Ask TennZen: Does gardening really pay?

It's time for another edition of "Ask TennZen," in which I do my best to answer your questions. As always, any advice offered here is taken at your own risk. Your mileage may vary.

In regards to my post about planting potatoes, I was asked:

"Would you mind telling me what your total costs are for the project (like for the organic compost and excluding sunk costs like tools you already own and trash you composted yourself) are? Does it end up saving you money?"

Thanks for the great question.

It sure does save us money to grow our own.

Allow me to break down the costs for you.

Mushroom compost: We've spent $25 so far. It will probably take one more truckload to fill up the next layer of tires, once the plants have grown tall enough to clear a layer. So, total compost cost: $50

Seed potatoes: $10 Seed potatoes go a long way because you don't plant the whole thing. You cut them up into chunks with two or three eyes per chunk, then you plant the chunks... about 4 chunks in each stack of tires.

Total spent: $60

Spending $60 to get $1500 worth of potatoes? I'd call that a pretty good investment, wouldn't you?

I'll expand this out a little further.

The tires: FREE. We went to a local tire shop and they let us have as many used tires as we wanted, as long as we promised not to burn them. You can also find them at junkyards (and plenty of other dumping places).

Extra compost: FREE. Kitchen scraps, yard trimmings, cut up leaves, shredded paper, coffee grounds and all other compostable household waste.

Water: FREE. We have rain barrels that we use to catch rainwater, which is used to water the garden. We use discarded plastic drums to catch the water.

If we run out of rain water, we do use water from the faucet to supplement for watering the garden if we need it. But the cost is usually no more than a dollar or two extra on our monthly water bill.

Fertilizer: Not necessary, because of the compost. But if you wanted to add extra fertilizer - say, Miracle Gro - the cost would be less than $10.

Gardening equipment: Nothing special. A shovel. Probably $20 at Home Depot. Other than that, we use the best tools on earth - our hands. With the potato tires, you don't need anything big like a tiller or tractor because all of this is done right on top of the ground.

Pesticide: We don't use for organic gardening. But if you wanted to use something like Sevin dust, the cost would be less than $20.

So, if I had bought all the above, total cash outlay would still be less than $100. $100 to get $1500 is still a fantastic return.

I hope this answers your question.

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