Thrifty gardening

Happy New Year! Perhaps you are on holiday or preparing to go back to work soon. You may even be looking out on your garden and feel the need to get out there. I find that being in my garden and getting close to the earth is refreshing and rewarding. It clears my mind of everyday worries. Somehow gardening activities demand that I focus on the task at hand. I find it quite invigorating too. One minute I'm watering a patch and re-viewing my layout, what's working and what isn't. The next minute I'm moving plants around and leaving piles of weeds in clumps as I go. 

My garden is mostly comprised of perennial plants.  The few annuals I have, seem to come up from reseeded stock, season after season, or from seeds I have collected, saving me from spending big. 

At this time of the year straight after Christmas, I find I don't have much spare cash to spend on gardening even through I have some spare time, so its important to have some thrifty gardening tips. Here are some that have helped me get through the year.

1. Let nature do it's thing:

Let the garden become a little unruly and allow some flowers or herbs to go to seed.  Collect the seeds on a dry day and store in marked envelopes for sewing next spring. 

2. Make your garden and food waste work for you

Make your own compost, but have two piles going. Start one after a hefty gardening prune (exclude weeds!) and then leave it for some weeks. Start another heap with food waste (no meat products) to which you add any subsequent pruned clippings. It does take a few months, but you'll be amazed how much green waste you can recycle and have some mulch and nourishment for your plants - like all living things, they do need good supplies of food!

3. Make more 

Some plants can be grown from cuttings placed in water e.g. Impatience, fuchsias, Rosemary, oregano etc. Pot soft wood cuttings in well drained soil using a rooting hormone e.g. Lavender, Streptocarpus, or use a layering technique for ground covers.

4. Be generous

Offer cuttings and surplus plants to your friends and neighbours and you'll be rewarded with reciprocity. 

Hope you have a productive gardening year and are able to take some time to just be still and to take some breaths.

- Claudia x