Use A Plastic Bottle To Keep Garden Hoses Neat & Organized

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It's not uncommon to drive through a neighborhood and spot at least one garden hose on a lawn tangled in random loops, kinks, and spiraling twists that give it a Medusa-like appearance. While fancy hose reels and discreet hose pots are awesome options, sometimes you may need a quick garden hose-wrangling fix at the last minute — and better yet, on a budget. Cue the humble, and seemingly everlasting, plastic water bottle. Handy YouTuber dailyoriginalvids offers a genius hack to store the garden hose in your yard and keep it out of sight. It involves cutting a plastic bottle and using it along with its cap to essentially create a makeshift mounted cord holder.

This clever garden hack takes only a few minutes to complete and gives a second life to a plastic bottle that might otherwise end up in your recycling bin. And while the finished hose organizer may not win you any backyard beauty contest, it can, however, offer a simple solution for storing your garden hose neatly and reducing the clutter around your home or garage.

To get started on this DIY, you'll need a pair of heavy-duty or all-purpose shears to cut through the thick plastic on the bottle's neck. You can find these on Amazon for under $10, such as Fiskars' All Purpose Scissors. An everyday hammer will do for this project, and you can find a decent one around the same price on Amazon or at your local Home Depot or Lowe's. 

Before building your holder, unwind your tangled garden hose and wrap it in a neat loop on the ground. Your next task involves cutting the empty bottle in half. After that, you'll need to make a hole in the bottle. The hole you make in the bottom of one of the halves should be big enough for the cap to fit through. It could be helpful to trace a guideline with a marker first — just to avoid cutting more than needed. 

Once you test it to ensure a good fit, slide the neck opening through the hole, then screw on the cap. The DIY holder is essentially complete at this point. But as seen in the video, the bottle's curved bottom can double as a hanging point, allowing the entire hose to be hung from a nail or hook mounted on a wall. Now you can quickly store your hose without taking up more floor space in your garage or shed.

So, can this hack prevent your garden hose from reducing your home's curb appeal by keeping it neat and manageable? Yes. Can it reduce those kinks and tangles that can lead to premature hose degradation? Possibly. The idea seems pretty reasonable if you have a short, lightweight hose. 

However, there are reasons to be skeptical regarding its durability and longevity. For example, it seems that your average water bottle size, which is about 17 ounces, may not be ideal for longer or heavier garden hoses, such as those spanning 75 feet or more. At the very least, a larger, longer bottle (such as a liter) may be required. But even then, it's questionable that a single nail will support the weight of a heavy hose on the edge of a water bottle for the long term. 

It seems that a more reliable mounting hook would be required, as the edge of the bottle will either slide off the nail, bend, or simply tear due to the weight of the hose. That being stated, this may be a good idea for budgeting homeowners seeking a temporary fix to a common household issue. At minimum, this DIY is definitely worth trying out if you have the supplies, especially when you factor in the low cost.