For many people, starting a garden is an appealing but daunting prospect. The perceived high costs and difficulty of growing your own food may put some off from making a positive change.
Fortunately, TikToker Summer Ginther (@summerginther) showed how to start a garden on a tight budget.
@summerginther how I started my garden for only a few hundred dollars! 💰🪴 #beginnergardener #diygarden #budgetgardening ♬ Here Comes the Sun - Relaxing Instrumental Music
The scoop
The 45-second video is crammed with useful and practical tips for making your own garden without straining your savings.
By recycling pallets from a previous project, they had the materials for garden beds at no cost and suggested ways for viewers to find their own discarded lumber. They sourced soil from a local landscaping company rather than purchasing it by the bag and found garden stones for free from someone moving.
To save even more money, they planted perennial flowers and started plants from seeds. The video ends with the simple message that the garden's function is far more important than its aesthetic appeal: "My garden might not look as glamorous as some of the others on the internet, but it still allows me to grow all the food I want for much less."
How it's helping
Most produce in supermarkets in the United States travels over 1,500 miles from farm to table. Pesticides used in industrial agriculture also have a major impact on the environment; runoff contaminates the soil and surface water. Additionally, most farms use tilling to treat the soil, which releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
Growing your own food is a great way to reduce waste and your pollution footprint. A small investment can pay dividends for years to come. Not only that, homegrown veggies are significantly more nutritious than store-bought produce.
What everyone's saying
The comments were very supportive, and some offered tips of their own.
"I love that you reused wood for the garden beds!" one viewer commented.
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What is the biggest reason you don't grow food at home? Click your choice to see results and speak your mind. |
Not enough time ⏳ "I started my garden by planting all of food scraps! It's a free way to grow quite a few things (strawberries, potatoes, green onions, onions, tomato)," said another.
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"Freecycle website is the best to find free things!" a viewer helpfully suggested.
Another commenter pointed out a way of sourcing compost and soil at no cost: "In Philadelphia, residents can get free compost and soil at the recycling center!"
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