Thrifty gardening tips – and our latest competition winner!

Thanks to all who entered the competition to win a copy of On The Plot With ‘Dirty Nails’. The winner is after the jump…

Thanks too for all the great tips, which are going to prove very useful in the months to come. Here are some of my favourites:

Cut the bottom off a 2 litre pop bottle and use it as a mini-cloche (Kelly).

Save your old, laddered tights, cut them into strips and use them to tie up tomatoes, beans etc onto poles. They stretch much better than string and don’t cut into the stems as they grow (Claire).

Sow sweet peas and climbing beans inside the cardboard cylinders from loo rolls. Pack them into a recycled mushroom box and fill with compost. Any roots that grow through the tube grow safely in the surrounding compost, which makes them so easy to transplant (Lottie).

Buy organic seeds – you can then save the seeds to plant out the next year. Try to swap seeds and growing tips with friends and neighbours – it is worth knowing which varieties perform well in your local soil and growing conditions. In addition to the other comment about loo rolls, the middle of kitchen rolls or Pringle containers are great to grow leeks in (Andy Sowden).

Use crushed-up egg shells to keep slugs off. But not if you have hens, as they will eat the eggshells themselves and scratch up your plants in the process! (Deborah May)

Nettle and comfrey leaves left in a bucket with water makes great fertiliser; collect fallen tree leaves and store wet in bin bags for seed compost for next year; and the thing that saves me the most money is giving saved seeds and cuttings away, then being cheeky and asking fellow gardeners for theirs – they are usually more than willing to swap, and you end up with loads of different plants (Claire T).

Never overlook the cut-price plants or seeds at a nursery or garden centre… most plants will perk up with a good feed and some TLC; with seeds, if you soak them the night before you sow them you’d be surprised how many germinate even if they are past their so-called best before date! (Isabel R).

Image credit: BigTallGuy.