How to Grow Your Own Plants at Home Easily

If you’re short on outdoor space, the likelihood is, you’ll be short on indoor space too. Hands up if you definitely don’t have a shed or greenhouse for storing your gardening gear in.

For those just starting out though, you really don’t need a load of bulky spades, pots and hi-tech hydroponics to grow your own in a small space. In fact, you can go ultra low-key and use up stuff you probably already have lying around.

From your recycling bin, dig out cardboard egg boxes, which make ideal pods for chitting potatoes; washed out yoghurt pots and jam jars work well as starter plant pots (although drainage will be a problem longer term), and you can plant seedlings in used toilet roll tubes.

With kitchen gardening, the first step is to accept that some things will take up too much space, need too much light, and won’t yield all that much when home-grown.

So, when it comes to dill, coriander and tarragon, for instance, you’re generally better off buying bunches (preferably plastic-free) from the grocery store instead.

Your everyday staples though, like basil, parsley, rosemary and sage, all deserve a spot on the sill (cleaned tomato cans will do for pots) and won’t dominate your kitchen.

When it comes to your front step, realistically you’re likely to have three patches of space: One on either side of the door and potentially space for a hanging plant above.

Most people fill these gaps with topiary and pots of lavender, but if you want veg instead, here’s what you could replace them with:

1. A heavy duty grow bag (the size of a bucket) full of potato plants. All the better if it’s got handles so you can easily move its position if need be.