I'm in master gardener training and have decided that one of the ways I want to volunteer is to give talks on gardening. I've had pretty good reactions (no one fell asleep or threw anything at me!) to my talks on gardening for cats, but I better have a few presentations in my repertoire. And what do I love more than anything? Saving money and being clever in the garden, of course!

The thing is, so much of what I do feels "normal" to me that I don't even think of it as "frugal" (TM), so I'm asking for your help.

So here's your chance to communicate your wisdom without actually having to talk in front of a group! :)

Thanks, Monica

I'd have to say my favorite frugal tip has been my association with my garden center client. Since the time I've formed this association, I've gotten everything for my garden through him. Yes, I still have the urge to go shopping at all the nurseries around here but I stave off the urge and tell myself to do something more constructive with my time.

I used to have a stack of receipts for gardening things at the end of every month. I spent a lot, like thousands and thousands every year. Now I don't spend a penny.

So how to make this tip work for others? I would say that if a person is an extreme gardener, to form some sort of alliance with a garden center. You can get lots of good castoffs or if there is a mutually beneficial work arrangement, you can trade tasks for plants/pots/etc.

Since working with my client, I've met other garden center owners. They are such nice people. I think many of them have some type of task they can't get done and they could use an extra set of hands. They would be willing to trade it for some plants or whatever. Once you've formed that association and fulfilled your end satisfactorily, you can be "on call."

Get a garden center to adopt you!

Cher

Ask your friends if you can have their clippings when they prune (so you can start your own bushes) or ask if you can prune their bushes for them. Older folks will often appreciate the help.

Ask your friends if you can rake their excess pine needles or leaves for your mulch and composting.

Ask your friends/acquaintances if you can take their straw bales after halloween so you can use for mulch and compost.

Ask your friends if you can take some seeds from their flowers. Trade away the ones you don't want to use.

Save your dish water, add a little epsom salts and ammonia to fertilize your plants.

Get an aquarium and use the water you take out when cleaning for fertilizing your plants.

Save old holey plastic buckets and boxes for worm bins.

Use old envelopes for drying seeds. NEVER use plastic bags because if there is any moisture in the seeds----they will mold. Been there, done that.

Put clay pots indoors during the winter. Some of mine are breaking up. If you do have a broken pot, you can still use it, just sow some flowers in it, lay it on its' side as if the flowers are spilling out.

Use some type of netting or chicken wire to keep cats out of planter boxes. My kitties think loose soil means their bathroom is ready. Not good.

Newspaper and cardboard are my new friends. Use for mulching, clearing paths, killing weeds.

There is much beauty in the plant world, if only we'll take the time to see it.

2. Work a few hours a week at a garden center. The pay may not be much but you get employee discount (check to see there is one) and you're there to see what's going on sale soon, what's about to be thrown out, what's in the 75% off bin, etc.

Harimad

"Don't kill any bugs except fireants.
Bad bugs are just food for good bugs."

the idea being to bring in ladybugs, trichogramma wasps, etc instead of poisoning your garden.

Don't judge a plant by its cover. I have a navel orange tree growing happily in my back yard that was rescued from the trash dump at a friend's house. I just rescued a nice gardenia from the side of the road.

Most plant that are being dug up and thrown out by ignorant non-gardeners just need a little loving care.

Don't be afraid to ask for something in a store. I got a whole herb garden by asking the lady who runs the floral department at our local grocery store if she would let me have the herb plants she was tossing out.

Learn how plants grow. For instance, pussy willows take root when they are in floral arrangements, and are easily transplanted and grown into nice shrubs. Gloxinias are bulbs. They go dormant, and when they do, people think they are dead and toss them. Ask for the toss outs when you see dying gloxes at groceries, etc. Same for forced bulbs. They'll take a couple of years in the garden to grow back into a normal bloom cycles, but hey, they're free!

Carry materials with you on nature trips to take cuttings, gather seeds, from native plants that would make good garden plants. I carry a shovel and plastic bags in my trunk at all times, and clippers and ziplocs in the glove box.

Find a company that remodels old houses. Most of the time, they strip the old landscaping and put brand new stuff. Get in good with them, and they'll call you and let you have what they're tearing out.

Haunt the roadside trash on the day everyone tosses their household stuff. Our city has a special day on the first pickup of each month. Amazing what neat stuff you can find.

