How To Grow Your Own Veggies On A Budget
Growing your own vegetables doesn’t have to be expensive if you know which choices to make...
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Starting A Vegetable Garden
When you first start vegetable gardening, you may feel like you’ll have quite some money to spend: you need things like tools, containers, tunnels, seeds or seedlings, climbing racks,... The list goes on and on.
If you buy all these things in specialized stores, you’ll spend several hundreds of Dollars, just to get started.
Trust me: been there, done that, got way too many T-shirts...
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Creativity Is A Money-Saver
But (vegetable) gardening is like everything else in life: you can make it as expensive or as cheap as you want.
With a little imagination and some creativity, you can build your own productive vegetable garden, without having to spend an arm and a leg.
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Save Money, Go Organic
If you choose to go for an organic vegetable garden, you can save even more, since you don’t have to spend money on expensive pesticides and fertilizers. You can just make them yourself, using the weeds you find in your garden, or everyday kitchen stuff.
I’ll show you how to do all this and give you some of my recipes in one of my following posts.
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Gardening On A Budget Tips
I’ve collected some budget-friendly tips you can use to set up your own vegetable garden.
Source: Windowfarms
Did you know you don’t even need to have an actual garden to grow your own veggies?
Almost everything can be grown in containers. You can have your own homegrown veggies if you only have a balcony or even just a south-faced window.
For people who don’t have a lot of space, vertical gardening or even window-farming is the way to go. I’ll tell you more about that in one of my future articles.
So, back to the tips on gardening on a budget.
Because I have so many, I’ll be sharing them in a series of posts. Make sure you don’t miss out on any and follow me now (@simplymike)
You can subscribe to my RSS feed or newsletter at the bottom of this post.
DIY & Recycling: Everyone Can Do It. You Too!
If you feel like running away screaming when you hear the words DIY, please don’t. It’s all very easy. Just a little over a year ago, I had never held a hammer before. Until one day I decided I wanted to build an insect hotel. I found someone to explain the basics to me, and now I’m building my own raised beds, trellises and everything else.. If you can’t find anyone to help you get started, simply go find some basic tutorials on YouTube. They can be a big help
And remember not to be too hard to yourself: your veggies won’t care if their trellis is not perfect. As long as what you create can fulfill its purpose, it is more than good enough.
By applying the DIY-principle, you can basically start your garden without having to spend a single cent. All you need is a little time and effort.
If you don’t have a creative mind, just hop over to a site like Pinterest and do a search for ‘DIY gardening’. You’ll find loads of ideas that are simple and cheap.
There are a whole lot of objects you can recycle and put to use in your garden. You can make a trellis out of bike wheels and cord. Or use old ladders and wine racks. You can use empty egg boxes as sowing trays...
The only limit is your imagination.
Here are some more ideas:
Make your own gardening beds.
Buying a gardening bed can be really expensive. But why would you pay for them if you can easily make them yourself out of old wood pallets?
You can find loads of step-by-step guides on Youtube and Pinterest.
Make your own plant labels
Get creative with sticks, corks and other stuff to create your own plant labels.
Make Mini Greenhouses
When planting out your seedlings, you can protect them against heavy weather and slugs. Simple take an empty water bottle, cut it in half and place the upper part over the seedling. It’s like a mini- greenhouse that also keeps out slugs.
Everything can become a planter
You don’t need to buy expensive pots and containers. If you just take a look around, you will notice that there are a lot of items in your day-to-day life that can be transformed into decorative planters.
Think in terms of an old closet, empty tin cans, old tires, suitcases, or even shoes or boots.
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If you pay attention, you’ll soon notice your world is filled with things you can use as a planter.
(Do remember to make a few holes in the bottom of whatever you are using as a planter, so the water has a way out)
Recycled Windows
Old windows are perfect to be re-used in the garden. You can use them to create a cold frame, or - if you know your way around tools - build your own greenhouse with them.
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DIY and recycling can save you a lot of money when you’re starting a (vegetable) garden.
For more ideas, examples and even blueprints or tutorials, Pinterest is the place to be.
I’ll be back soon with more tips on how to garden on a budget.
Happy gardening!
This post is a translation of my original post in Dutch that was published on my own website
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Hello @simplymike,
Just wanted to say hi and let you know that your wonderful post have been picked up for the weekly Sustainability Curation Digest in association with Minnow Support Project.
Your post will be Upvoted and REsteemed by @msp-curation bot on behalf of MSP.
Thanks for writing awesome content and if you have some time, make sure to check out some of the other posts from this week.
Sustainability Curation Digest #5🍓 🌍🌱 by Carpedimus - MSP - Happy Earth Day!
Keep up with the great work :) and thanks for sharing!
Thanks a lot. A Minute ago I bumped into the curation post. I feel really honoured to be in a list with such great articles :0)
You are most welcome and you are absolutely deserve it :)
Now you’ve got me blushing ☺️
I think one of the coolest DIY gardens I ever saw was an old pair of blue jeans with dirt filled in the waist area, and in the front pockets attached to a small piece of 3 rail fencing, the legs were filled, and draped down to a pair of old cowboy boots. The waist area had some flowers, the pockets strawberry plants, and the knees more strawberries. The boots had marigolds to keep bugs away. it looked pretty cool. I didn't have a camera at the time, I can't imagine it would last more than a season or two, but yeah, just old stuff from a closet. If it can hold a little bit of dirt it is a planter.
Lmao - I have seen pictures of jeans being recycled to be used as planters. So funny!
I had forgotten all anout it, though.
I think I know what to do tomorrow, lol. Got some old pairs of jeans in the closet...
Thanks for the reminder ! :0)
Lmao - I have seen pictures of jeans being recycled to be used as planters. So funny!
