Plants, Lawns And Containers - Counting The Cost

Planting is almost always the cheapest part of creating your garden. If your garden is bare though, it can cost a lot of money buying everything up at once.

Unless your lawn is in a dreadful state, it will normally take only a small amount of time to repair by using weedkillers, then patching, levelling and mowing. For any new areas of your lawn, it will be much cheaper to just seed it instead of turfing it.

It is generally throwing money away buying deciduous hedging plants like beech, as they need to be chopped down to quite a low level after being planted. Keep any existing trees to save on cost, and if you are planning a couple of plants as the main focal points, think about buying larger ones for greater effect.

Separating your garden up into small sections will allow you to work on one area at a time, allowing you to budget accordingly. This will also allow you to save money by propagating herbaceous perennials for other sections of your garden. Any plants that will be visible from your home should be given priority to, even if you are working to a small budget.

Wherever possible, grow plants from cuttings or seeds, starting them off on house windowsills if needed. Large plant containers usually show instant results, with the cost ranging from modest for plastic, to extreme for cast iron. You can also use old household items like saucepans and buckets to save on cost, however always make sure to create drainage holes in the items.

Exotic plants and rare varieties can cost much more than commonly found plants, although this may not be too much of a prohibitive barrier. Special offers through mail order are an inexpensive way to build up your stock of plants, however these plants will generally be smaller than ones bought from a garden centre.

Once you have created your plan for planting in your garden, don't bow to the temptation of in-filling between young plants with temporary gap-fillers. This money is better spent on a weed suppressing mulch.

Specialist flower markets are held in some cities regularly, and can be a good source of decent plants that are often a lot lower in price than buying from the shop.

Hopefully this guide will have come in handy for showing you the various ways of getting your garden in great shape, without breaking the bank.