I am sorry. I do not mean to be harsh but as gardeners we should be the first to protect nature in its true form. I think this is the last thing a master gardener should be suggesting to anyone.

Keep them clean, practice rust & rot prevention, store them neatly so they can be easily found the next time you want them, use them properly so they don't break doing something dumb with them.

And desperately try to teach the rest of your family the wisdom of doing so...

Because we have so many slobs in this world, we also have unused lanes where the slobs dump their refuse. I recently built a 32x16' fence to dogproof my garden. All of the 4x4 posts were salvaged from road where people dump their "projects." I cut the rotten ends off, brushed them with roofing asphalt, and blew my savings on steel ground-spikes. I cut old barbed wire this morning to run along the ground (discouraging doggy forays)--also free. And haven't bought a landscape timber in several years; the bottom one on a tier might be shot, but folks will throw out the whole thing...

I'm not a master gardener. I don't support the master gardener program, because I've seen too many of them with their 6-week course degrees do real damage giving out bad information. I think the term "Master Gardener" is deceptive, and should definitely not be applied to someone in Florida who comes from up north and takes a six week course. I've been gardening here for many years, and still don't know enough about gardening in Florida to call myself a "Master" of anything. I get really tired of their know-it-all attitudes, and how they throw their title around. I've actually corrected some of them that were giving talks in our area, and they have insisted that what they were saying was right. It makes me ill to think that people actually see that title and believe everything they say.

Sorry, but I had to vent.

You don't support people interested in gardening taking an eight-week course (4.5 hours a week) to learn the finer points of plant science? And then volunteering their time in their community to spread the joy of gardening?

Part of our volunteer time is staffing a gardening hotline. It was stressed to us that it was OK to say you would find out and get back to the person. We are encouraged NOT to provide any information we're not sure of.

Finally, if you move to another region, you have to recertify in that region, because as you alluded to, gardening in, say, Florida is very different from gardening in Michigan.

Monica

Shredded fall leaves make perfect spring mulch. I use a "Leaf Hog" on mine.
Strong, straight sticks make supports for tall plants.
Those pesky rocks make a great natural edging for beds.

Just found this on the main page of the Michigan Master Gardener website:

"The 'Master' in Master Gardener doesn't mean you know everything about gardening. It means that you volunteer your time helping others grow."

- Mary McLellan, state master gardener coordinator

I think the funniest frugal family story was my great aunt throwing a fit when her oven grate broke and she couldn't get a replacement because Sears/Roebuck was no longer around and nobody was making parts for a turn of the century iron oven/stove. Gotta give 'em credit, though, it worked for 90 years before falling apart.

I guess my current favorite tip is cheerfulness- whether asking questions at the store, admiring someone's yard, or asking the construction workers for the empty buckets. If you give them the option to say no and keep things pleasant, things are often easier all around. Can't say I always do this...

Never pay for delivery of anything and it's great for getting county mulch and that way you can back right up to the bed (usually) and spread it. I couldn't imagine how difficult it would be to bring home all the stuff I use without it. Not to mention big plants, dirt, landscaping rocks and of course all the stuff in the house: appliances, furniture, rugs...

Many nurseries sell invasive plants which should be banned because they are harming forest preserves (like honeysuckle). When in doubt, checking the internet can save a bunch of headaches. In general, I always check before I plant.

Ok, here's mine: Put spent coffee grounds on acid loving plants. Use dog poo to keep your dog from digging in a particular spot (not for veggie gardens tho). ALWAYS save seeds. I work as a garden guide at Monticello, and we use an 1800's "trellis" - its a branch trimmed from a treestuck in the ground. The peas grow up it. GREAT idea.
Save all veggie scraps and either bury them in your garden or compost them. Use sweet potatoes to generate lots of green viney stuff to cover a large bare area. Plant leeks if you can't afford alliums (read that one on GardenWeb!)but like the blooms. Save old black coffee to water your African Violets. They love it. Use grass clippings in between the rows of your veggie garden to keep down the weeds and enrich the soil. A layer of newspaper under the clipping will guarantee you won't have weeds! Save yogurt cups to grow seedlings. Use 2 liter bottles as mini greenhouses.

I always let friends and family know I like old bricks and stone. I'll come and pick them up from folks who are tearing out this or that.

I'll drystack a planter surround. Use them to edge around a new plant (no honey, don't mow this one down). Drystacked a cold frame, which I can take down and resize or shape for next year. Hide the uglies - right now I have a nice square in red brick stacked around the Tree of Heaven stump that persists despite my best efforts. They also squash weeds well.

