Save those empty plastic milk jugs and liter bottles for the garden or for your container plants - then when you are through with them, toss them in your yellow lidded recycle bin. Here are two neat ideas of ways to use them in the garden.
1) Cut the bottom out of the gallon milk jug and remove the cap for ventilation. When you have young tomatoes, peppers, and other warm weather vegetable plants and hear that it is going to dip into low temperatures at night, set them over the plant as a cloche. This will work like a little hothouse and protect your plants till the weather stablizes and nights are consistently warm. Be careful and watch during the day in case the air inside the cloche becomes too hot. If that happens, set it aside and put it back over the plant in the evening.
2) Use either plastic liter bottles or milk jugs for this tip. Cut out the bottom of the jug or bottle you choose to use. Purchase some soft, cotton rope. You will be using the rope to make wicks that will slowly feed water into the soil at the root zone of the plant.
Cut a hole in the cap large enough to thread the rope through. Screw the cap on tight. Make sure the piece of rope (wick) is long enough inside the jug to become filled with water and act as a wick. Turn the jug upsidedown next to your tomato plants or beside any of your plants. Determine the length you need the wick to be so it lays close to the root of the plant. Cut it to length then cover it with soil. Finally bury the jug in enough soil so it is stabilized, then fill it with water. The water will slowly soak through the rope wick into the soil and keep the root zone moist. When the jug is nearly empty, it will be easy to fill. You can also add fertilizer as needed.
