Made my first four raised beds today.

jlock274 · Thu Mar 03, 2011 9:18 pm

Made my first four raised beds today. I had a lot of fun and it was really good practice as I have many more beds to build before spring. Hopefully the willow tree will be coming down next week.

Willow Tree that will be removed

Section of the yard that will be spaced out garden boxes.

Another section of the yard dedicated to garden boxes.

lakngulf · Thu Mar 03, 2011 9:55 pm

Great start, and you have some big plans. What type dirt do you plan to use? Also, is that snow? We have been in the high 70s down here. I guess the early spring predicted by the groundhog is coming through.

DoubleDogFarm · Thu Mar 03, 2011 10:34 pm

alaskagold · Fri Mar 04, 2011 8:13 am

Eric he can always use rebar in the corners, pounded in the ground.

jlock are those logs presser treated?

And holy COW that is one large willow tree. Are you going to have a tree service come and do it? are you doing it yourself? are you pulling up the stump as well? FYI (or maybe it is just where I live) willows have this weird ability to regrow from the roots. I can't tell you how many times I have had to dig up roots because I have a new tree from an old root. Good luck on that monster!

sjohnson9206 · Fri Mar 04, 2011 9:21 am

Looks good, but I agree with DD. We built a raised bed for strawberries a similar way last year, and even with re-inforced corners, it's still pulling apart. The ones we build this year will have the overlapped corners.

jal_ut · Fri Mar 04, 2011 12:19 pm

What is that soil like the beds are sitting on? All over Illinois I saw acres of corn and soy beans growing on the soil nature gave us. If it is shallow and rocky I can understand the raised beds, however I can't understand the compulsion to make raised beds if your soil is any good at all. Much easier and cheaper to just garden in the soil that is there.

DoubleDogFarm · Fri Mar 04, 2011 12:27 pm

rainbowgardener · Fri Mar 04, 2011 12:30 pm

To each his own, and if I had acreage like jal does, I would certainly not waste time and money trying to put it in boxes. But I do love my raised beds. Makes sure you never walk on your soil, so it stays nice and loose. Allows you to concentrate amendments, compost etc, in the spot you are growing in and not have it wash away. A lot easier to have good loose soil very deep, without having to do all the labor of double digging. (It takes work to build the boxes, but it is one time work, mine are in their ninth season.) Makes a good spot for putting hoops in, so that you can have poly tunnel, row cover, deer netting or whatever you need over it. ETC.... If you only have a little bit of garden space, raised beds help you get the most use and productivity out of it.

jal_ut · Fri Mar 04, 2011 7:42 pm

Rainbow, I have no qualms at all about walking on my soil. In fact, after I plant seed I walk on it to firm the soil to hold the moisture. Light, fluffy, loose soil dries out more quickly. Don't worry the roots can penetrate.

I have never seen any of my amendments wash away.

Hoops, tunnels, netting, trellising etc, work just as well on a flat plot as around a raised bed.

If your goal is to make work, then make raised beds. If your goal is to grow food with as little fuss and expense as possible, then just garden.

I am coming back to my original question: What is the soil like that you are putting the beds on? Good chance its better than what you will fill them with.

"To each his own" I guess that's it ok.

jlock274 · Fri Mar 04, 2011 8:08 pm

Anything not made right will fall apart. I have seen overlapping and understand the reasons and may do some beds like that too. I always have been one to learn my lessons the hard way... lol.

garden5 · Sat Mar 05, 2011 12:57 pm

Your beds look great! Very nice and neat looking.

Like RG said, though; one of the reason folks go with beds is that they don't have to walk on the soil. Do you plant on gardening like this? If so, your beds may be a little too wide.

However, you could easily fix this by running a board over the middle for a walkway.

Jal, I can see your points and they are good ones.

I garden in-ground and also walk in the garden. However, I also find that I have to repeatedly cultivate it in order to fix the packed down pathways that I make. I did put in a small spot that was just a small square that I didn't walk in. I found that I was able to mulch it so I didn't have to weed and since I didn't walk in it, I didn't have to till.

