1 Add some homegrown flavour. Herbs are expensive in the supermarket and a few pots on the balcony or at the front door can provide lots of flavour for your cooking. Herbs such as mint, parsley, rosemary, chives and oregano are all easy to grow.
2 Pick your own salad. Use a small plot or pots to grow salad greens and mix up fresh, tasty salads in a flash. Lettuces, mesclun mixes and radishes grow quickly from seed. Sow every few weeks for a constant supply. Some salad greens, such as mizuna, tolerate frosts.
3 Go vertical if space is limited. Beans and peas grow upwards and will only take up a corner of a courtyard or balcony.
4 Get the kids growing. Greens are less likely to be left on the plate if the children have had a hand in growing them.
5 Winter does not mean a bare garden. This time of the year is often when vegetables are at their most expensive. A little planning ahead and your winter garden could be brimming with cauliflowers, broccoli, cabbages, leeks, silverbeet and Brussels sprouts. Plant winter veges in January to give them time to get established before the first frosts hit.
6 Do not pay to take green waste to the landfill - turn it into compost and save even more by not having to buy compost. The Dunedin City Council has brochures on how to get your compost going, or you can go to the library and find books dedicated to the art of composting.
7 Make your own liquid plant food by half filling a plastic barrel that has a tight-fitting lid with seaweed or manure. Top up with water and leave to stew for a month or longer. Hold your nose, then dilute with water in a watering can and sprinkle over plants to give them a boost.
8 When buying vegetable plants, buy mixed punnets, unless you have a family big enough to eat six broccolis within a week or two before they go to seed. If you cannot find mixed punnets, go halves with a green friend.
9 Do not just think veges for the pot - some flowers such as violas, calendula, and roses are edible too. Grow them among the vegetables, or in your flower garden, for colourful additions to salads.
10 Organic vegetables can be expensive, so why not grow your own. Organic gardening avoids the use of chemically produced fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides. More attention needs to given to the soil to keep plants healthy and strong, as controlling weeds and pests can be problematic, but once you get the hang of it, it is very satisfying.
11 Grow plants that seed themselves. If you want to add some colour with flowers, choose annuals such as cosmos, alyssum, poppies and black-eyed susans. They drop many viable seeds which will germinate in spring, meaning you only need to buy them once. Remember, flowers attract beneficial insects, which helps with pest control.
12 Seeds are the cheapest way to go and you can make them last. Sow a small pinch, not the whole packet in one go.
13 Talk to keen gardening neighbours to find out what grows well in your area so you do not waste money on plants that are not likely to thrive or produce much.
14 Join a gardening club to meet like-minded people and draw from the experience of others who have been growing vegetables all their lives.
15 Start simple if you are new to gardening. Try growing a few different things and, as you have success, you will be inspired to try more and more. Potatoes are a good crop for breaking in new ground.
16 Do your research and read instructions. If a plant needs partial shade and you plant it in full sun, it may not give you the results you were hoping for. Timing is crucial in the vegetable garden. Plant at the wrong time and plants will not grow well, or may quickly bolt and go to seed.
17 Plant an apple or pear tree for an autumn bounty of fresh fruit. Heritage varieties have a reputation for good disease resistance. Some fruit trees are self-fertile, while others need to be planted in pairs to allow cross-pollination.
Store apples in a cool place, in a box with newspaper between the layers, and you can enjoy apple crumble and homemade apple sauce for months.
18 Rotate crops to keep to keep plants healthy and keep diseases, such as clubroot in brassicas, at bay by not allowing them to build up in the soil.
19 Find friends to keep your plants healthy. Companion planting is based on the theory some plants, when planted with others, keep pests at bay.
They may do this by giving off a strong scent which repels insect pests, or they may attract beneficial insects which eat the bad guys, or excrete substances into the soil which help other plants to grow strong. Flowers such as marigolds are said to be beneficial for the soil, while garlic repels aphids.
20 Tell everyone that you are starting a garden and would love it if they could give you divisions of their perennials or seeds they have saved from their garden. Or divide your own plants, such as hostas, to get an extra plant.
21 The garden is great for recycling. Egg cartons, milk cartons or yoghurt tubs are great for growing seeds. Old wheelbarrows, gardening boots and tyres can be used in place of expensive pots. Old pantyhose can be used as ties for climbing plants and toilet paper rolls can be used as seedling protectors.
22 Take care of garden tools to give them a long life. Keep them clean and dry, and a light film of oil will help keep rust at bay.
23 Get colourful and paint the handles of garden tools in bright colours so they do not get lost in the garden.
24 Look out for second-hand garden tools and furniture. Garage sales are a good source.
