If you love growing your own food at home, you may wonder, is it cheaper to grow your own vegetables? Gardening provides you with many advantages: It’s a good choice for relaxation, improves the appearance of your house, and supplies great fresh food.
Most significantly, planting a garden can help you save money for food instead of buying groceries. However, this is dependent on the expenses of cultivating the crops, categories, and quantities of vegetables planted, garden yields, and other elements. So, if you do it properly, it will save you a lot.
Is It Cheaper To Grow Your Own Vegetables?
Generally, cultivating a vegetable garden is one of the most effective ways to save money and even increase your food source and food safety. Instead of spending a large amount of money buying food from supermarkets, it is cheaper to grow your vegetables.
For instance, when you plant a cucumber plant, you have free cucumber seasonally instead of purchasing it.
However, to truly understand how much cheaper it is when you grow a garden, consider several key factors. You will need an initial investment. This money will be spent on seeds, soil, fertilizer, gardening tools, etc. Fortunately, a lot of fruit and veggies seeds are sold at a low price, so your investment does not cost too much.
Besides, you use this expenditure in several ongoing tasks like watering, pesticides, and other methods to protect your crops against harmful insects and diseases.
But don’t worry! There are a wide variety of cost-efficient vegetables that you can plant in your garden. Let’s scroll down to find out!
What Are The Cheapest Vegetables To Grow?
Lettuce
You’ll recover your investment from a $3 package of lettuce seed and enjoy your fresh lettuce for a few months. You should avoid planting too many seeds because mature lettuces will easily bolt if you don’t harvest them on time.
During the growing season, you should keep the rest of the seeds replanted every two to three weeks. This makes sure that there is always a stable supply of fresh lettuces for your meal.
Garlic
Garlic is one of the simplest vegetables to cultivate, and it’s commonly planted in the winter to save space in the yard. Garlic does not enjoy competition, so you need to weed your garden regularly. Picking on time and curing help generate high-quality garlic.
Garlic grows best in northern climates, especially in autumn. When you plant garlic in this season, its roots have time to develop, and its tops remain under the surface roughly three weeks before the earth freezes in the winter.
Winter Squash
Winter squash is also a popular choice for you since it’s simple to grow, doesn’t require weeding, and, most significantly, lasts all winter, offering a valuable veggie to your food source during winter and spring.
Before cultivating, the squash bed should be well-prepared, and the runners should have plenty of space to expand. Winter squash is a suitable and efficient option and to save your money if you have large spare space to grow it.
Tomatoes
Tomatoes are a great long-term investment. They don’t require much room and are extremely simple to crop. Tomato seeds are the most cost-effective and generate the most affordable gain, but they will take a long period to mature. Purchasing mature plants or seedlings will cost you $5 and $9 but will deliver you fruity tomatoes much sooner.
Cucumber
Many gardeners choose to crop cucumbers as they are a favorite fruit and easy to grow up. You don’t need a special cure or spend too much time cultivating them.
Cucumber seeds are around $5 per packet, and each plant will produce up to four-pound cucumbers. You only need around three plants to break even, which soon becomes a return on your investment.
Herbs
If you often buy herbs from groceries, you’ll realize they are sold at a higher price than several plants. It’s time to think about growing herbs in your garden. Herb seeds are cost-efficient, so you’re overpaying for them in the supermarkets.
You can crop various herbs such as basil, rosemary, mint, etc. They will grow up very quickly, give your garden the best smell, and help you cook delicious dishes.
Conclusion
Is it cheaper to grow your own vegetables? Yes, it is more affordable for you to produce your own food at home than buying outside. You will have a chance to be close to nature, take care of your plants, and provide yourself with high-quality food without worrying about food safety or supply shortage.
