Landscaping a property can enhance its aesthetic. Like many projects, however, the cost can become a barrier to fully realizing your designs. The good news is that when it comes to landscaping there are lots of creative solutions you can employ to cut down on costs without cutting corners on your ideal goals. Here are 5 great ideas that will help you reduce the cost of your next landscaping project.
1 – Pick The Right Plants
The first tip is all about getting you started off on the right foot. There’s nothing wrong with buying plants you like or plants that are on sale – shop the sales at the end of the season for the best savings – just make sure you’re buying plants that will thrive in your landscaping. If you are landscaping a part of the house that doesn’t get much sun make sure to pick plants that like the shade. Having to replace plants can be a huge drain on your landscaping budget and one that can easily be avoided with the proper planning.
2 – Get Creative With Reusing Everyday Items
Most plants have tips and tricks to help them grow. For example, when you are growing tomatoes you’ll need something to hold them up so they grow nice and tall in the places you want. To achieve this you can go out and buy specialty tomato holders, not a huge expense but it can add up if you’ve got a few plants in your backyard garden.
As an alternative try saving the wooden chopsticks from your takeout and twist ties from food packaging. As the plants grow higher you can use elastic bands to add chopsticks and increase the hight of your supports. When they get big enough use scrap wood or bamboo in a teepee shape, bound them at the top with elastic bands.
3 – Skip The Weed Killer
Herbicides, while effective, are an added cost and if used incorrectly can cause unwanted damage to your landscaping. Most weeds can be taken care of with a little bit of ingenuity and elbow grease.
If you’ve got a big patch of weeds a quick and effective way to kill them is with a pot of boiling water. You don’t even need to boil the water specifically for this purpose, leftover water from cooking will be just as effective as long as it’s still hot. The goal here is that the boiling water will reach down and kill the roots. For tough to kill weeds try adding some vinegar to the boiling water.
4 – Make Friends With The Worms
Nature is great at making its own fertilizer and a healthy garden bed is going to attract one of the best little helpers around, the earthworm. Worms are great at breaking down organic matter into nutrients that your plants can absorb. Worms like a moist garden bed and they live in the top 30 centimetres of the soil.
An easy way to attract the worms is by taking some food scraps, finely chopped or blended (like a worm smoothie). Once prepared they can be buried in a little trench around the garden bed. Worms like things such as potato peels, tea bags, and eggshells, but won’t be as attracted by acidic food such as onion skins or citrus fruits.
5 – Water First Thing In The Morning
Chances are that if you’ve got a big landscaping project one of the main costs will eventually become your water usage. Keeping lawns and plant beds wet and happy, especially in the hot summer months, can be a challenge. That’s why it’s a good idea to get in the habit of watering your lawn and garden first thing in the morning to reduce the amount of water that evaporates as the day heats up. It’s a small thing that can really add up over time.