My uses:

Brooded small numbers of chicks
Kept a weak baby goat in a secure place
Store feed and components (holds 100# of black oil sunflower seed if you shake it down)
Provide water to small numbers of animals
"sled" for moving materials over frozen ground
Haul water to trees too far from faucets--my garden tractor will easily handle 2 tubs in a small trailer
Keep minnows alive between fishing trips

And they are recyclable too!

Sorry that's more than one:)

Destany

Rip old newspaper into one inch long strips tearing from the top to the bottom of the page. Use only black & white sections since colored print can emit toxins into your soil.
Make glue using 1/4-cup water to one-cup all-purpose flour.
Dab each seed with the flour-water glue and stick them in the center of the strip. Be sure the seeds are spaced evenly apart--check the back of your seed packet for the recommended amount of space between each seed.
When the glue is dry, roll up the strips and place in separate sealable plastic bags. To keep the seeds dry add one tablespoon of salt. It's also a good idea to place the seed packet into the respective seed bag. That way, in the spring, you'll know exactly how to plant them.
Store in a cool place, such as a basement, until spring.
When it's time to plant your seed tapes, lay each strip seed side up in rows several inches deep. Cover with soil and water.
Come next spring, you'll have beautifully spaced plants at a fraction of the effort.

I borrowed this from another site. A great way to sew those seeds!v :)

Wing

Free garden beds:

I created my front and back gardenbeds for free with layers of my neighbors grass clippings, leaves, sticks, kitchen non-meat scraps, free coffee grounds from Starbucks, junk mail and newspaper. It helps the environment and my garden and it's free! I can't believe the amount of wonderful earth I have now, all wormy and moist where previously it had been dry and rooty from all my trees. I top the beds off every year with free chips from tree companies.

Another benefit, I no longer use chemicals because all the free stuff mulches, fertilizes and keeps the weeds away. Coffee grounds on the lawn are awesome. I reduced my lawn with beds so there is less mowing to do. I now have frogs! I heard if you stop using chemicals they will come...amphibians absorb chemicals through their skin easily, so if you use chemicals, chances are you won't have frogs. Frogs are a cheap way to keep the bugs population under control.

Free edging - broken concrete pieces

Free weedmat - layers of newspaper, the thicker the better

Someone at this forum mentioned using roof shingles for edging in front of the beds so that the mower can run across...what a great idea! I plan to try this, thanks!

~Alex

And maybe y'all can keep it going!

*potatoes- (whole or pieces)- grows a new crop of taters
*beets & turnips whole (old ones or top part)- grows greens
*celery (bottom root)- grows a whole new plant!
*pineapple- plant top (have yet to succeed with this one-
you have to keep it alive for about a year & 1/2)
*lemongrass- plant the old stem that might be hanging out in
your fridge & watch it grow
*also onions & garlic

i'm going to keep experimenting with "food recycling" & see what else works.. i think i've just discovered the dangerous secret that farmers & food suppliers don't want us to know about... LOL!

this week i'm trying romaine letuce, hopefully it will work the same as celery.
anyone else have ones they've tried w/ success?

Tracy

- Growing everything from seeds this year...so far, so good. And all of those plant labels came in handy.

- Compost grown in our own backyard.

- Wood chip mulch from the municipal landfill.

Cheap Bubbler
=============
When we first started gardening, we didn't know about the store-bought hose attachment to keep the water from gushing out in our beds. So we just cut down a 2-liter soda bottle, turned it upside down (spout side down)
and put it in the ground. This kept the water from gouging out our soil.

Amend soil with manure instead of store-bought compost
======================================================
We moved a year and a half ago and had to amend the soil. Compost by the bag can cost 3 times as much as a bag of 77-cent manure from Home Depot. So my little hatchback (we know have a truck) brought home 77 bags. Work the manure in the soil and water the heck out of it for a couple of weeks (to get out all the salts and in case not rotted enough).

Use sand to amend clay soil
===========================
Using sand is so much cheaper than commercial amendments.
It's time consuming as you've got to hand blend the sticky clay soil and sand.

Big wooden tongue depressers as seed id sticks
==============================================
I think I got 100 for not very much money at Michael's (a craft store). I use a blunt number 1 pencil. When the stick is unusable...it goes in the compost/yard waste.

