Raised Beds Advice (Gardening Related)
LaserWolf
Portland Oregon 11,517 Posts
We just built our first raised bed. Big 14'x5'. We are going to build 2 more of the same size.
We just reclaimed a part of our yard that was taken over by Himalayan blackberries, which are the Kudzu of the NW. Cut em, pulled em, covered the ground in cardboard, covered the cardboard with gravel, raised beds on the gravel.
This year we are growing our Tomatoes in full shade, so we are looking forward to a garden that actually gets sun.
Any suggestions on soil/compost depth, plants, watering any thing, will be appreciated.
I have never done raised beds and have never had a large garden of my own.
We just reclaimed a part of our yard that was taken over by Himalayan blackberries, which are the Kudzu of the NW. Cut em, pulled em, covered the ground in cardboard, covered the cardboard with gravel, raised beds on the gravel.
This year we are growing our Tomatoes in full shade, so we are looking forward to a garden that actually gets sun.
Any suggestions on soil/compost depth, plants, watering any thing, will be appreciated.
I have never done raised beds and have never had a large garden of my own.
Comments
To amend the soil I use a mix of aged steer, chicken, horse manure, and ashes. The natural soil where I am is pretty good/rich/dark. If your soil isn't that great, I suggest bringing in a load of soil from a nursery. Soil is everything.
Also, if your beds aren't completely enclosed/covered, birds and various other animals will eat your plants/vegetables--especially if you are in a more rural area. We have wire mesh and rebar structures covering all of our gardens.
We water 30 minutes a day on an automatic drip system.
Currently growing: tomatoes, cucumber, bitter melon, eggplant, jalapenos, and chard.
i dont think 2 feet is necessary for most vegetables. a foot of good soil will cater to most things.
id love to grow broccoli rabe
There's only so much we can grow in the full sun in the Arizona heat. Because we didn't know any better we originally had peas, carrots and green beans but they didn't last long once we hit the triple digits. We also had cucumbers that were striving but we lost them to I believe the heat and a bacteria they are known to get.
I'm learning as I go so I don't have much advice. Mainly keep an eye out for bugs/insects and take care of them before they do too much damage. I water twice a day. Once in the mornings and once in the evenings. Everything I learned was from youtube.
photo 1
The above bed was the one made from recycled pallets. We are growing Basil all along the front row. There's also Roma tomatoes, jalapenos, serrano peppers, green bell peppers, banana peppers and cherry tomatoes. We had a serious problem with caterpillars in this bed which took a toll on the tomatoes but they recovered very well. We have been pulling peppers left and right from this garden.
photo 2
The above garden beds have Eggplants(the left) and Heirloom Tomatoes(the right). We planted these about a month or two after the other stuff. They replace the peas and beans we lost. The eggplants took off fast. We have the fencing around them to keep the ducks out. We haven't had any problems with birds.
photo
Above is Batman and Robin
They eat every bug in sight. Unfortunately they also eat every plant in sight so we have to keep them away. We had to get rid of our turkey and chickens because they were tearing up the gardens, and shitting everywhere. My girls grandpa raises chickens so we took them there.
What area are you in? I'm curious as to how your eggplants are doing.
(Enclosed apple trees)
Ive got two raised beds myself. Had great luck with lettuce, beans and corn this year. Just replanted some lettcue seeds last week and should have another crop by end of Sept.
Squash/cukes are always a solid go to crop for my gardens. They tend to take over everything though if you let them get our of control, which can be a bad thing OR a good thing if alot of your other stuff doesnt take. Its a good space filler, depending on how much space you have.
Gardening in the summer
Records in the winter
Thats how its been for me the last few years.
The tomatoes went a bit crazy and have crowded everything, but the other stuff did ok considering (two types of peppers, and a small blueberry bush). things have slowed down some and an animal has taken a liking to the tomatoes, but the yield was pretty good considering the late start. Next year I'll spread things out some.
the only reason why i would want to own a home is to do shit like this.
Yea, I'm jealous of Reynaldo. I would love to have more growing in the backyard, but we don't own the house.
i know it's kind of fucking gnarly, but hit up a barber or salon and grips some human hair.
line the outside of your garden with that shit and animals will stay the fuck out pretty much guaranteed.
http://www.evasolo.com/productinfo/568115/
We replaced our fence. The old one looked like the new one, except rotted and falling down. We kept the old fence on site and used it to build the beds. You can see we laid boards flat and stacked em like bricks in a log cabin type design. All design credit goes to Nancy. The level of craft is zero, because I have no wood working skills.
Persian Iron Wood in the foreground, real edible chestnut trees in the background.
Our garage on the left, back of house on the right.
We had the blackberries cut down, dug out, put down layers of cardboard, inches of gravel. We have killed 4 of the blackberries 7 horcruxs and are convinced we will one day defeat the dark weed.
Saw this UFO over Portland.
Thanks Rey. We ended up using no liner, the gravel bottom, then cardboard, then blackberries, then some real nice soil under all that.
Our beds are 14" deep.
We are buying a 4 way soil mix, top soil, sand, chicken shit, leaf compost. Put that in next week, cover in plastic for the winter, in February or March we may add compost, but we will start planting lettuce. Maybe we will even plant lettuce now, not sure.
We live in a urban/rural part of Portland, Coyotes, birds, racoons, opossums yes. Deer, rabbits no.
What we are really worried about are giant slugs.
I want soaker hoses.
meistromoco, nice photo.
Brian, thanks, gold and zucchinis aren't going to save you. I sold my gold at $1,800.
blakatom, we used cedar planks and pressure treated 4x4s and 2x4s.
Some things to know about pressure treated wood. Until recently they were treated with Chromated Copper Arsenate. The copper is no worry, but the arsenic will kill you.
The quantities of arsenic in the wood are fairly high, but extremely stable.
Arsenic is naturally occurring and widely dispersed chemical. It is most likely in your drinking water and top soil.
It does not like to travel, any leaching with pressure treated lumber is likely to happen in the first rain, so my 20 year old boards aren't worrying me.
Once it leaches out it would have to come in contact with your veggies roots.
Once in contact with the roots it would have to travel to the part of the plant that you eat.
That this occurs has never been proven, or disproven.
To be extra safe we clad the inside of the beds with cedar and are planning to not grow root crops in the beds. Which is a shame.
The dust from cutting treated lumber can put arsenic in the air. EPA doesn't have any guide for the saw dust, but I wore a dust mask and cleaned up the dust.
More gardening photos and advice are more than welcomed.
How were the Chestnutts?
This site has been invaluable: http://westsidegardener.com/index.html
WEST SIDE!
(Limes)
You want to keep it out? or contain it? We have managed to contain ours to a middle island by digging a 3ft deep trench all around it and burying a wall of pvc/rubber tarp in the trench and then filling back in. Stopped the bamboo encroachment by about 99.9%
It is cool though because it stays green all year round and if we need some trellis material, we just harvest some.
Any thoughts?
I want it gone forever. Not sure how realistic that is. It's destroying a fence. And I thought ivy was bad.