How-to: Make Your Own Natural or Recycled Pots for Plants and Seedlings

Spread the love:

If you’re a gardener, then you’re already doing great work for the environment. Yay for you!

And if you’re a gardener, then chances are you’re probably already pretty crafty. You could buy pots the right size to start any plants or seedlings from any gardening center, but none of them, even the ones made from natural or recycled materials, are as good as simply bypassing the consumer market altogether and making your own.

Whether you’ve got tiny seedlings or giant plants to pot, you can put them in the D.I.Y. plant pots below. If you choose a method that’s within your skill set, uses materials that you’ve got around your house, and results in the perfect plant pot for your needs, then you’ll have set yourself up for the perfect gardening experience without a single trip to the store:

cement planter: These cement planters from Centsational Girl (writing for Home-Dzine) are easy to make using a variety of small and large recyclable plastic containers–yogurt tubs, plastic cups, the plastic pots that nursery plants are sold in, etc. The planters look nice just on their own, but you can also embed objects such as river rocks, bottle caps, and broken pottery pieces into the tops of the planters for even more decorative effect.

newspaper pots: Yes, you can buy tiny little pots and trays to start seeds in, but why would you want to? Certainly you don’t need store-bought when you can make  these little origami-folded newspaper pots, tutorial courtesy of A Heart for Home, that are the perfect size for seedlings.  Since the pots are made from recycled newspapers, require neither tape nor glue, and can be planted right with the seedling, they’re the perfect eco-friendly choice.

egglings: You can start seeds in eggshells! Using this tutorial from Mossy, you can once again completely remove a material from the waste stream and–even better!–amend the soil as you do so, since the eggshells that you’ll be putting right into the ground with their seedlings contain valuable calcium for your soil.

egg carton containers: And once all the eggs are gone, start another batch of seeds in the empty cardboard egg carton. Unless your cardboard does a really good job disintegrating, you’ll likely have to transplant your seedlings, not plant the container as you can with some other materials, but there are organizational benefits to being able to keep a full dozen of the same type of plant together in your egg carton.

plastic bottle pots: You can turn a plastic bottle into the perfect pot for a seedling, with surprisingly little waste to recycle. Check out the plastic bottle pot tutorial from She Gathers, substituting your own natural soap for the bleach, and a piece of recycled newspaper for the paper towel.

The cement planter image is the property of Centsational Girl.

Spread the love: