Muddy knees David (oh2fly) wrote:

quote:

Am I the only one in the raised bed camp?

In the three years I have been active on this forum, I was thinking just the other day that I have seen a sharp increase in the discussion of raised beds just this year. So... let's discuss.

Who is growing with raised beds? I'll start a list here.

When did you start using raised beds? Are your beds framed? If so, what size is the framing and with what materials? If wood, what type of wood did you use? Did you purchase it of scavenge it? How many raised beds do you have?

What did you use for soil/materials inside the bed(s)? Are you glad you made the change? What crop production changes have you noticed since switching?

Before switching to raised beds, did you use conventional, single-row planting or did you use wide rows?

Please post photos if you have them. I'll post my details and photos tonight. Back to the garden for the day now...

Johnnie

I've been using double dug beds since 1983. They aren't raised in the traditional way, with siding, but are raised by digging paths and tossing the dirt onto the (already turned)areas where the beds will be. The width varies from about 18" to maybe 36" (I try to keep them so I can reach the middle of the bed from either side). This year I'm thinking about finding some sort of siding to try to keep from having to move the soil back out of the paths into the beds after rain or snow erodes the sides.

Big advantage to raised beds is the friability of the soil. Roots and root crops can grow very readily through soil that has been cultivated and never stepped on. I plant intensively in either direction, patterns using varied colors, swirls, whatever, practicing companion planting so I can crowd my small space. I also grow up on trellises, beans, peas, melons.

I started growing in raised beds back around 1980. They are double-dug per the methods I studied based on the French Intensive system, such as the Bio-Dynamic and Bio-Intensive methods.

The beds require no rigid sides since the process involves loosening the soil to a depth of about 2 feet. The soil in the beds themselves had rounded sides and rose to about 6 inches or so. Higher beds with steeper sides would invite soil and mulch to wash down in heavy rains and higher beds simply are not necessary given the depth to which the soil was loosened.

These systems support the idea that your garden's greatest asset is your garden soil and your efforts should be spent in building up that soil. Therefore, no soil, vermiculite, peat moss, perlite or any combination was purchased and imported to bury my soil to a depth that the roots of my plants wouldn't have to touch it. (My theory is that unless you are living on a toxic waste dump, you are wasting the earth's resources by importing materials to bury or replace your soil.)

Before that I used wide-row planting techniques as championed by Garden Way author Dick Raymond. In effect, the wide row method is part of traditional intensive planting I use on my beds.

I never kept records, but I would have to guess that I increased my harvest by at least 4 or 5 times. Perhaps more. These methods involve intensive planting based on techniques dating back thousands of years before the Square Foot guy discovered them.

My previous garden had the following beds:
(10) 4x12'
(7) 4'x15'
An assortment of odd-sized beds to fill in along slopes and curves bringing the total to about 1000 SF.

The new garden will be somewhat larger with the added benefit of being on more level ground and without the flooding issues that plagued the previous garden.

I will no doubt be told that double-digging is too much work. This may be true for some with injuries or other ailments but I am no Superman. I built the previous beds over a couple of years, digging the beds in small sections, setting as my goal finishing an area equal to that which I felt like doing that day without injuring myself. I am doing the same with my new garden right now.

And yes, I am glad I made the switch. I see no other way of gardening in my future.

Here is a link to a slide-show of my previous garden's first year from my old website:
Adirondack Garden

As Bio-Intensive guru John Jeavons wrote: "Properly performed, labor is not tedious or enervating,but strengthening and rewarding."

Wayne

i'm not sure if this counts, is my first attempt at a raised bed, and am liking the idea more n more, because of weed controll and ease of the plan, this is in the greenhouse floor, planning to start cole crops, but also thinking those could go outside direct seeded now though, maybe i can start marigolds in them instead.

I just build one 4'x8' bed this year. First one we will have in our garden. The bed is located in an area of our yard where water tends to collect in spring.

My son wants to try to grow strawberries in the bed. So my intent is to raise the area so the plants aren't waterlogged.

The bed was build from purchased cedar and is 8 inches tall.

Raised beds:

Okay here are my two beds. First pic is the one I built in 2000, and have been adding compost to for years now, but did start out with some peat moss, to get that soil lightened up back in 2000.

And the second pic is a 2006 bed hubby built me for xmas and that will be awhile before I make enough compost to fill it up, but it's coming along.

Each bed is 5X12, and I have no problem reaching the middle from the outside of the beds. Course I have long arms! hahaha


I till them in the fall and add compost and leaves and if my Mother brings me a bale of peat moss, I'm not opposed to throwing that in there either,

and I'm still picking stones out of both of them. Had the old bed pretty good, but Rocky passed and threw the extra dirt from his hole in the garden, and now I'm picking out stones again this spring.

