1. Grow gourmet greens 

Avoid the over-priced bagged salad in the supermarket by growing your own tasty leaves. You can use old boxes, fruit punnets or shopping bags if you don’t have pots. Simply fill an old fruit punnet with peat-free compost and firm. Sprinkle salad seeds thinly on top and cover with a thin layer of compost, ensuring the seeds have good contact with the compost by firming again. Snip the leaves and they'll regrow.  

2. Make new strawberry plants 

It's easy to make new strawberry plants for free! Find an allotment neighbour or friend who has a strawberry patch and ask if you can snip their strawberry runners. These are the baby plants that are still attached to the parent by a runner (or stem). Cut and pot up into peat-free compost and when they've rooted, they're ready to be planted into a container or in the ground.  

3. Take cuttings from herbs 

Make more plants for next year by taking semi-ripe cuttings from non-flowering stems of perennial herbs such as thyme, rosemary and sage in later summer and autumn. Do it first thing the morning, and pop the cutting in a bag if not potting up straight away. Cut a 10cm length, under a node. Strip the lower leaves and pop in a pot of gritty compost with a plastic bag on top, secured with an elastic band. Once it has rooted, take the bag off.  

4. Make your own spice 

Allow some of your herb plants, such as coriander, fennel and mustard to flower so you can let the seedheads ripen. Once they're crisp and brown, simply tip the entire seedhead into a bag and give it a shake. These aromatic seeds are fantastic in pickles, preserves, and for flavouring meat and fish.  

5. Make paper pots 

This is a great way to save buying new pots for your veg growing - or buying more plastic. Find out how via our YouTube video. 

6. Save seeds 

Saving your own seeds is a cheap and easy way to create more of the veg you love. And a great place to start is tomato seeds. Head to our seed saving pages, or watch our Instagram video. And don't throw away old veg seeds! With proper care and appropriate storage, your old veg seeds could last up to 10 years.  

7. Reuse bottles as homemade planters 

It's easy to recycle plastic bottles into containers for veg. These veg-heads (pictured) are decorated and filled with vegetable seed for homegrown hair! Simply, cut the top off a bottle, punch holes in the lid for drainage and decorate. It’s a lovely project to do with children and saves money on expensive garden containers. Keep them somewhere shaded so they don’t dry out. 

8. Grow food from scraps 

Recycle your vegetable tops and bottoms by growing them for flavoursome leaves. It’s a great project for the summer holidays, reduces waste and saves money on compost! Place the flat end of your leftover vegetable in a shallow water dish and watch it regrow. Try carrot and turnips tops and the bases of lettuce, celery and onion. Change the water regularly, and once they grow, snip the green shoots into stocks, stir-fries and soups or toss them in a vinaigrette.