Recyling Panty Hose in the Garden and Home
Growing pumpkins or squash? If you have squash pests, covering them with pantyhose, tights, or stockings keeps them safe and lets enough air in to let the fruit mature! This technique works well for apples, too, and storing onions and garlic. See new uses for old socks and nylon stockings.
Like me, you probably have a drawer or box with tights and nylon stockings that you no longer wear. And perhaps you keep all those single mateless socks that emerge from the wash because you hope the other sock will turn up!
I’ve mastered the art of finding new uses for them. I don’t turn them into rugs, quilts, sock puppets, doll clothes, pet outfits, or anything that requires real work. Below, you’ll find a (very) few of my favorites. Please add some of your own in the comments!
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New Uses for Old Socks
Don’t throw out those old or lonely socks! There are many smart ways they can be useful:
- Nothing works better for dusting and scrubbing than slipping both hands into cotton socks and getting to work. Spritz the palms with appropriate cleaning products and use them on the floor, the counters, the ceiling fan, the car, the window blinds, the baby, or the dog. They’re washable, too, and good for many reuses. Check out some of our favorite homemade cleaners.
- Unmated socks also make good storage bags, especially for organizing a junk drawer. Use them to store loose extension cords, crayons, or pieces from board games and jigsaw puzzles or to organize toiletries when packing a suitcase. Use a permanent marker to categorize the contents and a rubber band or twist-tie to secure the bag.
- Hang a sturdy sock from a kitchen hook and toss your spare change into it once a week. At the end of the year, add the accumulated change to your emergency savings account or put it towards a special treat. We use ours, usually about $50, to buy some holiday-feast items that wouldn’t otherwise make it onto our shopping list.
- As bar soaps shrink to small slivers, collect them in a cotton sock, tie up the end, and use them as a soap-in-a-bag for baths and showers.
- Make a cold or hot pack: Fill a cotton knee sock or tube sock about ⅔ full of dried rice, lentils, beans, or dried corn kernels. Tie it shut with a piece of twine. Place in the freezer for a flexible cold pack. Microwave for 1 or 2 minutes for a hot pack. For a real treat, slip a couple of warm ones under the covers at the foot of your bed to warm up your feet on a chilly night.
- Cold-weather walkers and runners: pull a couple of long wool socks over your lighter-weight gloves at the start of a winter jaunt. If your hands get too warm, pull the socks off and tuck them into your waistband or stuff them up the sleeves of your jacket.
Smart Garden Hacks for Old Tights or Pantyhose
Just when you thought you were safe from pantyhose! Your worn-out pantyhose can actually be incredibly useful in the garden. (If you don’t have pantyhose, find a stretch material.)
- Since nylon is stretchable, it works for tying tomato plants to their cages so the growing stems do not become top-heavy. Strong and stretchy, the soft fabric won’t injure the plant stem, and it will expand as the stem grows in diameter. Wrap once around the stem, not too tightly, before tying it to the stake. This gardening hack is also useful for other plants and young trees—and a great way to avoid squash vine borers!
- As melons, gourds, and squashes are heavy, providing support to the stems is essential to keep them from breaking. Use clean pantyhose or stockings to wrap around the fruits. Here are some instructions and pictures.
- Protect your garden fruits and vegetables from maggots, codling moths, and other insects by wrapping them in the stockings or nylon socks, when they’re immature in size. Due to the stretching ability of nylon, the fruits will not be stressed and gain their size easily, and the fabric will work as a barrier against these pests.
- A leg or a whole pantyhose makes a good container for stored onions or garlic. Hang it from a hook in a cool, dry place. The air circulation and flexibility of the fabric make pantyhose perfect!
- Collect seeds from your flowering plants and vegetables before they cast them down on the ground and become invisible. Just cover the brown ripening pods or seed heads with pantyhose.
See how we use pantyhose in the garden!
Find more great tips for reusing, renewing, and refreshing. Also, get fun ideas for upcycling or repurposing old objects!
Margaret Boyles
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For years I used a sock as a "case" for my 35mm cameras. I inverted the ankle part back over the foot part, creating a double thickness of sock, and kept a camera-in-sock standing on end in my very well-compartmentalized purse for handy access. Today's camera phones seem (I don't know for sure -- I don't own one) to be a lot more delicate than my 35mm workhorses, but if you have a camera phone in a case, maybe the doubled-over-sock can still be helpful as a protective cushion. Maybe?
What a great use for mismatched socks!
We have great fun dressing newborn baby pygmy and Nigerian goats in socks during chilly winter months. Cut a slice across the heel (front legs slip thru here), snip off the toe (this part faces the rear), and cut off or roll down the ribbed ankle section to form a turtleneck. The business part of the baby is left exposed and functional, plus Mom can sniff and identify in a crowd.
How do you use the panty hose to stop the squash vine borers? No description was given in the article.
I recently read that someone cut up old socks to slip around canned foods to protect them from bumping into each other and shattering! We live in earthquake country so any little thing helps!
We find that old socks are perfect for stretching over our outdoor faucets when the time comes to wrap them for cold weather. Simply layer several the full length of the faucet and, if needed, secure at the base with another sock, tied snugly
Nice post! Thanks for your sharing.
Cut off the foot part, and cut a 1 inch hole in the side of the ankle part of the sock, and slip over your wrists and poke your thumbs out the side holes, to keep your wrists and hands warm when you still want your fingers exposed. These are great when painting (either art or house painting), as a handy place to wipe your brush, and steady yourself with your hand against walls when painting. When it's not necessary to wear gloves or mittens outside, these under your jacket or sweater sleeves keep you much warmer. They also provide comfortable wrist support.
Thanks, Donnarose.