Sour cream containers as scoops
================================
And you can put in recycling bin after use too.

CD-R/DVD-R plastic stack cases
==============================
See my post
http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/frugal/msg0414201916072.html

Free plastic pots
==================
Check local gardening centers...Armstrong's in California was very generous with me...I got the carload full of 5 gallon pots to move my cannas.

If you don't like a plant or it isn't doing well
================================================
Give the plant away or throw away the plant. I'm sure
there are so many other plants you'd like to enjoy instead.

Final tip
=========
TRY to put on some sunscreen, a hot or glove....I'm laughing
as I write because it's hit and miss on this tip with me.

Today another friend gave me several stacks of clear plastic containers that he'd had sitting around. They look like lids from a fast food joint. I can nest one inside the other and have a very nice tray for starting plants from seed. I use several popcorn pieces in the bottom of the water tray to keep the top portion out of the water.

I realise this is an old thread but I figured one could never have enough frugal tips. ;-)

Monica

Pop bottles are also very good mini greenhouses. Cut out bottom and push into ground around the plant.
Save the cap as if it gets cold put cap back on at night, don't forget to take the cap off in the day time.

We also have a few worm bins, the finished compost is absolutely amazing. We made worm compost tea, aerating it with an aquarium pump. It worked better than anything by Miracle Grow and several plants that hadn't bloomed in years flowered for us.

Plant swaps and exchanges.

Mail order fruit trees cost can run you from $20 to $35 apiece, or even more, then you need to consider what postage and handling adds to your bill.

Grafting permits you to make your own fruit and nut trees for about one tenth the cost of retail, quite a savings!

Grafting is pretty easy to learn. I whetted my taste for it on the internet, then actually bought a very good book about it by RJ Garner that is the best manual I have ever laid my eyes on. So in all, pretty much self taught (or at least 'self-read'), and now I am actually teaching others.

You can buy rootstocks for around $2 each, trade other people scion wood, or just buy it outright for a dollar or two per stick (usually you can graft half a dozen trees up from a 8 or 10 inch stick of scion wood). Thus you could whip up a half dozen fruit trees for around 12-15 bucks, plus or minus. That same half dozen trees, retail, would run you around $130 to $210, depending on what and where you bought from. If you buy rootstocks by the 25 or more count from places like Raintree or One Green World, the price goes down to 1.75 each, usually.

This is one tip that has saved me alot of cash over the years. I have grafted some 90 kinds of plums, 40 or more kinds of apples, plus decorative hawthorns, and assorted gooseberries, peaches, apricots, cherries, pomegranites, jujubes, mulberries, roses and persimmons. And I am probably forgetting a thing or two :)

I forgot to mention that it is also a very interesting and fun craft. You can use it anytime a tree has leaves on it, and in some cases, when there are no leaves. Well worth learning -- it adds a whole new dimension to gardening!

My contributions are the following:

1. If you live close to orchards, ask for the apple pomace to amend your soil. It does wonderful things to clay soils!!

2. Search for a municipal recycler in your area. Chances are, that there is finished compost available for a low cost or free.

3. The Garden Web site has a really nice explanation (with pictures) of starting seeds in coffee liners. Look under seed starting

4.Never pass up a household auction. Many of the things that no one wants make wonderful garden trellis, fences or ornaments. You can usually get them for a few dollars as a lot.

Keep up the good work, I will be checking back to get more hints.

When I moved into my house I had cockroaches and the ugliest plants ever in the yard. I pulled most of the plants out and sold them at a garage sale since they were these lame landscaping plants. I didn't want to tent the house for roaches so I got a duck and it ate all the cockroaches. Then I got another duck and a few chickens to keep the duck company. After a while, we started running low on cockroaches (as well as snails, slugs, grasshoppers, japanese beetles, lawn grubs, etc) so I wanted to feed the birds fresh fruits to supplement their diet so I brought the fresh eggs to the farmers market where I gifted them to people in the booths in exchange for their trash (mango rinds, apple cores, extra lettuce that was ugly from the ends of the heads of lettuce, and such). Because people thought they were getting such a good deal trsading trash for fresh eggs (and *I* tought *I* was getting a good deal too), I got not only as many boxes of fresh veggie and fruit refuse and I could freeze for the birds every week but also if I tried to buy herbs and veggie plants from the herb and veggie people, they insist that I take them for free. Meantime, I composted the bird droppings with earthworms. Once a month I sell off extra plants, eggs, baby ducks, worm compost, worms, and herbs and veggies I get in trade for eggs. I make between $40 and $1500/month off my 1000 square foot garden (depending on if I sell some realy rare stuff out of the garden or just a few buckets of worm compost and a dozen eggs).

