I have decided to have a recycling week theme for the blog. Please join in with your recycling ideas for in the garden, allotment or in the home?
Today its flower pots or plant pots. I had one of my Eureka moments yesterday morning when I was wakening from my slumber. I was thinking to myself:
"Why are plant pots brown? Even when they are plastic." I suppose its because flower pots/plant pots use to be made mainly out of terracotta clay. How many gardeners have heavy clay in their gardens? Imagine if you could make pots or turn a potters wheel? Remember Pansy Potter The Strong mans Daughter? Oh to read The Dandy and The Beano again! Remember Corporal Clott from The Victor comic? He could take on a German Panzer unit with his bare fists. What about Roy of the Rovers?
Sorry I digress. I am always looking for plant pots to make new garden plants with. I could always buy some small four inch pots for about fifteen Cents each. Or I could always make some for free? So that is what I did. I saved one Euro fifty for myself and recycled some plastic. Its an help anyway.
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| New see through plant pot. Should be great especially for cuttings. |
Plastic bottles rescued from the recycling bin. They are cut in half to make cloches (top half) to protect our delicate vegetable plants from Mr and Mrs Snail and Slug. The bottom half have holes made in them for drainage. I used a knife but its far safer to use a battery drill!
Somebody gave me some cooking oil buckets. I fill them with water and use them to fill my watering can. My late mother use to call it a "Degging" can. Apparently its an old Lancashire word for a watering can. The water in the buckets help to keep a humid almost Tropical climate in the poly-tunnel. Some people would say it looks cluttered. But it saves filling up the watering can from the tap outside the farm house. I sometimes use the hose pipe but its a bit harsh and heavy on seedlings and new plants.
Some plant pots made from the cooking oil tubs. We drilled holes in them and filled them up with garden soil from the veg plot. The holes in the veg pot were filled with well rotted cow manure. Garden soil is like a bank account. You should not take it out unless your going to put something back!
Talking of money. I split two of my Phormiums (New Zealand Flax) and planted them. There are over twenty of them. I saw some in a garden centre for fifteen Euros a piece the other day. I will sell them you for a fiver each or perhaps we could barter?
You can see my pig slat path. This was another recycling idea. It collects grass and I should have put a membrane (plastic bags) under it. But I didn't and it will get weeded like everywhere else. More recycling ideas soon. What recycling ideas have you?
Corporal Clott was in The Dandy. Who was I thinking of?
ReplyDeleteI will also be cutting up plastic bottles. Tonic water bottles the thin neck end will be used to water my tomatoes. I have to have them in pots this year and am afraid that water on the leaves will cause them to burn in the sun. I will water from the can straight into the funnel like recycled bit. The other side will either be used as a pot or if I can manage to get some beds together, I will sink some into the soil with some VERY small holes drilled in it. Then when I water into those pots the water will drip feed out. rather like an olla. They are very expensive as the clay pot variety. I will use the plastic for now.
ReplyDeleteI might even cut my own bamboo poles this year! we have enough of it growing where ever the heck it wants to chop it all back and the blighter to come back fighting.
Some great ways of using plastic bottles Sol. The clay pots are expensive and easily break but I still prefer them to plastic.
ReplyDeleteWe have bamboo growing but ours is not very thick. I think you would easily sell yours to anybody who grows beans, peas or sweet peas. How is your new garden project going? Thanks;
I have put some pictures up
DeleteHokey dokey!
DeleteWe use the old 20 litre olive oil tins, sometimes painted on the outside for pots, have an old watering can split on the bottom and generally use any old plastic bucket or container. All look good with a flower or some basil
ReplyDeleteHi LA. You're right they do all look good with a flower or basil. I put shrub cuttings in pots until they get too big and then they get planted in the ground. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteDo it while you can - plastic bottles will soon be banned from sale. I had a friend who tried putting holes in a large plastic bottle and letting whatever it was she planted send it's shoots through the holes. Me, I always stuck with little red/brown pots.
ReplyDeleteHi Valerie. I wish we could cut down on using plastic. I often wonder how much we pay for plastic bottles and packaging. I am always out of plant pots so I thought I would make my own for free. They are not very attractive but they are ideal temporary containers for garden plants. The great thing about containers mean your plants are portable and you can plant them any time of year. Thanks!
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