Like you say, though, to each his own. Everybody's situation is different, though. Your garden seems to be fine with you walking around. Mine...not so much

.

In the future, wouldn't mind putting in a few, no walk, no till, no weed beds.

jal_ut · Sat Mar 05, 2011 7:06 pm

In the future, wouldn't mind putting in a few, no walk, no till, no weed beds.

When you figure out how to make no weed beds, let me know.

jlock274 · Sat Mar 05, 2011 7:19 pm

The beds are not in their final destinations. I had just made them when I took the picture. I can walk them anywhere I want in the yard and of coarse I am going to have isles large enough for a wheel barrel or lawn mower...

soil · Sat Mar 05, 2011 8:48 pm

If your goal is to make work, then make raised beds. If your goal is to grow food with as little fuss and expense as possible, then just garden.

DoubleDogFarm · Sat Mar 05, 2011 10:36 pm

jlock274 · Sun Mar 06, 2011 12:14 am

DoubleDogFarm · Sun Mar 06, 2011 12:56 am

John,

I removed my posting. Good luck on your project.

Eric

rainbowgardener · Sun Mar 06, 2011 8:54 am

Sure, post more pictures... you are doing great!

I took down a tree last season to get more sun for my raised beds too. Not as tall or nice a tree (mine was tree of heaven, an alien invasive, so a good thing to get rid of anyway). But I may this season take down a few more, since my property has lots of trees and not lots of space to grow veggies.

Some of us gardeners get kind of obsessive, but all in good spirit and trying to be helpful and informative. What works is what works for you. Everyone has to figure out the kind of gardening that works in their garden, not only with their climate, soil, etc, but with how much time they can put in, how much they can spend, what their physical condition is like, etc.

garden5 · Sun Mar 06, 2011 10:47 am

By all means keep posting!

Don't take us the wrong way. Ha, like RBG just said, sometimes we can get a little too helpful

.

We're not trying to criticize you work at all, more like thinking out loud about ideas/inspirations we got from your pic.

Keep up the good work and let us know how the garden progresses.

DeborahL · Sun Mar 06, 2011 4:24 pm

What's rebar?

jal_ut · Sun Mar 06, 2011 4:50 pm

Rebar = steel reinforcing rods used in concrete. It normally comes in 20 foot lengths. The rods have little bumps on them so they won't slide in the concrete. Gardeners can use it for a number of applications. You can get it in different diameters. It is fairly inexpensive. Lumber yards , or hardware stores that sell lumber usually stock it.

DeborahL · Sun Mar 06, 2011 6:23 pm

Thanks. I wonder why it's called REbar?

DoubleDogFarm · Sun Mar 06, 2011 7:41 pm

It's short for Reinforcing bar

Eric

rainbowgardener · Mon Mar 07, 2011 7:03 am

My local big box store stocks rebar in a variety of lengths, down to 3 feet.

It is what I used to hold my raised beds together. Just got a huge drill bit and drilled a hole straight down through the stack of fence posts and then pounded the rebar in with a sledge hammer. (Not so bad for a 5'3" grandmother!)

Father's Daughter · Mon Mar 07, 2011 11:10 am

Thanks for posting the pictures, JLock. I now know what we can do with some of those cedar fence posts hanging around in our yard! My husband picked them up about 15 of them for free from a local fence company and used them as rollers when he moved our shed last fall. He's been trying to figure out what to do with them...

soil · Mon Mar 07, 2011 11:22 am

I took down a tree last season to get more sun for my raised beds too. Not as tall or nice a tree (mine was tree of heaven, an alien invasive, so a good thing to get rid of anyway). But I may this season take down a few more, since my property has lots of trees and not lots of space to grow veggies.

we have the tree of heaven's too, they are a horrible tree for the local ecosystems here. they are allelopathic and have negative effects on pretty much everything but grass. which is probably because they are a nitrogen fixer if memory serves me right. make sure you let them dry before giving them soil contact, they will root from my experiences. we cut them down on our property and they grow right back like nothing. also help others get rid of them. I do know a guy who coppice's them on purpose for growing oyster mushroom logs.