I have to keep them boxed up, because hubby likes to weed whack! Can you picture standing beds with no protection? I shudder to think about it!

These pics are from last year, with stuff growing in them, so you can get a better idea how they work for me:

everything looks fantastic, two thumbs up, sure looks like the way to go

I have two 4' x 8' beds for this year and will be adding to their length for next year's garden.I used 2 x 10's with about 8" above ground. I also plan on adding a cold frame for next year situated east/west. The other beds are running north/south. The two beds had cover crops planted in them, one is still full, and in the other I have planted carrots, green onions, radish, beets, several greens, and bush beans. Both are hooped with PVC to accommodate plastic coverings for heat retention, or shade cloth to allow the greens to grow in the heat of the summer. I attach these with cut pieces of old garden hose.

My raised beds used to look like Wayne's beds. Our soil is clay and it needed loosening up and I dug 2 shovels deep. A second reason was to get rid of the rhizomes from a crab grass that would come up everywhere. I wanted a longer growing season and because my garden was on low land, it was soggy half the time. So, I started making cedar 2x6 raised beds. That helped with the wet ground and the soil warmed up sooner. When the Redwood store opened up down the road, I started using rough 2x12s instead of cedar. We experimented with double stacking them so they are 2 feet high instead of just one. We soon discovered that we couldn't make enough compost to fill all these beds. There is a recycling place nearby that makes a bunch of different soils. They sell an organic mix that is great. We buy it by the yard and amend it with our compost, leaves and coffee grounds. Here's a pic from my roof of one of the gardens. As you can see, the beds come in all shapes and sizes.

Great thread... I will be watching this closely. I am just about to begin construction on my raised beds and have many questions...

My first real gardening, in Texas, was mostly shaded...so I did almost all flowers and such. I did have some veggies, but I put those in pots on the deck.

As a kid I gardened with my dad's mom who plowed up her entire garden twice a year and then did straight rows.

My first Alaskan garden had very long raised beds, maybe 4 feet wide by 20 feet long. They were held in by logs (great big spruce tree logs, about a foot in diameter, if not more). The logs were held in place by rebar. Then there was open garden area just for potatoes and then a greenhouse with wooden sided raised beds, about waist height. The greenhouse beds were all wood, no rebar. I *LOVED* those raised beds (the ones in the garden and in the greenhouse), the logs were wide and round and perfect to sit on while working in the garden. I also loved the 'never walking in the beds' part, the soil stayed so super light and fluffy, it also dried out faster in the spring and warmed up more quickly too. The greenhouse beds were wonderful since they were waist height, super easy to do chores and see everything (obviously you couldn't sit and work though).

Now (at Alaskan house #2) I put in raised beds in the garden. I had them made out of the end slabs of logs (cheaper, one side is the round outside log part, the other is flat, but just 1 something inches thick). I had them made about 2.5 feet tall.

I filled them up with my own native soil with some compost mixed in.

The beds are OK, but I am not thrilled with them. Because the sides are boards, not logs, I can't sit on the edges. The wood was all spruce, and wood stakes were used to hold the sides upright and together. I REALLY liked being able to sit and weed in my old garden. Also, since I wanted to cram as much garden as possible, into the space that was already fenced off in this new garden, there isn't enough room to sit on the paths between the rows.

The beds do warm up fast, but I also think that since they are so tall, that they *COOL* down fast too. That is a big problem for me. Those beds at the first house with the logs, obviously had more insulation, as well as not being as tall.

This summer I am GREATLY increasing my garden, I do want to do all raised beds, but this time they will either be shorter or better insulated and all of them will be sitting friendly.

oh2fly...the picture of your garden just takes my breath away. That's beautiful. The green is almost unreal. Wow!

Hey Johnnie!

You started this thread and promised pics! I'm looking, see nothing!

I'm sure there have to be other people out there with some raised bed chatter and pictures!

Show us!

Thanks lindagee. Our secret is daily watering from the clouds

David, Have to say the green turf grass looks very nice. My "lawn" is a mix of buffalo grass and dandelions and the uncultivated areas of my yard have perennial rye and other native grasses to 3 feet high. I can only mow around the flower and veggie beds, to give some definition, as the rest of the property is wild and full of rocks and unlevel. Even a riding mower would have trouble, and then the grasses would be tough and ugly, allowing weeds to invade.

Your raised beds are lovely. If I ever have money again, maybe I'll pay my contractor to build some. In the meantime, the double dug method works pretty well.

M