gardens over a lifetime and this figure includes anything from landscaping, building sheds or installing decking. However, having and maintaining a garden doesn’t have to eat into your budget, especially if you invest some imagination into ways of saving cash while creating a unique space to spend time in. Designing a garden on a budget can be done easily, from using cuttings to sourcing affordable furniture. Plus it doesn’t matter whether you’re an old garden hand or a novice gardener, you can still ignore the urge to spend a fortune and spruce up your garden at the same time.
Recycling for planters and containers

The garden world really is your oyster when it comes to recycling everyday items for planters and containers as pretty much anything can be re-purposed for this. If you have any old kitchen items such as sieves and pots, they can be reused for planting, as can painted tyres, canning jars, plastic bottles, worn out baskets and even old guttering makes a perfect growing area for strawberries. Disused shutters or material shoe racks are also ideal planters for trailing plants and can save money on gardening. Anything you can’t find lying around the house, or for when you need garden tools and furniture, look online and in local centres for shopping discounts or vouchers to help you get the most out of making your budget go further.

Taking care of your plants

If you haven’t already got a compost pile, it’s probably about time to start one. This way you’ll be able to use your kitchen waste and help your plants grow better at the same time by improving the soil. You can use anything from banana peel, coffee, eggshells and all uncooked waste to add essential nutrients to make organic garden soil. Similarly, you can reuse your gray water for saving money on your water bills, and use plastic bottles and containers for keeping your plants hydrated. Simply, punch holes around the base of the bottle, then bury it inside a hole next to a plant and fill up with water to create a slow release watering system.

Keeping the weeds at bay

It’s every gardeners nightmare to find ways of keeping weeds out the garden and strangling or taking control over other plants. If you have an old blanket or carpet, don’t throw them away, instead lay them out in areas where weeds are prevalent. Even better, recycle old pizza boxes or thick stacks of newspaper for the same reason by adding a mulch of leaves or grass clippings over them so they will naturally decompose into the soil and form a weed barrier. You can also make your own weed killer by spraying white distilled vinegar over them until they eventually die. Additionally, making your own weed killer, pest remedies and fertilizers will ensure that no nasty chemicals are lurking in your soil too.

Gardening is an activity that naturally lends itself to recycling, reusing and reducing, it’s just a question of learning what works for you and your garden so that you find inventive ways to re-purpose items that would otherwise be thrown away.
 

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