How to Enjoy Gardening on a Budget

Growing food and flowers in the garden can be a satisfying hobby, but it can also be expensive. In a humorous book, The $64 Tomato, author Bill Alexander calculated that all the seeds, plants and supplies he used to grow just one gourmet tomato cost him $64. While the garden can be a rewarding hobby that saves you money at the grocery store, it can easily become a costly one. With a little frugal creativity, however, you can enjoy your garden without blowing your budget.

Many of the most expensive parts of a garden are the hardscape elements that form the boundary and support for beds, borders, paths and patios. You can save a lot by forgoing cedar boards and using logs from a fallen tree, spare pavers or stones, or even a stack of metal window wells placed together to create a wall that’ll hold soil. You can also get creative with the way you build raised garden beds by repurposing materials from around the property. For instance, repurposed bricks can be used to create a path or border, while old windows and brick cinder blocks make for cold frames that can double as starting containers for seedlings.

When purchasing flowers, herbs and vegetables, choose smaller size healthy plants that will be less expensive to fill in your garden or container. These plants are typically more economical than larger plants, and they’ll catch up in size over time. You can also grow your own plants from seeds, saving you a substantial amount of money. While it takes a little more time to get a plant started from seed, the long-term savings are significant.

If you’re looking to save money on fertilizers, consider composting. It’s the best way to improve your soil and it requires only a small initial investment. You can use landscape debris and kitchen scraps to create a simple, yet effective, compost pile that breaks down in a few weeks. Just layer the compost elements, alternating dry, brown elements with moist, green ones.

By using a small plot of land to grow a wide variety of vegetables, fruits and herbs you can dramatically reduce the amount spent at the grocery store. You’ll also find that some foods are much cheaper to grow yourself, such as fresh herbs and leafy vegetables like kale, spinach and lettuce. Similarly, root vegetables like horseradish root, ginger and turmeric and perennial flowers like hydrangeas are relatively expensive to purchase but can be grown from cuttings and seeds.

The most cost-effective way to garden is to design your landscape with the unique conditions of your site in mind. If you have naturally dry and sunny conditions, choose drought-tolerant plants like sedum. If your site is boggy or clay, select wetlands plants that thrive in these conditions. And by incorporating barriers to deter critters and adopting organic and natural pest control methods, you’ll be able to save money on chemical fertilizers and herbicides.