Flimsy plastic seedling trays are an abomination. A couple of uses and the are fit for the bin. What a waste. So don’t use them. Make your own pots out of newspaper instead. Fill them with home-made compost and plant your seed.

Once the seedlings have grown, plant pot and seed in the ground.Its so much easier than trying to empty those silly plastic pot and the plant roots are less disturbed.

The square pots featured above  are made from folding newspaper. Find out how, here.

These are really easy to make and I really like them. They are strong enough to take  a lot of watering.

Or you can make round ones.I don’t like these as much – the square ones sit neatly in a tray . However there is certainly less folding and so they are quicker

What to do…

1 Take a drinking glass or can and a sheet of newspaper.

2 Fold the newspaper into a strip about 15 cm wide, so that the strip has several layers to it.

3 Lay the strip on a work surface. Take the glass or can and place the end of the glass so that it is 5cm in from the edge of the paper. Roll the strip of paper around the glass, you may want to use a small piece of masking tape to stick the remaining flap of paper down.

4 Fold in the overlapping paper so that the end of the glass is covered.

5 Stand the glass on it’s end pushing down the paper from within the pot. You may also use a small piece of tape to secure the bottom.

Once you have made your pots, fill with peat free compost and plant your seeds. For extra
stability stand your pots together in a tray. Once the seedling has sprouted two sets of leaves,make a few holes in the sides of the container and then plant it into the ground.

With thanks to recyle for Hampshire and the Makers of the Homestead

You can  buy a special kit for making these but why bother? However if you insist you can get them here(along with a lot of other plastic free garden supplies), from  Amazon  You can read our Amazon policy here.

You can also use toilet roll inners.