It's pretty weird but it supports my trips to get exotic plants at botanical gardens in other cities. I get extras and sell those at my plant sales...you knew that though...

Here's my neighbor's tip: when you cut off the bottom root part of alliums (leeks, onions, green onions) just plant the bottom in the ground and water it. green leaves come out of it if the rooting "takes" (almost always) and you have a whole new plant. I got a leek plant this way, way faster than from seed. This technique also worked with romaine lettuce and cabbage and chinese greens. When you go cook, you can cut off bits of the green onion leaves instead of yanking the whole thing out of the ground. My neighbor did this for a year and eventually found a big red onion sitting in the ground where she planted a green onion bottom. If you use this technique successfully please send a silent thank you to Rhonda (my neighbor)

When it's time for transplanting, simply soak the bottomless pot in a bucket of water, place it in the hole, and slide the tube off of the top. You never disturb the roots.

Whoa. There is no such thing as a "paying hobby" to the IRS. Even if it is only $30/wk like you say, you still must report it by law.

I see by your profile that you live in Austrailia and things may be done differently there, but here in the US you would be getting yurself into some big trouble for not filing quarterly taxes on a business.

NJCher posted this in February of 2004, so it's an oldie... but a goodie that bears repeating.

One of the most frugal (& enjoyable, & therapeutic, & rewarding) things we can do in our gardens is occupy our time & our hands.

I often have the impulse to add something to the garden, & as we all know, giving that impulse some immediate gratification always involves spending time & spending money.

So I try to save my time & my gasoine & my cash by "adding" via re-habbing something I already have, or creating something "new" from what I already have on hand:

thinning plants becomes trading or propagating or making arrangements.

removing spent roses becomes starting potpourri.

when I trim the gangly rosemary, I take in a few sprigs to scent the kitchen or office & sometimes I put a few sprigs into a small vase to share with the people at the bank, the post office, the vet clinic, Starbucks, etc.

Some of these vases come from garage sales, maximum cost 25 cents, & some of them are glass bottles from here & there.

I paid something like $9 for a glass bit for my little drill, & I now can drill drainage holes in old coffee mugs to make small planters for mint, ice plant, etc.

These are nice for occasions when people typically give cut flowers:
people in the hospital, new mamas, & such.
& the recipient has something that they can keep.

(& if I ever run out of coffee mugs, I bet I can find more at garage sales or thrift stores!)

I plant apple and plum seeds in between my grape plantings. Then when they are 5 or so millimeters diameter or so (usually one seasons growth) I graft them to some superb apple or plum and try to find a home for them. Usually it is not too hard, particularly if you use well known names like Fuji, Golden Delicious, ad nauseum. Or you can plant on the roadsides for future generations to wonder at! Now is that cheap enuff?

If you are not participating in this brand of high-excitement, you are really missing out :^)

great hints here -- got to keep this thread toward the top!

One we use is our chicken composting system, LOL. All kitchen scraps go to our 8 hens, who rapidly turn them in to valuable manure and mix it in with the leaves in their coop.

It makes for great compost in only a month or so, and since we have to pay by the bag for our trash, saves at garbage time--my DH will put kitchen scraps in the chicken bucket, but I never could convince him to put them in the compost bucket.

We get great compost for the garden, get rid of kitchen scraps and lots of leaves, provide entertainment for the kids, plus, we get more than enough eggs for our family and plenty to give away to the neighbors and friends.

Leigh

my tips would be: broken concrete and free planting beds. i hunt down a pile of broken concrete any time i need a patio, or to edge a new raised bed, or to stack for garden benches, etc. a pickup really helps here! to be nice to the truck, i only haul a few pieces at a time, as concrete is heavy.

when i need a new planting bed, and that is more often than you might think, i pick a place in the yard and lay out a border of broken concrete, or bricks if i find some for free. then i lay down a light layer of newspaper, because a thick layer of newspaper is like pouring a concrete bottom. then i go hunting for neighbor's neatly bagged leaf and grass clippings, and pour those into my new planting bed over the papers. i try never to dig the soil under the bed, just build over the top of it. after a few rains, i can spread homemade compost over the leaf mixture and start to plant. usually, a free bed made this way is really at its best the second season out, and continues to get better over the years. i use those leaves and grass clippings for mulch and compost also. they turn our heavy clay soil into heaven on earth.

i especially loved the tip about planting seeds in eggshells. my mom used to do that when i was little. she would save the egg carton, poke holes in the carton, set half a washed eggshell in each little section, fill each with a fine soil and a seed or two, and water in. i believe that the little plant would break thru the bottom of the shell in time, and she'd plant the entire thing in the bed. that way eggshells became amendments to the soil over time.

