8- . . . and pretty much everything gets a new lease on a clean life!
Basically, when you want to clean your garden equipment and give every tool a fresh start, vinegar is your best friend. Use it to clean planters, pot saucers, and bird baths, to soak rust off of hose spigots, screws, bolts and other tools, and to sanitize outdoor and/or patio furniture.
9- Flowers last longer indoors, too.
It’s a true gardener’s dilemma: leave flowers outside where they can have a long, healthy life and visit them occasionally, or bring them inside you can admire them even on rainy days, but cut their lifespan short. Vinegar helps make the tough decision much easier by helping to preserve cut flowers!
All you need to do is pour about a quart of water into your favorite vase, then add 2 tablespoons of white distilled vinegar and 1 teaspoon of sugar. Pop in fresh-cut flowers – or even droopy ones that need reviving! – and watch them perk right up.
10- Your pets will know to stay away . . .
If you have dogs or outdoor cats, you know how tempting a fresh garden bed can be to them— and the damage they can do when they decide to snuggle up beneath the flowers! Happily, you don’t have to constantly try to ward them off while you’re doing your planting or banish them inside, because you have vinegar on your side.
All you need to do to discourage Fluffy and Fido is soak some old T-shirts or other pieces of clothing in white vinegar, then place them on some wood stakes around your garden. Replace every 6 to 7 days, and the smell will keep your pets to their part of your yard.
11- . . . and so will wild animals.
Just because an animal isn’t a pet doesn’t mean we want to hurt it to get it to stay away from our fruits, flowers and veggies. After all, as much damage as they do, who would want to hurt a rabbit?! Make the bunnies hop away the natural way by soaking a corncob or two in full-strength vinegar overnight, then placing them around your garden and replacing them every two weeks. Peter Cottontail will give your peas and beans a wide berth after that!
12- Your fruit trees will be protected.
Of course, not all uninvited visitors to your garden are fuzzy, cuddly and adorable. If you’re an ambitious or lucky gardener with some fruit trees, you’re probably plagued by fruit flies. Trap and kill them, in a similar manner to the way you would indoors, with some vinegar.
Mix 1 cup of water, ½ cup cider vinegar, ¼ cup sugar and 1 tablespoon of molasses. Pour an inch of the mixture into 2 or 3 old lidless tin cans, and hang them on your tree. Check and refresh them regularly, and you’ll see that the fruit flies are no match for your vinegar solutions. (It works on moths, too!)
13- Creepy crawly invasions will be no more.
More pests you can ward off with vinegar? Ants, slugs, snails and other insects! Vinegar is a natural insecticide, so you can spray it around the borders of your garden and along the threshold to your home to warn them away, or even eliminate an ant hill by pouring white distilled vinegar directly into it.
It’s not pretty, but to save your vegetables, killing slugs and snails is also necessary. You can kill the garden-destroying pests the natural way just by spraying them directly with vinegar. As always, be careful where you aim!
So many useful ways of using vinegar every home gardener needs to know! How many of them have you heard before? Have you ever tried any of these tricks? Are there any other ways to use vinegar outside that you think should be added to this list? If you have a green thumb, share!
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