Sun and rain are free so optimise the use of these natural resources

Garden on a Low Budget

• Collect seeds and start to raise your own plants. Use resources like books, the web or seed company advice flyers to find sowing and storage information. I have several interesting roses grown from collected hips.
• Buy small plants so the can establish well and mature. Larger perennials can often be divided before being planted out.
• Mulch you garden and key plants with 2-3″ of well rotted organic material. It will condition the soil, keep weeds down and improve water retention. Mulch on top of damp soil not dry soil.
• Scare birds off your brassicas with a potato stuck with birds feathers and suspended from a near by tree or make your own scarecrow.
• Reuse plant labels after rubbing them down with an abrasive or cleaning agent.
• Grow new plants  such as fuschia, chrysanthemumns, marguerites and pelargoniums. Many others plants will grow from cuttings.
• Buy secondhand tools and invest in a sharpening stone to hone them down.
• Make your own compost mixing green and brown waste.
• Scrounge form other gardeners, they often have more plants or seeds than they need and most are good hearted souls.

Make do and Mend

• Reuse and repurpose items into the garden. You can find interesting containers this way. Just make sure there is a drainage hole.
• Repair broken items that can be used in the garden.
• Use hazel twigs as canes to support your growing plants.
• Make your own crazy paving from ‘found stones’. I have rockeries and small walls from stone I have collected along the way.
• Stables often offer free horse muck if you collect it, ditto seaweed.
• Do not bother with chemicals in the garden. Sure you may loose some plants but an organic garden tends to get into a form of balance with nature.