Reusing and Recycling Garden Materials

Whether you are looking to reuse materials in your urban farm for environmental purposes or to cut down on costs, there are lots of creative ways to create your own ecosystem, and reduce waste. This article covers just a few ideas to get you started, if you have used them or have other suggestions comment them below or post on our groups page to share your ideas and pictures with others!

Reusing Your Waste

One of the biggest household waste factors is food waste. But there is a lot that can be done with the scraps from your pantry or off your plate. An easy place to start is with compost/worm bins. If you have extra space outside getting a compost bin or worm bin will easily use up all your food scraps. The scraps are turned into healthy soil/fertilizer that can be shared and spread. If you have sprouted foods like garlic or onions that have gone bad for eating they can be planted outside saving you money on them in the future. If you or a neighbor have chickens many food scraps can be given to them, not only does this help give the chickens entertainment and varied food sources, it produces eggs and chicken manure which is a fantastic fertilizer.

Saving Soil

Soil can be expensive and if you have soil from a previous planting season that has gone dry or lost its nutrients don’t worry, it can be brought back to life. As previously mentioned if you have access to chicken manure adding some to your old soil is a great way to revitalize. Grabbing a bag of worm castings from the garden store is a great all natural way to add fertilizer to your soil. Once you have added some nutrients and water back to the soil grab some worms from your yard and put them in, to start helping the process!

Check out this video by Epic Gardening on how to bring life back to your soil!

Be Creative

There are lots of unique ways to reuse materials from your garden or farm, hopefully this is a good starting point to help get the creativity flowing. Be sure to check out your local farms and community gardens for recycling programs and creative ideas!