Cheapskate gardening 2: How to get plants cheaply (or even free)

In my first cheapskate gardening post, I wrote about propagating plants and included lots of links to online resources to help you get started. In this post, I’ll talk about other ways to save money on plants.

Get ‘em on sale (or free!)

Here in the land of early frosts and negative winter temperatures, the big box stores and nurseries are already starting to clear out their stock, so we cheapskate gardeners can score big. For example, last weekend I got three 1-gallon Japanese maples from Home Depot for $7 each. They’re regularly something like $39.99. (Note to Flagstaff gardeners: these are still on sale at this price. Go get ‘em!) Today I snagged a 1-gal Russian sage for $2.98 and a 1-gal clematis ‘Jackmanii’ for $6.98. Last year’s haul consisted of 1-gal evergreen shrubs (boxwood, euonymous) for $1.98 each, 4” chrysanthemums for $.50 each, and 6-packs of pansies, violas, and snapdragons at buy 1 get 10 free (no, that is not a typo). It takes a bit of luck and persistence, because once something goes on closeout, it tends to sell out quickly. I try to check at least one big box store every weekend in the late summer and fall (yeah, OK, I visit every big box store, nursery, and any other establishment that ever considered selling a plant pretty much every weekend. I need therapy.) Start paying attention to what goes on sale when; it’s worth it. Sometimes the stuff you get will be winter-hardy, just getting a bit pot-bound and shabby-looking. Sometimes they’re annuals that will need winter protection. Also watch for stores clearing out their bare-root stock in late spring, but check the packages carefully; many bare-root plants die before the store closes them out.

Here's some of those buy-one-get-10-free violas, which wintered over nicely in containers on my porch and were then moved out into the garden.

Sometimes stores will mark stuff way down that’s past its prime or, on rare occasions, let you have stuff free. Always check what I call the sad sack rack, the clearance rack of plants that need a little TLC or maybe have just passed their bloom time. Last weekend I made the mother of all scores, 13 pink Knockout roses at Home Depot--absolutely free. They were tossed in a shopping cart, so my husband (who’s way more brazen than I am), asked if they were throwing them out and, if they were, could we have them. Much to my surprise, they said yes. This doesn’t always work, because sometimes the grower requires the store to certify that the plants have been destroyed in order to refund the store’s original investment. But it’s worth a shot.

Buy 'em small

Smaller plants are cheaper than larger plants, because the grower has invested less time, water, and fertilizer into their care. Often the smaller plants will adjust to transplanting faster and catch up with their larger brethren quickly. Know the plant and its growth rate, and if you don’t need the giant specimen right now, get the smaller one. Bonus: buy perennials bare-root when you can. Bare-root perennials go on sale in late winter to early spring and are generally ⅓ to ½ the cost of the potted versions you’ll see later in the season.

Trade

Trading plants is easy and fun--and it’s a great way to meet other gardeners. I’ve traded in a few different ways: trading with neighbors, via my local gardening group on Facebook (a local in-person gardening club would work well for this too), and online. Just today I traded some of the free roses I got from Home Depot and a peony I grew from bareroot stock on closeout--plus some Sacred Datura that volunteered amid my vegetables--for some strawberries, penstemon, and nodding onions. Learn to propagate (see my first post in this series), and you’ll always have stuff to trade. Try the Gardenweb forums to find online traders. Look for a forum with, “Exchange,” in the name. Offer to help a neighbor dig and divide perennials in return for a few. That’s an especially kind thing to do for someone with physical limitations. Note: I once acquired about 8 rose bushes from a neighbor who wanted them cleared out of his backyard. I did the digging and hauling, which saved him a bunch of effort and netted me a new rose garden. Yay!

Here's a bloom from one of those roses:

You can also host an in-person plant swap. I’ve always wanted to do that. Google “how to host a plant swap” for a bunch of articles telling you, well, how to host a plant swap. Then invite me!

Hit those garage sales

Moving sales and estate sales are especially good for getting garden stuff of all sorts--tools, equipment, pots, and, yes, plants. Especially houseplants, but some outdoor stuff too. I bought a pot of larkspur at a garage sale in Southern California years ago. They seeded all over my yard, and I brought some seed with me to Flagstaff. Here’s the result:

And here's a cymbidium I found at a garage sale in SoCal a few years ago. I wish I still had it. 

Also check out local plant sales. Someone here in Flagstaff has a regular farmstand at her home, where she sells perennials that a) do well in our crazy climate, and b) are cheap. I bought this phlox from her for $1.00 back in May; now look at it!

Forage

I’m going to put a big caveat right up front: obey all laws, and respect private property!

I’ve had good luck foraging for plants in a variety of settings. Here are a few places and strategies that have worked for me:

• Look for construction sites where old homes are being torn down or natural areas are being paved over. Ask for permission to dig up plants. I did this once in a forest outside of Portland, OR, on a site where a school was being built. I used my acquisitions--ferns, trilliums, and all sorts of other native woodland plants--to naturescape the creek in my backyard. Bonus: the plants didn’t get destroyed when the bulldozers showed up.
• Forage in the wild. I’m going to repeat the caveat here: obey all laws! In some places, it’s legal to harvest certain species of wild plants from national and state forests. Check with your local ranger station to find out what you’re allowed to take, from where, and how much.
• Take plastic shopping bags with you. They work better than pots when you’re in the field.
• Check out trash piles. I snagged a gorgeous yellow rose this way. Someone had tossed their rose cuttings in a pile in the woods, and one of them rooted. There was a lovely yellow bloom standing tall and proud above the pile o’ sticks. I’ve also snagged half-dead potted plants from piles by the curb when people are moving or cleaning. The salvias below were foraged from a curbside trash pile in SoCal. They were in 3" pots when my husband found them, wilted and with soil completely dried out. This picture was taken two years later:

Some caveats

• Choose plants that will thrive in your conditions - climate, soil, sun, etc. A dead plant is not a bargain.
• Check any plant you bring home, whether cheap, free or otherwise, for signs of pests and diseases. If your cheapo find infests the rest of your garden with some horrible plague, it’s not a bargain.
• Beware of accidentally foraging an invasive plant. If it takes over your entire garden and starts manufacturing nuclear weapons, it’s not a bargain.
• Give back to people who help you. Pay full price once in awhile (if you can) at the nursery that lets you have stuff for free, take a plate of cookies to your generous neighbor, etc. Being a cheapskate is not the same as being a mooch. Sometimes good customers also get sweetheart deals. These are peaches from a peach tree our local nursery in SoCal gave us. It had some wind damage but was perfectly healthy. We bought most of our plants from them and had them help us with some landscaping, so they were generous with us in return. This was an $80 tree.  

Good luck, fellow cheapskates! May your bargains be many, and your grasshoppers be few.