For someone who is into gardening, you can attest to the fact that it’s worth all the hype. And for the others who love gardening but don’t know how to go about it due to a lack of sufficient funds, this article is for you.
Now, I’m pretty sure you have a backyard space that you might want to use for your gardening but you’re yet to get a cost evaluation of the entire process. Don’t worry, I’ll take you on a brief educational journey on the cost of starting a backyard garden.
I’ll be making this cost evaluation for a 60 square feet backyard garden which is a great start for beginners.
How Much Does It Cost To Start A Backyard Garden?
Now, these are the minimum costs of the main things you need for your backyard garden:
- Peat moss- $34.37
- Organic compost bags- $37.40
- Plastic mesh netting- $43.98
- Raised bed for your garden- $84.25
In total, you’ll need between $200 and $250 to start your backyard garden. If you’re not using a raised bed, then the cost will be much lesser.
Ways To Save Money On Gardening
Well if you’re like me, you’ll still be thinking of ways to cut down on the cost of starting and maintaining your backyard garden. In my many years of experience in gardening, I have learned a few ways to minimize my budget for gardening.
Here are some pointers you’ll definitely want to know:
- Save your seeds: instead of throwing the seeds from your garden plants, learn how to save those seeds and you’ll never have to buy seeds again.
- Make your own compost: you can easily use a kitchen countertop compost bin in which you will toss scraps to be poured into your outdoor compost barrel. This will save you so much money that could have been spent on top dressing your garden with compost at the end of the next season.
- Use scrap materials: if you’re just starting your backyard garden, buying everything you need would be ridiculous. Learn to be creative and use available scraps and materials around you to improve your garden.
- Set up a rain barrel system: it would be great to use a barrel to catch rainwater for your plants. It’s cheap to set up plus it requires zero maintenance and saves money you’ll have used for watering your garden.
- Propagating cuttings: you can keep replicating your plants by propagating them. You wouldn’t have to get new plants since you can just keep making them and filling up your garden more and more.
Having shared these gardening cost management tricks, I’ll proceed to clear any more doubts you might have about starting your backyard garden.
Is Starting A Garden Worth It?
You might still have some doubts about starting a backyard garden even after finding out the cost. You’re probably wondering if starting the garden is worth it, well I’m here to answer you.
Starting a backyard garden is definitely worth the time and financial investment. First off, it is an amazingly beautiful sight to behold if you take care of it properly. It can also feed you, and give you a therapeutic environment to relax and chill in. For pet owners, having a backyard garden is wonderful because you can grow nutritious plants for your pets (and yourself too).
Your backyard garden is a cool place for you to connect with nature, it is an environment in which you can learn many things. You can literally bring your imagination into life because you have full control of your choice of plants for your backyard garden.
Even if you’re a busy person, there are low-maintenance crops like root vegetables, drought-tolerant plants, and herbs that basically grow themselves and are suitable for you to grow in your backyard and still make profits. So yes, it’s totally worth it in every way imaginable to a gardener.
Should I use a raised bed or in-ground gardening in my backyard?
If you plan on growing fruits and vegetables, you’ll need to use a raised bed (that’s why I added a raised bed cost earlier).
Seriously though, if you’re opportune to plant in the ground, it would be great. First off, you’ll have automatically slashed your gardening cost by half. You wouldn’t need as many tools (if any) as you would need if you are using a garden bed.
Another bonus is that your plant’s roots get to move more freely in a wide area and derive more nutrients from the ground. Water would be less of a problem too because the ground soil retains water better than the garden bed.
Either way is great, but the in-ground gardening has better advantages.
Conclusion
Starting a backyard garden is taking a bold step as it requires dedication for you to flourish. So now that you know the cost and many other things, I hope you’ll take that bold step and actualize your dreams of nature’s elegance. Don’t worry about your budget, once you start you’ll realize there are more ways to cut it down even more as you go forward in your gardening journey.