40 Best Gardening Hacks and Ideas to Save Time and Money
https://simplifygardening.com/40-best-gardening-hacks/
Some of my faves:
Putting coffee filters in the bottom of pots to allow drainage, but not dirt, out.
Using pop cans and such to fill the bottoms of large pots; less dirt needed, better drainage.
Cutting up old t-shirts to support tomato stems - soft and stretchy and won’t cut stems.
Composting. Duh. ;)
Eggshells! Right after (or before?!?!) the chicken, God’s most useful design, LOL!
Cardboard for weed suppression in new beds and in rows.
Saving cooking water and putting that on your plants when cooled.
Filling a just-emptied milk jug back up with water and watering house and garden plants with that.
Thanks for those !!!!
Re: eggshells
Wash egg well before using contents.
Rinse used egg shells (do not remove membrane)
Put shells in a gallon bag in freezer to store until it’s full.
Once bag is full, spread egg shells in a single layer on a cookie sheet & bake at 250 degrees for an hour - this totally dries them out & kills anything undesirable on shells.
Grind shells to a powder (food processor, blender, whatever you have that will work)
Powder can be used on food (people or animal/pets) as a good source of calcium - that membrane is a good source of collagen.
Powder can be used in garden for any plants that need calcium, such as tomatoes.
I do have how much powder = RDA for humans, but will have to find it - will post when I do.
For tomatoes, I usually plant with dried milk as the calcium source. Dried milk has gotten pricey (actually, it’s been pricey & sometimes hard to find) so I’m trying the eggshell calcium powder this year.
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Company coming tomorrow. My brother has been unable to mow this past week & is currently out of town. This means that I am going to mow at least around the house today - in 2 weeks since last mowing, grass & weeds are 8-12” tall already after rain & some warm days. It will be “interesting” .... getting on/off & how well I can tolerate ‘sitting’ - might have to find a way to prop the old leg up a bit - I have ideas.
Gathered my courage & looked at the garden yesterday - depressing. Lots of weeding. I am going to see what I can manage next week. I need to plant some things, too.
Bluebirds everywhere! Saw a bright blue male giving his lady friend a treat this morning - they were sitting on the fence together when I looked out the kitchen window. I’m not sure what boxes they’re using, but if I’m outside more next week, I should be able to spot them coming & going. Hummer feeders going out after I mow - we have yellow pine pollen everywhere & I don’t want the feeders covered/clogged because the mower will kick up a cloud.
Happy Easter to all!
Howdy! I have a large wire basket in need of a liner. Being a thrifty person (basket was free at the town dump last fall), I am considering a cheap way to line it with something free. Would cardboard, worked with to fit the curve of the metal, be worth a try? Might be a bad idea or look too cheap. Could poke drainage holes in it.
I also have a few small burlap bags that amaryllis came in last year. Maybe a combo of the cardboard on the inside and burlap on the visible side?
Either that or spend a lot on a real liner, which I checked out at Menards when I was there for other stuff many weeks ago. The basket is huge and I would have needed two 18 inch liners and cut them to work in my larger basket together. Liners were about $6-$7 each.
All thrifty garden hack suggestions on this much appreciated.
Oh I just remembered I have mosses turning green on the edge of the woods...maybe that could be used as part of the El Cheapo project.
Maybe the burlap plus moss on the visible side would work. Might be pretty with the moss showing. The burlap is too thin by itself, to hold back erosion of the soil.
The metal is narrow metal strips, not really wire. About 20 inches across the top.
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Zone 9b status report
Blossoms have set on the blueberries
Canes coming up from the raspberries
Trees have all set fruit, the March freeze didn’t kill blossoms
Grapes on their way
Cabbages almost forming heads (should have started a month earlier in Feb)
Had to strip/thin baby limes
Onions and garlic well established
Pole beans on their way
Potatoes are aggressive
Cucumbers up
Peppers and tomatoes stalled by a few cold mornings this week ~40deg
>>>Saving cooking water and putting that on your plants when cooled.<<<
Also, running the kitchen sink’s hot water faucet into a jug, until it gets hot, instead of down the drain.
We also do the same with the bathtub hot faucet; a half gallon juice jug does the job.