Also, make friends with your local restaurant or deli, especially if they serve pickles with their sandwiches. You can usually get the 5 gallon pickle buckets for free! I use mine to hold my potting soil out on my balcony. I'm sure that there are other uses for them as well.

Also put requests in on Freecycle. And check Craiglist often for free plants or seeds.

Just something to think about...

I wanted a hill on my level yard. In the corner of my fenced in city yard, by an erosion preventing pine tree.
My neighbor had some excess clay dirt from his project.
I had a wheelbarrow and muscle (I needed that).

Not enough dirt by calculation to make much of a strawberry hill that the next year transformed into a small bog garden with the use of a discarded pond I picked up.

I had about 3 or 4 dozen gallon milk bottles with caps (you need them to keep the air in and the jug from collapsing).

I laid down some excess brick amongst the jugs and brought in first load of dirt. Then more jugs and more bricks and more dirt till I had a mound about 3' high. Then I added limestone, plants and trees and of course several strawberry plants all around the bog area. For realism, I added a few dead trees/stumps and got some cattails from the local slew.

If I ever decide to change it (or someone after me), they can reuse the bricks, stones, and recycle the jugs. Seems like I won't change it tho, I just keep added to it. This spring will be it's third year.

Oh, lest I forget, neighbor was discarding a toilet. I bleach washed it, left it out in the rain for a month and then sledge hammered it into workable pieces and buried it amongst some large plastic planters and put perenniels in the pots and covered it all with my compost. My hill didn't get higher, just larger. And my fall 75% off hens and chicks had a new home.

For about the same amount of money, you can also grow very expensive perennial plants as well. Some of my Winter Sown sell for more than $10.00 EACH at a nursery! Never again will I ever buy a plant for my garden! Even if it's 75% off... I can winter sow dozens of them for the same money!

Some of these ideas I already mentioned in Bulbs, Vegetables, and Wintersowing, but here they are all together in their true home;

1) Instead of beer for slug traps, you can just use a bit of yeast in water. Bury a cottage cheese container to the lip and then fill with this mixture.

2)Old sheets, towels, even natural fiber clothing make fine weed barriers. They do break down within a year or so. It's fun to find snaps and buttons when planting the bed in later years!

3) Raised beds can be made for free if you can find tree trunks that don't have branches. Maybe that is not so easy everywhere, but with all the tulip poplars around here, in vacant woodsy lots, I find a lot of straight, about 6" diameter logs that can be up to 15" long. I haven't done anything in the way of attaching them, but I'm sure one could. They serve the purpose of holding in the soil, just by sitting there. They have a rustic, natural look. Of course, after quite a few years they rot.

And of course, as the last poster urges, winter sow! Sturdiest transplants you could ever hope to buy or grow.

Hepatica

This year we'll try growing potatoes in old apple baskets. (Must have a hundred of these old things around!)

I guess the moral is to use what you have, scrounge what you don't! :)

Cheers!

For seedlings that I want to transfer directly to the garden without disturbing the roots: yoplait yogurt cups. I decided to try them because they have a sort of upside down cone shape.

I made a happy discovery: The cup has a false bottom--the bottom of the cup is raised up 1/4 inch. When I used a razor blade to cut off the ring of plastic that raises up the false bottom (see crude illustration below) the whole bottom popped out, and then the seedling and dirt will all slide right out the bottom into the planting hole.

...... [~~~~~]
..... [~~~~~~]
.... [~~~~~~~]
... [~~~~~~~~~]....... <--The soil only goes down to here
.. [==========]
. [((empty space))]..... <-- slice off the bottom ring here

I'm still new to outdoor gardening (been doing small container gardening, indoors mostly), but my whole garden has cost me less than $75 so far this year.

