Sarah’s 5 little green tips

Reuse

It’s amazing what you can make things out of in your garden. Grape tubs make perfect mini propagators. Yoghurt pots and toilet rolls make great deep root trainers. Margarine and ice cream tubs with added holes in the bottom are great for sowing seeds into. Milk cartons can be cut into plant labels or turned into compost funnels. Garden centres often giveaway piles of pots. No need to buy new.

Save

A fantastic way to build up a stock of locally grown seeds without the need for piles of single use plastic packaging is to save your own. Easy seeds to start with are sunflowers, nasturtiums, tomatoes, nigella, calendula, sweet peas and lettuce. Saving seeds gives you plants that are adjusted to growing in your local conditions and will better suit your soil type, weather and locality.

Feeds

Make your own plant feeds. There is no need to buy those single use plastic bottles from garden centresit’s so easy to make your own plant food. Chopped up nettles steeped in water makes amazing high nitrogen feed for early leafy growth. Comfrey leaves make a great feed for tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers. Woodash boosts potassium levels and micronutrient levels. Coffee grounds and Christmas tree needles make fantastic acid boosting additions to plants like blueberries and roses.

Mulch

Mulch is magic stuff. It reduces the need for watering, adds organic matter to your soil and reduces weed growth. Less weeds mean all those nutrients in the soil are left for your fruits, vegetables or flowers. Conserving water is so important as our climate changes. And we all know if we look after our soil it looks after our plants. Grass cuttings, layers of newspaper, cardboard and leaf mould don’t cost any money and make great mulch. Last year I treated myself to some straw as well.

Make space for edibles

Ornamental gardens are stunning but a plot full of fruit bushes and vegetables are somehow even more beautiful as well as incredibly satisfying. And don’t forget planting flowers amongst your veggies will boost pollination and help control insects. Perennial fruit bushes are a fantastic investment; think blueberries, raspberries, strawberries and currants. It doesn’t take long to get the return on your investment in fresh fruit. Delicious fruit with no unnecessary plastic packaging, no air miles and no chemicals.

You find out more about Sarah’s ecoliving on twitter (now X) at @littlegreentip1