The $0 Tomato: Discover "No-Cost Gardening"

I hate reality shows. However there's one that's just kicking off out in San Francisco that I'm looking forward to watching. You might call it "The Frugal Farmers" or "Gardeners Gone Wild."

The challenge: Raise half the food you eat this year in a garden that costs absolutely nothing to maintain.

Anneli Rufus and Kristan Lawson are the authors of The Scavengers' Manifesto, and are the brain trust behind what they call "No-Cost Gardening." They're taking the challenge themselves and have thrown down the gardener's gauntlet for you to do the same. They'll be reporting their progress -- the good, the bad and the arugula -- on their Website, and I plan to check back in with them periodically here at The Green Cheapskate to see how their garden grows.

Anneli and Kristan describe themselves as full-time scavengers. "We've made a lifestyle out of getting stuff (legally) without spending a cent," they say. My Inner Miser applauds them for helping to show people that gardening need not be expensive. Sadly, what started out as a way to save money (i.e. growing your own food) has, in our uber consumer society, morphed into a $40 billion annual industry of specialized gardening tools, overpriced seeds and nursery stock and even stylish garden apparel. Do you really need a special wardrobe to dig in the dirt?

Here are some of the tips from Anneli's and Kristan's Website for getting plant seeds for little or no cost:

• Saving the seeds from store-bought produce. It's amazing how often this works and yet how few people do it.
• Seed swaps. Various clubs and cliques of gardening enthusiasts hold "seed exchanges" or "seed swaps," in which a group of like-minded individuals get together to trade seeds.
• Saving the seeds from the plants we planted last year. We always try to let at least one plant of each type "bolt" and go to seed, so we can save its seeds and start the cycle all over again the following year.
• Get old packets of seeds for free or cheap, then plant more than you need, taking into account the fact that only half of the seeds at most will ever sprout.
• Seed sales at discount stores. If you're lucky, you can catch the right moment when some discount supermarkets drastically lower the prices of already-cheap seed packets as they approach their expiration date.
• Buying expired and old seed packets at garage sales for very little money. Old seed packets don't crop up too often at sales, but when they do, you can often get them for ten cents or twenty-five cents a packet.

Check out their Website for the details, more tips, and info on the No-Cost Gardening challenge and stay tuned for regular rutabaga reports here at The Green Cheapskate.

Learn more about starting a garden from seeds.

Jeff Yeager is the author of the book The Ultimate Cheapskate's Road Map to True Riches. His Website is www.UltimateCheapskate.com.