How to Begin Growing your own Apartment Jungle without Spending a Fortune:

Starting a collection of plants can be an expensive hobby, but it doesn't have to be. Here are some tips I have picked up along my journey of collecting various plants and seeds over the last few years. 

Buy, exchange, and/or sell plants, seeds, and cuttings. 

• Learn how to propagate your house plants. That way you have multiple plants of the same kind instead of just one. 

• Participate in online and local communities that offer seed and plant cutting exchanges. Local communities often hold plant and seed exchange events in the spring time. It's a great way to grow your collection without having to involve money. 

• Buy and sell plant cuttings on online auction websites, such as Ebay and Tradera. 

Buy secondhand gardening tools, stands, pots, and containers. Get creative! You don't have to only use things that are made for gardening.

• Get creative! I love terracotta pots. However, the bottom trays are often sold separately and are more expensive than the pot itself. Instead, I buy plates and bowls from thrift stores to use under pots with holes. For plant stands, I buy secondhand stools, and plant stands. I've used tea cups purchased from thrift stores to put mini cactus and succulents in. 

Repurpose your trash. 

• Reuse plastic. I find myself throwing away a lot of plastic containers as a result of buying food from the grocery store. Instead of throwing those containers away, I started collecting them to use for various gardening purposes. Here is a post discussing container ideas on a budget. I like using yogurt containers, juice/milk cartons (vegetable gardening), egg cartons (germination), and plastic bottles (cut in half to cover seeds during germination). 

• Look for free items. Buckets, old cooking pots, and wooden pallets can easily be found for free in your local community. Look online for free ads. My apartment complex has a free stuff area near the garbage room that people leave out for anyone to take.  I just recently found a mini wooden pallet that I am now using as a shelf for my tomato plants on my balcony. 

• Grow plants from food scraps, such as celery, carrots, ginger, pineapple, avocado, fruits with seeds, sweet potato, green onion, onion, and garlic.

Start composting to use your household organic waste as fertilisation instead of buying it. 

• Here's an article about how to compost in an apartment.

Photo credit: Judah Guttmann on Unsplash