Your home garden can be a place of calm and quiet in your busy life, or just a haven away from the housework. My garden has come alive in the last few years, I have collected a few money saving ideas along the way. Having a nice and productive garden doesn’t have to be expensive. Whether you just have a flower garden or a vegetable garden there are ways to save money and keep your garden affordable. By talking to my gardening friends, I have come up with the following money saving tips you can use in your own garden. If you are really into gardening, now is the best to get yourself ready. Why? You will see.

1. Compost
You don’t need to spend lots of money buying compost because you can make your own. Fall is the ideal time to start your own composting area. You can either purchase a compost bin of some sort or make your own. All you need is a spare bit of ground out of the way, maybe behind the garage or shed and some timber off cuts. I found some plans on the Internet that are easy for any home gardener to follow. It is better if you have 2 bays, one for fresh material and one that is composting. Fall is good because you can start with all of the leaves that land on your lawn and spent vegies such as pumpkins and other plant refuse. Save all of your fresh vegetable scraps and fruit peeling for the compost heap.

2. Mulch
One gardener friend of mine has a great tip to save on watering, she told me to mulch my entire garden to a depth of a few inches. This helps to limit weed growth and also keeps any moisture in the soil as it stops the soil itself from drying out in the hot sun and drying winds. You can use your compost for this or purchase some bark chips or straw. If you know someone with stables and horses, the used straw from the stables is great mulch. Grass clippings can compact and become impervious to rain but if combined with fallen leaves it is a good alternative.

3. Be water wise
The first thing I did when I decided to extend my garden and to have a large vegetable garden was to install a water tank to collect the rain water from my garage and house. You would be surprised how quickly a large tank can fill up, even with little or no rain but the heavy dew that falls at night. I use this water solely for the garden.

4. Grow your own plants
Do you have a favorite plant that you would like to have more off in the garden? One of the fun ways to get more plants is to propagate them yourself. This is also a rewarding task as you have grown something from scratch, be it seeds or a cutting. Some plants that are quite hybridized won’t have fertile seeds but you could grow it from a cutting. Any good gardening book will show you how to make softwood and hardwood cuttings. Different plants will grow from either of these methods. You can also give plants away as gifts to friends and neighbors.

5. Make your own garden products
When I joined my local gardening club, the first talk I went to was about making your own herbicides and pesticides. A cheap way to kill flat leaf weeds is to paint a drop of kerosene in the center on a hot sunny day. This will burn the plant and cause it to die, vinegar also works. To get rid of scale and sooty mold, make a mixture of soapy water and white oil to spray on the infested area. This will suffocate the bugs. Soapy water is also good for getting rid of aphids.

6. Go organic
I try to avoid using expensive chemicals around the yard and have found some really great alternatives. If you attract predator insects to your yard to eat the bad bugs such as aphids, you won’t need to use chemical sprays. And to avoid salts and fertilizers building up in the soil, I like to use seaweed or fish based liquid fertilizers on my garden. A seaweed solution is also good to use when planting out seedlings or any plants really as it helps to prevent root shock.

7. Plant swap
A free way to get more plants for your garden is to swap with your neighbors and friends. You will find that not everyone will grow the same plants as you so if you strike your own plants from cuttings or seed, you can swap for other plants that they grow.

8. Join a gardening club
Another great way to find out more about the plants that grow best in your area is to join the local gardening club or society. There is bound to one near you and even if it only supports say roses or vegetables you will get some fantastic tips from the other members. Some clubs also arrange for tours of gardens you might not otherwise be open to the public.

9. Reuse Your Newspapers
A friend of mine saves all of her newspapers when she wants to start a new raised garden bed or veggie patch. She uses the paper to place over the grass of the lawn as a base for her garden. Lay the papers several sheets thick and then top with good soil, compost and mulch. The paper will rot away in a season and will prevent the grass from ruining your garden bed.

10. End of growing season sales
I always make a point of visiting nurseries at the end of Spring/Summer to search for bargains in gardening tools and plants. Most places will have cheaper tools as it is not the growing season and they are getting ready for new stock. They also may have plants that are past their best but will survive with some tender loving care from you.