Plants for 15 Cents!

If you have a large space to fill with plants, starting them by seed could save you a bundle of money. For less than $6.00 ($2.00 for seeds and less than $4.00 in peat pots and we had the potting soil left over from last year) we should end up with over 40 zinnia plants (God willing, of course). That brings the per plant price to less than 15 cents! My local dollar store didn't have the kinds of seeds I wanted for landscaping my front yard but they did have sunflower seeds, vegetable seeds and more for 25 cents a package. That would bring your costs down even more.

There's also a certain indescribable (and priceless) joy that comes with growing plants from seed. It's truly exciting to see them sprout above the ground, grow their first true leaves and eventually flower in your garden. I like to save the seed packet and write the date I planted them (the above packet's seeds were planted on the 16th) right on the packet. I used to tape them into a notebook but it got too messy. I think pictures will be much neater.

These Mexican blanket flower seeds were packaged to be planted in 2010 but they were free (can't get cheaper than that!), courtesy of the Maryland Master Gardeners at the 2011 Montgomery County Fair. I figured that if they grow it'll be a bonus and if they don't I can always reuse the soil and pots.

I also planted this package of purple zinnias today. I think the red and purple will look nice together. The purple will go in a full sun area and the red on the border between sun and shade and even a bit into the shady area.

Have you ever planted anything from seed? Did you enjoy the process? May your gardens be bountiful and may God bless you dear reader!

Clearance Plants

Bromeliad bloom; photo by Phyllis Wheeler

If you have a green thumb, it's worth visiting your local garden center or nursery to check out their clearance plant racks. Sometimes the plants look perfectly fine but they need room for new stock, sometimes they need a little tlc and sometimes, well, they might be on the verge of death. It's still worth a peek if you love gardening.

Before Christmas I paid about $7.00 for a Norfolk pine tree in a tiny 3" pot at the Fort Meade Commissary. This week I found one on clearance at a local garden center for only $1.25! Not only that but the clearance plant is a tiny bit larger than the one I've had since December. I also got two large (over 14" tall) bromeliads in nice ceramic pots for less than $5.00 each. The foliage needs some trimming and they could both use a larger pot but that's still a bargain. The pots alone would normally cost more than $5.00.

I'm guessing that this is a great time of year to get bargains on plants because the holidays are over but (for most of us) it's too early to plant outside and, if my local garden center was any indication, there's not much of a crowd buying plants right now.

Hope you find some great plant bargains!

PS: If you love plants you'll surely enjoy my orchid extravaganza photos on my inspirational blog.