Gardening for all budgets

Whether you have $10, $100, $1000 or more to spend on your garden, consider this cash-savvy advice

- Mary Lovell-Smith

Be it a dispassionate assessment or wild fantasising over what could be, before the garden dons its spring glories an appraisal may be in order. Starting a garden from scratch or wanting to tart up an existing one, there's a budget to consider but whatever the state of your wallet, there's plenty that can be bought to make your garden more beautiful.

SOW, SWAP & CUT

You don't get much for that little blue note. It will be a toss-up between a couple of packets of seeds or punnets of seedlings. Annual flowers are great for ready summer colour. Especially desirable are those like alyssum, poppies, lupins and nigella, which bloom for ages and self-seed readily so they'll be coming back year after year. Cheap and cheerful might spring to mind, but with a good eye and a touch of research the look can be moody, sophisticated, dreamy, exotic - whatever you desire.

While it pays to buy seeds of easy-to-germinate vegetables (we're thinking tomatoes, lettuce, radish), it is prudent to buy seedlings of those that are difficult to get started such as celery, eggplant, fennel and peppers.

Free or nearly free plants are, however, obtainable. Look out for seedling swaps. Visit your local community garden. Some have plants to give away, or in return for an hour or so of gardening.

A tub of rooting hormone will gobble up all your cash but cuttings can easily be taken without it. Especially on those plants that root readily, including geranium, pelargonium, succulents, fuchsia or many salvia. It's easier and more satisfying than you may imagine.