Save Money With These Garden Ideas on a Budget

It costs money to design a garden. While this is generally a no-brainer, the actual cost of building your typical garden may be the basis for some surprising sticker shock, particularly if you’re not financially prepared for the encounter. However, this shouldn’t deter you from bringing life to your garden; a little creativity is all you need to work around this. Here is a list of the various ideas that can help you ignite that creative spark.

1. Spare a Spare Tire

A tire’s days don’t have to be over just because they’re worn. A little ingenuity – and a little paint – is all you need to turn this important piece of transportation equipment into a perfect garden conversation piece.

The beauty about using a tire for your garden is that it’s stealthily versatile once it’s painted. If laid flat or stacked on top of each other, they can be turned into a stylish barrier for plants or veggies. If you hang one from a tree like a tree swing, its inner section could double as a base to ensconce a hanging garden arrangement.

2. Build Your Own Butterfly Feeder

Putting a bird feeder in your garden is a nice way to add an easy touch of nature to your backyard or patio. But why not take it to the next level and invite the world’s most beautiful insects to your garden?

It’s not that hard to do – all you need is a sturdy plate or lid and some over-ripe fruit, and you’re good to go. You may want to make sure the surface is a color that allows the fruit to stand out, so that the butterfly can detect its presence. You’ll also want to make sure the plate is in an elevated – after all, you’ll want to see the butterflies during their pit stop.

Attracting butterflies to your garden does more than improve your backyard’s overall aesthetic. It can help your garden flourish, since butterflies have the power to pollinate. It’s not too much of a stretch that they’ll hang around your flowerbed for a spell after swooping in for a nosh of fruit.

3. String Things Along

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There’s something about a string of lights that can inject a sense of rustic ambiance to any backyard or patio. Better yet, it doesn’t cost a whole lot of cash to add this special vibe to your abode.

To get these lights to work, all you need to be able to do is hang them from point A to point B. This makes them a versatile piece of décor that you can easily move around depending on your mood or the season. The lights that string across the patio during a summer cookout could be the same lights that merely illuminate your back fence during the fall.

4. A Patch of Fake Grass

If you live in a townhome or a condo, chances are you have a patio area instead of a green garden. This patio is more than likely a slab of drab concrete which may be in desperate for a little personality. Fortunately, it’s nothing a little patch of artificial turf can’t provide.

While fake grass or AstroTurf may be the bane of many a sports fan’s existence, it can add a proper pop of color to your backyard floor, which could make it a bit more inviting. The only caveat to this is that it doesn’t have tremendous drainage properties. This should be something you’ll want to bear in mind If you have small dogs that do their business on the patio.

5. Skip the Turf and Bring on the Paint

If you own the condo or townhome you’re living in, and you want something a little more permanent than a strip of phony grass, that drab slab of concrete can serve as an excuse to unleash your creative beast. Specifically, it can serve as a thrilling canvas that can allow you to extend the personality of your home – not to mention yourself.

The sky’s the limit with this decorative concept. You can of course paint it in one monotone hue, but you can also paint fancy designs, abstract art, or geometric patterns on its surface. It’s a fantastic way to reverse the “letting the outside in” concept that tends to work so well with large bay windows.

6. Stick Marbles in Your Fence

A wooden fence does have a touch of rustic charm, yet its monotone color could be a touch boring. Yet its somewhat dull personality can be livened up pretty quickly and affordably by stuffing it with a few marbles.

Adding marbles to your fence will do more than break up the monotony of your wooden fence. At certain parts of the day, sunlight will hit the marbles at just the right angle; when they do, flourishes of color will radiate from embedded spheres, giving your garden the kind of character that a plain old fence can’t do on its own.

The trick to making this work is to drill marble-sized holes into your fence. These holes will be just big enough to allow the marbles to rest inside the fence snugly without causing splintering around the hole. Once they’re in tight, they won’t come out until you take them out.

Also, it would behoove you to remember that marbles do come in different sizes. If you wanted to, you could create a pattern built on a combination of small and large marbles to create an even more dramatic influx of color pops.

These concepts merely scratch the surface when it comes to cost-effective ways to bring creativity to your garden or backyard. As with any idea that’s partially designed to save you a few bucks, these innovative design strategies simply require a bit of imagination and a little work. However, if you’re game to meet these requirements, you’ll be rewarded quite handsomely.

Photo Credit

Photo by i-visual licensed under CC0

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