by Texas Homesteader ~ 

The other day I decided to try a gardening hack I’d read about. I wanted to paint some small rocks red to look like strawberries. The idea is to Trick Birds Away From Your Garden Strawberries.

The birds see the bright-red faux berries and decide to swoop in for a little snack. A few pecks of that rock hard ‘strawberry‘ and they decide you’re an awful gardener and move on, leaving future strawberries for your own harvest.

I already had the paint, I already had the rocks, but I didn’t have a small paintbrush. So I decided to make one on the fly.

All I  needed was a tiny scrap piece of absorbent material & an ordinary clothespin.

 

Y’all know I typically use RancherMan’s clean but holey socks for rags. So I already had plenty of scrap material. That cotton terrycloth is absorbent and soft, I knew it would work great for my paintbrush. So I cut a small strip from one of those old socks to repurpose for my current project.

I rolled the strip of cloth and used a clothespin to hold the material together to make my homemade paintbrush.

Voila! It worked perfectly for my painted-rock project.

When I was through painting I simply removed the clothespin from the cloth and put it back in my bag of laundry clothespins to be used for its intended purpose.

That tiny bit of repurposed material is the only thing that went into the trash.

Now it’s true that this paintbrush could never do fine detailing and such. But it worked perfectly for my project.

And as a bonus? No new paintbrushes needed to be purchased and either cleaned/stored or thrown away just to be repurchased over & over again. SCORE!

#UseWhatchaGot!

~TxH~

Other ‘Use Whatcha Got’ Ideas

• Make A Cute Porch Lantern
• Assuring Safety Around An Underground Cistern
• Repurposing An Empty Parmesan Cheese Container – BRILLIANT!
• MYO Simple Craft Paintbrush In A Pinch
• Replacing Our Bedside Clock/Radio
• Predator Guard For Our Martin House
• Trick Birds Away From Garden Strawberries
• Protecting Tender Seedlings
• Safer Straight-Pin Storage
• Tame Electrical Cords
• Save Your Fingernails When Cleaning
• MYO Chalkboard Labels
• Keeping Boots Stored Neatly

All ‘Use Whatcha Got’ Posts

My Favorite Garden Hacks

• Easy Garden Planning Spreadsheet
• Getting A Jump: Planting An Indoor Greenhouse
• Repurposed Cardboard Seed-Starting Pots
• 3-Sister’s Garden – The Original Companion Planting
• Low-Cost Vegetable Gardening
• Using Cheap Biodegradable Weed Block
• Tricking Birds AWAY From Your Strawberry Plants
• Easy Compost For A Healthy Garden
• Propping Tender Seedlings
• Cheap (or FREE) Wood Mulch For The Garden
• Homestead Hack: Remember Where You Planted Seeds
• How Vegetable Gardening Can Change Your Life!
• Easy Deep-Soak Watering
• Planting Potatoes In Galvanized Trough

MORE Gardening Posts

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