I had forgotten all anout it, though.
I think I know what to do tomorrow, lol. Got some old pairs of jeans in the closet...
Thanks for the reminder ! :0)
Lmao - I have seen pictures of jeans being recycled to be used as planters. So funny!
I had forgotten all anout it, though.
I think I know what to do tomorrow, lol. Got some old pairs of jeans in the closet...
Thanks for the reminder ! :0)
Lots of awesome ideas! Aquaponics is another good one - and one I plan to do as soon as I'm in a place where we're allowed fish. I played with it once with good effects.
I'm very interested in hearing more about the window gardening though.
I’m just learning about hydrophonics. The startup gear is pretty expensive.
The ‘original’ windowfarm setup is hydrophonics-based:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windowfarm
and
http://www.windowfarms.org/
I prefer aquaponics - where you add the fish, a natural fertilizer... and the planting medium filters the water for the fish.
As with many things, it's only as expensive as you want it to be. My first experiment with aquaponics involved a tote for the fish tank, some wood (yeah, wrong material, but it's something I know how to handle) to make a frame for my plant trays, a small pump to get the fish water to my top tray then, the tray and plant stuff... Very simple, very cheap. Sat in my window and really, really worked! (Except for the cats who wanted to sit on it!!!) Even though my plants succumbed to the cats (the fault of my design, not the system), the fish tank was cleaner than any I've ever kept before with far less work! It really was a total success.
I hope to set something up again soon - and will document it for Steemit when I get there.
Great article with many great Ideas, we will have a little bigger balcony in our next appartment facing south on the 5th floors.
We were already doing aromatic herbs, but trying to have some vegetables is in our plans.
Thanks for the tips
Even on the smallest balcony you can grow all different kinds of lettuce. There are also very small variaties of different veggies like tomatoes (check ‘Red Robin’ - it won’t grow higher than 30cm), sweet peppers (‘kobold’ variety max heigth 40cm), ‘bush champion cucumbers’ stay small too.
I found an article with many more examples of mini-veggies that are perfect for a balcony:
http://www.topinspired.com/miniature-vegetables-to-grow-in-pots/
Peppers and cucumbers would be interesting indeed.
We also like cherry tomatos in their own big pot, event if it grows high it's ok.
Letture put vertically is also interesting.
Thanks for the advices!
Thanks for sharing such valuable tips. That recycle window project looks so nice! I wanted to do window farming this past winter but somehow I got distracted and I never did. DIY and recycle can save you money not only when in comes to gardening. It applies to everything.
There are literally no limits when it comes to DIY and recycling. If you have a creative mind (or a Pinterest account), the list of possibilities is endless..
Yes, Pinterest is great resource. I found inspiration for a lot of DIY in there .
I really like to read DIY articles, I always get some good ideas fro life.
I read some articles about vertical gardens, they are great if you live in a city and have a small space. Ty for sharing your ideas.
Vertical gardening gives you so many more options, because you win such a lot of space. I’ve build a climbing rack on every single one of my raised beds last year ;0)
This is very informative @simplymike. A very important thing to note about vegetables, which you allude to, is that you don't actually need a garden, in the true sense of the word 'garden'. Very true.
Your backyard, containers etc..can sufficiently serve as your garden.
But there is one you have not touched on,, and which i have heard being mentioned in some quarters, that is the Sack garden. Might you be well conversant with that.
Would be great if you can feature it sometime in your future posts
I need to look up what a sack garden is, although I think I know what you mean.
And indeed, you don’t need a garden, nor a backyard. There are so many miniature varieties of veggies you can even grow indoors...
We're on our 5th year of doing our own organic veggie/herb garden. It's so exciting to harvest your own veggies. Your ideas for greenhouses/hot houses were so helpful - going to definitely look out for some old windows! Such a cute idea :)
one day, I want a giant greenhouse built with old windows. It’s such a charming sight :0)
It sure is! We desperately want to buy some acreage so we can do aquaponics, permaculture, etc. Right now, we get notes from the 'lawn police' for having 'clover' in our yard. I think we've outgrown suburban life.
You should send them here. We’ve got lots of clover to count :0D
LOL! I was standing in my front window when they came around with their camera (first week of April) to snap a photo of the crime scene of a patch of clover. A letter followed two days later (with the infamous photo) to call a company out to 'spray' it with a time limit of 14 days. :) It's still there 14 days later! It's good for the soil and a healthy lawn and my cockatiels love it like it's candy.
Seriously...we've had 5 animals get cancer - one of them had a blood cancer directly connected to the agent orange in those sprays - it mutates genes. I should make a sign, "Clover stays!"
Organic is the way to go for sure!
This is insane...
Plastic bottles have lots of uses. We use them for vertical garden too most for mint and onions. There are lots of information on line about DIY and recycling that we can get help from. Thanks for this compilation post .
I also use them to build a ‘fortress’ against slugs (make the sides slippery with some cream, so they can’t get over the ‘walls’), or to water the plants when I’m out for a couple of days. Just turn them upside down and make a couple of holes in the top so the water slowly drips out.
There are indeed loads of uses for plastic bottles.
I never thought of growing onions in them, though. I should look that one up...
Thank you for this awesome informative post! Love to read about gardening, I also had my own in the last years. Fortunately, I have enough space for gardening, which is a wonderful! Love to take care of my plants and eat organic! These days, even the "eco" and "organic" foods we find in the supermarkets/markets are questionable....anyways! thanks for sharing and putting so much effort writting this up!
You are right. Bio or organic that is sold in the supermarkets is definitely questionable.
No purchased vegetable (labeled as ‘organic’ or not) tastes as good as my homegrown veggies, which are brought up with only natural extras and a lot of love :0)