Save on Gardening

Having your own garden saves you money more than you know it if you're doing it right. This is my own guide line to check if I am saving money on my gardening or spending more.

Usually we just buy potting soil and pots for our garden, but this is not saving this is spending. To make a saving on pots and potting soil improvising is a must. For potting soil, instead of buying just pick a place where you could dig out good soil or the best thing is make your own potting soil by preparing a compost before planting season.

For improvise pots, recycled materials are the best choice, empty plastic milk or orange juice bottles works greate. Cut the top part and presto you have a recycled pot, it does not look nice but it does what it suppose to do. Just don't forget to poke some hole at the bottom to allow excess water to drain out.



For your compost, prepare before the planting season. It so simple to make one, just have a ventilated container or a open location on your yard to pile up dead dried leaves or grass clippings where you could start the compost. Shredded paper will also work. Add you kitchen waste excluding animal meat byproducts. The formula for a good compost is 1 part green and 3 part brown, the green part are fresh material like green leaves, spoilage from fruits, potato skin etc.., the brown parts are the dried leaves, dried grass. Basically the green parts is rich in nitrogen and the brown part is rich in carbon. The mixture should be kept moist but not wet. Adding soil will kick start the compost and frequently turning the compost pile will speed up the process. If you are afraid that the compost will stink don't be, just follow the above and it will be fine. The reason compost stink is if there are meat by products, there is more green than brown material, if it is wet and not ventilated. The compost would be ready in about 2 to 4 months depending how often you turn the pile. Just mix the compost with the regular soil you have and it's a perfect potting soil.

Now you have free pots and free potting soil, next are seeds or starter plants. You can spend some dollars on the seeds and starter plant just get the best quality so you could have better yields. Plant your seeds base on the instructions and you'll have enough fruits or vegetables of your choice without spending much and in the end of the season you'll have more harvest than the money you have invested on your garden.

If your thinking about fertilizer, the best fertilizer free and readily available in urine. Yes urine, collect your fresh urine and dilute it with a gallon of water and there it is free liquid organic fertilizer. It sound gross but it is not, it contains what the plants need but just water the roots and not the leaves and don't apply it any more if your about to harvest in a week or two.


Happy gardening!!!