Perfect for Beginner Gardening
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Building the raised bed garden
There are no strict rules for raised bed construction. Use whatever you have handy and is easy to work with. The raised bed garden can even be a mound of soil on the ground. However, I recommend containing your soil.
You can create your walls with
- Scrap lumber, just nail together in your desired dimensions.
- Cinder block works well and is quite sturdy.
- Scrap metal roofing is another excellent building material.
You could build with stone or brick, but that’s a lot of work.
Straw bales make for an excellent instant garden.
Whatever you’ve got, use it. It’s okay to mix materials too.
Raised Bed Construction From Lumber
To construct a raised bed garden out of lumber, make a box in any way desired. Brackets, nails, screws or any other fastener can be used.
In the above video, I used scrap 4×4 posts, 2×4′s, and 1×6′s. Everything was nailed together. Wood screws make for more sturdy construction.
I figure if I can round up scrap wood, raid my husband’s tools and do it, anybody can.
Here’s a video on raised bed construction, where the bed is well constructed and very sturdy. My only comment is that the bed doesn’t need to be anywhere near that tall. 6 – 18 inches should do it.
Raised Bed Plans
The guidelines for raised bed construction are simple. The bed should be about 18 inches deep. There is no need for a bottom. It can be 6 inches if you’re growing shallow-rooted vegetables like lettuce.
Make your bed long and narrow so you can easily reach in to plant, weed, and maintain. Using this guide, your bed will be a maximum of 4 feet wide.
Consider making multiple small beds with walkways in between, instead of larger beds. Maintenance is much easier this way, and like plants can be grouped together.
If you don’t like bending over, you can close the bottom of the bed and raise it up off the ground. Then you can work very comfortably. If you do this, then of course, keep to smaller beds.
Advantages of the raised bed garden
- No need to remove rocks, break sod, break hard soil, and provide lots of soil amendments. Using this method, you mix your
garden soil at the beginning and will never have to do it again. - You will need to bend over, but no need to get down on your knees.
- Almost no weeds. By mixing soil from various ingredients, you will not have an outbreak of weeds during the first planting. This is especially true in arid climates where weed seeds accumulate and wait decades for good moisture to sprout.
- Soil is rock free and so workable. No need for tillers, hoes and other heavy-duty equipment.
A Bed From Straw Bales
Straw bales can be used as a really fast mode of building a bed. Arrange several bales in a rectangular shape like a picture frame. Fill with soil and you’re good to go. After a year or 2 the bales will break down, just incorporate them back into the soil.
You can also plant directly in a straw bale. The bale needs to be watered and fertilized ahead of time, but makes an oh-so-easy medium for growing.
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