Food Gardening on a Budget

As a gardener, I can’t resist tips that promise to be budget beaters and I am probably not alone. With the cost of everything going up, the idea of gardening for free (almost) is enormously appealing. Food gardening on a budget is possible, with some help from friends and neighbours, freecycling and being creative when reusing what’s to hand.

Save With Seed

When it comes to savings, a packet of seed will last two seasons or more. That beats a six pack of seedlings hands down. Even if you have a small garden and only want six tomatoes, there is no reason why they can’t be started from seed.

Seed stored correctly can be viable for up to three years. Once a packet has been opened, it should be stored in a cool, dark place and kept closed (I use clothes pegs). A desk drawer is good, as long as you don’t forget about them. Rather keep the packets in an airtight container or shoebox, and mark it as a seed box. You’ll notice that all seed packets are date-stamped.

Vegetable Growing in South Africa by Charles W. Smith, is a very old garden manual, that sold for 10 shillings, which means it was probably printed in the 1950s. His advice is still sound. He writes, under General Rules: “It makes no difference how much fertiliser or water or care you give a crop grown from poor seed. The result will be poor if the seed is poor. You may have to pay a little more for good seed but if the seed is good, it is worth the little more.”

Freecycle – within your neighbourhood

One person’s waste can be another’s treasure. Make use of your community’s WhatsApp group or Facebook to appeal for bagged leaves (for mulch and compost), discarded plastic plant pots for potting up seeds or growing on veggies and other items like paving stones, bricks, old planks, and even tools that people might be clearing out. Once people know what you want, you might find yourself buried under bags of leaves.

READ MORE: Small Food Garden Ideas

3 ways to use plastic bottles

As seed germinator:
This is useful when seed is sown into individual pots. Cut the bottom off a 2-litre cool drink bottle, keeping the cap on. Place the bottle over the pot and it will trap in the moisture. No need to water as often.
As a seedling protector:
Once the seeds have germinated, take off the cap so that there is more airflow. This will still create a greenhouse effect as well as protect the seedling from birds and bugs. The bottles can also be placed over seedlings in the soil. Use this for propagating cuttings as well.
For watering larger vegetables:
The most cost-effective way of watering is to get water directly to the roots. Cut the base off a 2-litre cool drink bottle and remove the cap. Bury the cap-end of the bottle in the ground at root level. To water, just fill the bottle. Less water is lost to evaporation as well.

Make Your Own Fertiliser

The 2 easiest fertilisers to make are a compost tea, using worm castings from your wormery or compost from the heap, as well as a green tea made from herbs (comfrey, borage, yarrow) or other nitrogen-rich green clippings.

The basic method is to put a big handful of leaf mould or chopped up greenery in a porous potato or orange bag, tie it up and suspend it like a tea bag from a stick laid across a bucket. Half fill the bucket with water and let the bag steep. Give it a stir every day and when the water looks like tea (compost) or takes on a greenish hue (green herb clippings), the tea is ready. Dilute it 50:50 with water and drench the soil.

Cardboard as Weed Guard or Mulch

Don’t know what to do with cardboard boxes from a move? Use it to suppress weeds in beds or to cover pathways. It biodegrades over time and can be broken up and added to beds as a mulch.

Cardboard can also be used in lasagne gardening. This no-dig method uses cardboard as a base laid over grass, weeds or soil. Add a layer of chopped branches and other prunings for good drainage. Water well. Then cover with a thick layer of leaves or straw, a layer of compost and a layer of garden waste like lawn clippings. Keep on repeating the brown compost and green layers until you have a raised bed about 60cm high. Water well and leave it for a few months to degrade, so that it reduces to about 30cm high.

Make Your Own Seedling Trays

Perhaps the best-known biodegradable seed tray is an egg box. Fill each cavity with seedling mix and sow. Once the seedlings are a reasonable height, cut out each cavity and plant. Other items you can use are polystyrene cups (make a hole in the bottom), old icetrays (drill a hole in the bottom of each cavity), in half of a hollowed-out breakfast grapefruit, or plastic milk bottles with the base cut off and turned cap side down. In other words, almost anything goes, as long as there is a drainage hole. You can also use egg shells to grow your microgreens.

Watering Can from a plastic bottle

Use a two-litre milk or juice bottle with a handle or a larger 5-litre bottle. Puncture 10 to 15 holes in the cap. The more there are the finer the spray. Fill the bottle with water and use it to water the seedlings.

Save On Containers

Growing veggies in containers can be expensive but there are ways to beat it. Visit Crazy Plastics or any other plastics store for cheaper large containers. Use a soldering iron to make drainage holes in the bottom. Secondly, you don’t have to fill the whole container with potting soil, that is also expensive. Fill about a third to a half with small plastic pots, or broken polystyrene to take up the space and fill around it with potting soil.

Make Your Potting Soil Go Further

Mix together 2 buckets of good quality potting mix, 1 bucket of garden compost, half a bucket hydrated palm peat, 800g well-rotted manure, and a handful of superphosphates. Moisten the mix with 5ml EcoBuz StartGro (micronutrients) dissolved in 5 litres water.

Free Plant Markers

These are essential when you are growing veggies from seed, whether directly into the soil or into seed trays. It is so easy to forget what has been sown where. Here are three household items that work well as markers:
● Plastic knives, forks and spoons that come with takeaways. If you don’t like adding more plastic to the dustbin, this is a good option. With a permanent marker, write the name of the veggie on them and push them into the seed tray. Get fancy and spray paint them a bright colour. It looks really good.
● Save ice cream sticks, write on the name of the veggie and push it into the ground.
● Yoghurt containers, larger or small, can be cut into strips with a pointy end and pushed into the soil or tray. Make the strips broad enough to write on.

READ MORE: Must Haves For The Food Garden