Here's what has worked for me:

- used dirt dug from our "compost" (I put it in quotes because it's not really compost - just the pile where clippings and misc yard waste go) instead of buying lots of potting mix

- Started everything from seed except for berry plants

- Made my own trellis for climbing beans from an unused shepherds hook. Just took twine straight down from the crooks, then tied off different sections for the beans to climb

- Instead of buying twine, I just grab a few handfuls of the free stuff by the door at Lowe's each time I go in (used for tying things to the roof of the car)

- i didn't have any tomato cages and didn't want to buy any, so i planted the tomato seedlings strategically near stakes so that I could tie them up with the free lowe's twine

- just picked up a huge bag of coffee grounds from the starbucks in my office building.

I use yogurt cups for the next transfer stage of seedlings. Don't forget to poke holes in the bottom. We eat lots of yogurts so always have plenty. Then I clean them and recycle them when I plant the small plants in the garden.
Clare

We've collected lots of used coffee grounds from local coffee shops to use as soil and compost amendments. Also every week get a garbage bag 1/2 or full of veggie trimmings from the produce section to add to the compost. It's plant food and it's all free.

In the bottom half of very large outdoor plant pots (bot cheaply at yard sales) I put fine wood shavings we get free. Reduces soil needed, absorbs moisture, and starts to decompose so can be used as mulch later. All the mulch we use is those wood shavings with compost, UCG, and alfalfa tea added. Have to go and shovel the shavings but they're free. Alfalfa pellets are a fairly inexpensive fertilizer.

Plants from seed are the best value IMO. Plants from charity sales and yard sales can be good also as are plant swaps with friends.

My DH has bot a lot of garden tools (and mechanic and woodworking tools) at yard sales. I buy plant pots and garden decor there.

I've used lots of twigs to hold short garden peas up off the ground.

We yard sale so a lot of things we use come from there. One really good find was a square rigid plastic pond liner. I wanted to make a pond but decided not to so use the pond liner in the back of our van to haul dirty things we wouldn't put in the van otherwise. It fits perfectly, holds quite a lot, and is easy to clean by taking out and hosing off.

One obvious way to recycle in the yard is to salvage all grass materials possible. Grass clippings add a lot of nitrogen to the ground. Good grass that is dug out so beds can be put in should be used as plugs or as sod in other parts of your yard that are lacking.

Popsicle sticks are okay plant marker. Old plastic knives are even better markers(don't buy new knives just to use for this since that would defeat the purpose).

Old hoses can be used to tie up trees that are in danger of wind damage.

Dried bamboo can be used as stakes.

When cleaning fish tanks use the waste water on your plants. Also when replacing fish tank gravel it makes a great ammendment to the soil providing faster drainage.

Craigslist and freecycle are great.

Also make friends with local individuals to swap with. Swapping through the mail is not always the best way to get plants(it is great for collectors of rare plants or for people who complete large trades). I paid a total of $35 shipping 3 banana trees, some seeds, and some cannas.

I also use some biodegradable items as filler in my raised beds. I pile leaf litter in the bottom of my raised beds. Also sometimes I buy bags of large rocks or gather large rocks instead of using soil in the bottom of my raised beds. I find that bags of rocks fill more space and are less expensive than garden soil.

All natural decoration... Use sticks and vines to create broom facimiles. These can be used as a broom...lol But since regular store bought brooms are more practical these can also be used a decorations hanging from trees.

Cats are great when it comes to pest control so house a cat rather than buying chemicals when it comes to mole/vole or other rodent problems.

Coffee cans are great to make bird houses with.

Maybe I can get creative and think of more later.

Chere

A friend says she "never throws anything away the first time".

examples:

don't throw away paper towels until you've used each one twice-
first time for a light-duty job, second time for a dirty job.

If you have a dirty job & no previously-used paper towels, use an already-read newspaper.

Mobile Greenhouse: for those of you without a greenhouse and/or indoor seed starting setup and/or good southern exposure in winter (no strong light):

Start a flat or two of your spring veg/flowers and put the flats in your vehicle (early Spring). Flats will get warmed by ol' Sol herself, and when the plants feel up to it they will show up without any bottom heat. If you time it right (I'm still working on that) plants are pretty nearly hardened off for you, and bouncing around as you get to/from work helps toughen the seedlings.

Remember to vent by opening a window a bit on sunny days.

I have to give credit where it is due though as I didn't come up with these frugal tips. I found them at the following useful link. Still they work a treat and my indoor plants have never been more healthy.