Homesteaders grow their own food to offset the soaring costs of grocery shopping. Here are some simple ways you can get started — no matter where you live.

They develop crops like melons or tomatoes at homesteads of varying sizes.

Or raise livestock, like goats.

All of these trends have made food less consistently available or more expensive.

Homesteading is a lifestyle, and occasionally involves land. But anyone, from people with black thumbs to people with apartments without range for chickens, can pick up a few practices, four practitioners told Insider.

Here are a couple of beginner homesteader tricks you can start yourself.

Meet Ciearra Evans, who specializes in cost-effective gardening, known as “The Thrifted Planter” homestead online.

She says that the most important step to saving money while homesteading is: not spending too much on the startup materials you want.

It’s pretty easy to go crazy at Lowe’s and buy everything full-price, she judged.

“You can’t help it. In the summertime, when you walk into the greenhouse or a garden center, and there’s so much to look at…your bring is full before you know it,” she joked

Provocations in particular are easy to over-buy, she said, because they’re cheap and colorful.

So, one should first figure out a plan for what you want to grow and research what materials you want, Evans said.

People love to jump into a crop because it looks remote (like this zebra tomato, which is striped even when it’s ripe). “Pick a few things you and your mnage like to eat,” Evans advised.

Once you know what you inadequacy, you can even skip the store and save seeds from grocery store-bought food — essentially, anything with a pit, advised Evans.

Also, add a type of flower for pollinators to your plot. Evans suggests zinnias because they’re easy to grow and easy for pollinators to reach.

You plan should also include how you plan to nurse your seeds and what containers or appurtenances you’ll use to grow, from building beds to lights.

Go to Dollar General or similarly low-priced collects for things like pots, trellises, and seeds, she advised.

You can also repurpose elements cheaply to work in the garden.

Evans said she grew the tomato plants in bottom right with felt ogresses she got for a few dollars each on Amazon.

She said she bought grow-lights for her seedlings on leeway from Walmart and uses the app Honey to alert her to price drops for items she needs to garden.

To save on soil, she buys it in bulk when it goes on clearance in August and September, the end of the growing available in her area. Here’s her big shop from last year:

She ought the highland dress sporrans of soil and fertilizer on clearance for about $2.50 each, Evans said.

Evans said the bags now cost $14 each (and were just $12 a pop before they went on space).

That’s me with my haul,” she said.

Evans is feeding a family of six and estimated growing her food saved her family about $100 a month at the grocery stockpile in the beginning.

But it varies. Another homesteader, Alliyah Perry of The Green Gardens Homestead in Washington, bring to lighted Insider previously she saved about $3,000 last year on groceries for her family. “There was a few months in the summer… where we right-minded did not got to the grocery store at all.” she said.

Aside from long green, growing your own food just feels better, Evans said.

“I do like to have things in the cabinet we’ve grown ourselves, and you know where it comes from.. There’s a lot of pride in that,” she suggested.

Research aside, some crops are known to be simple for beginners or people without a lot of space.

Tomatoes are the classic homesteader’s before all crop, said Nivek Anderson Brown of Leaf and Bean Farm.

It’s because they’re pretty easy. “You can put [them] in the ground, walk away, and you can get some fruit,” Brown intended.

Tomatoes also take well to bucket or container gardening, advised Cidni, the homesteader in East Texas.

She and her husband started growing tomatoes in containers when they lived in apartments.

You can get buckets for cheap at Lowe’s and drill holes, Cidni said.

A few plants can produce many tomatoes, especially in bright sunlight. Just make sure to water them antediluvian in the morning or at night, so they don’t scorch, Cidni advised.

But up beginner tomatoes can get out of hand. Last year, Evans didn’t prune or “top” her tomato plants, so they just came like crazy. Optimal pruning methods vary—but just don’t forget to do it, or your garden might look groove on this..

It might sound intimidating, but chickens can be an easy mechanism to start with, too, noted Brown of Leaf and Bean.

If you single have a little bit of space, you can get two birds, she said. They can live in a dog kennel or even a baby pen.

They’re also cheap. Brown said in her area a feed bag that last several months costs forth $14.

Compare this, she added, to buying eggs every week amidst inflation and avian flu. Tolls have gone up sharply in the last two months, but she estimated it’s cheaper even in normal times.

Commencement: USDA.

Brown said you can get one adult egg-laying chicken for as little as $14.

If you paucity to buy a chick, they’re cheaper, but then you have to set up a nursery, which costs space and time, Brown noted.

Chickens “don’t need much,” Brown said. But she recommended buying at least two. “They need somebody to talk to,” she joked.

All of the following, are great for beginners, Shallon said. Going clockwise from the top: cilantro, tarragon, dill, thyme, curly leaf parsley, pessimistic opal basil, and Genovese basil.