Introduction: Poor Mans Paper Coffee Cup Garden.
This is an instructable on how to make a cheap, easy, coffee cup garden.
i made this because it was really cheap, so it works out because i don't have any money to spend.
hope you like this easy to make garden and please vote.
Step 1: What You Need to Get Started
1. paper coffee cups
2. stapler
3. popsicle sticks
4. bamboo skewers
5. marker
6. dirt
7. knife
8. seeds, total i spent $4.27 on seeds, i could have made twenty times this garden
Step 2: Putting the Cups Together
first determin how many cups your going to use if your only going to make one cup you can skip this step.
what you want to do is put your cups in eather a rectangle arangment or square to make kind of like a grid.
when you set them up make sure to mark what edges that are touching each other.
then take each one of the cups and cut the edges down so they are flat like shown.
Step 3: Lets Get Down and Dirty
time to fill your cup or cups with dirt.
you want to find some dirt either outside or you can buy some prefertilized dirt from the store.
you will want to fill your cup up to about half an inch from the top making sure to lightly pack the dirt in.
Step 4: The Name Game
to make sure you know what plant is in your cup we will want to use the popsicle sticks and a marker.
use your marker and wright on your popsicle the name of your plant your growing.
Step 5: Planting the Seeds
use one of the bamboo skewers to put a little hole in the dirt.
take two seeds and put them in the dirt, the only reason why i say two seeds is becuase then you know for sure atleast on is going to grow.
you dont want to put any more than two because then you will have to many plants growing in one cup.
Step 6: Bamboo Time
now the last step. put one skewer in each of the cups of dirt, of to the side a little make sure the skewer is touching the bottom of the cup. now make sure to water you plants daily.
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10 Comments
12 years ago on Introduction
This is a fairly common idea though. I have been doing this for years already.
Btw, are you adding this to the garden contest?
Reply 5 years ago
Hi Sfcsarah - I know this is such an old thread but i've been trying to grow plants in coffee cups but find that the bottoms go gross where i puncture holes in them. Did you have any solutions?
12 years ago on Introduction
Great idea for using paper coffee cups for gardening purposes. I never thought to use them that way. We always buy the cups because of their "green" ability (and it saves us throwing away plastic AND washing dishes,) this would be a great way to reuse them. An even closer-to-home recycling so to say. I linked where we buy our cups (in bulk, because it's cheaper) above if anyone wants to get a head start on their garden, or change their use habits. :)
Thanks for the article! Maybe we can match it up with a green watering system, too!
12 years ago on Introduction
The skewers are to allow the plants to grow up them (in the case of peas/tomatoes/beans they need to grow up something, without anything they'll just sprawl out over the available space and not grow ~properly (which is OK, but not good for your space management))
12 years ago on Introduction
what is the use of the bamboo skewers?
12 years ago on Introduction
That's a good idea you have to reuse those coffee cups. I think we still need to punch some drainage holes at the bottom.
The other idea was using the tin food cans for the same purpose.
Thanks for sharing.
Noina Bruno
12 years ago on Introduction
Great! I have some plant seedlings at home I need to get going, maybe I'll use some of the coffee cups left in the office.
Do you poke a hole in the bottom of the cup so the water drains?
12 years ago on Introduction
When I was gardening, I used this method.
When I transplanted, I would cut the cup leaving the top few inches of the cup in place. The effect being that a inch of cup would stick out of the ground and surround the stem. I did not have a cutworm problem when I did this, plus the cup would decompose.
12 years ago on Introduction
Nice idea !
I'd almost regret:
1 - I don't drink coffee
2 - the local coffee-cups are not big enough (and made of plastic).
I may get some from the waste-bin at work and get some more seeds going (Although I am already running out of places to store them)
Also, when I plant seeds I usually cover the vessel up with some plastic (like cling film) so I don't run the risk of the soil drying out witing for the seeds to germinate.
Reply 12 years ago on Introduction
yeah i was thinking about making a greenhouse type thing from bamboo skewers and seran wrap to go around the whole thing.