raised bed garden

[messmaker]

My wife is wanting me to make one. She wants the frame made from wood. Anyone have any experience with this?

[Russianwolf]

They are nice and easy to do and make it where you don't have to fix up your existing soil.

The frames are very simple. The way I do them is to make as many 1x6 frames to make up the height that you want. Simple screwed butt joints to a make a big rectangle (or whatever shape you want). Stack them up in the location of your choice and once you are satisfied, drive a treated 2x2 spike in the corners and viola the frame is done. You can screw the frames to the 2x2's to prevent them frm separating but I haven't had a problem with mine.

Line the bottom with something to block weeds and fill with good soil. Then get the Wie to planting.

[pelligrini]

The previous owner of my house had a bunch made from pressure treated landscape timbers. I've had to rebuild a couple due to the wood rotting. The ones I rebuilt were at least 10 years old when I fixed them 5 years ago.

They are really simple construction; using just the timbers and rebar. The timbers were held together and anchored with the rebar driven into holes in the timbers. I used a 1/2" spade bit to bore a hole in the timbers and then drove a length of rebar through it into the ground. The rebar pieces are 12-18” The next layer of timbers went on top with the bores going through them and the bottom. The tallest box is 5 timbers tall, bout 18". It’s pretty stable and fairly long lasting construction.

I did do half lap joints for the corners on the tree-box I totally rebuilt. It just looked a lot better to me.

[emjr]

I'm about to do the same thing, but I've got some almost-free Trex to use--wife does not want any PT wood near the edibles. I'm only going to need one tier in hte proposed location, so won't have to buy a lot of additional pieces when current supply runs out. I see advantages as: no rot, not too ugly, cooler than metal or masonry alternatives. I'll probably secure in place with 24" rebar.

[annunaki]

You are what you eat

If this is for vegetables, you may want to consider what pesticide poisons might be leaching into the soil and produce, from the "treated" wood.

What I chose instead, were cement blocks.
You can get them plain or decorative or paint them.
They last forever and lend themselves to many configurations.
The holes can be used for herbs.

[jziegler]

Along the lines of the cement blocks, look at these from Lee Valley:

http://www.leevalley.com/garden/page...55&cat=2,44664

The kit uses concrete pavers for the sides of the bed. They also have several hardware kits for other styles of raised beds with wood that you might want to look at.

The newer treated lumber is supposed to be OK for raised beds for food, but personally I'd still try to avoid it.

Jim

[dlminehart]

With food prices starting an inexorable climb, I'm also planning on starting a veggie garden using raised beds. I've heard that, with good soil in the beds, you can get by with as little as 6" of depth . . . but have to be very conscientious about watering consistently. I wonder if Trex is perhaps the way to go, to avoid chemicals from treated lumber. Have to price it out, and see where the nearest nursery supply is for bulk quantities of soil, vermiculite, and whatever. Buying by the bag is prohibitively expensive.

[moc]

Every year the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis collects those cheap black plastic pots and trays that plants are sold in and then recycles them into non-toxic, plastic planks for raised beds.

They're a bit pricey, but fall under the "good cause" clause. I suspect many places across the country do something similar.

And they throw the pots and trays into the giant chipper/shredder as they're dropped off... so it adds a power-tool manliness to recycling

*moc

[jziegler]

For anyone interested in gardening methods for a raised bed to maximize the crop for a small space (or even a larger one), look up square foot gardening (http://www.squarefootgardening.com/). A number of years ago, a retired engineer decided to look at home gardening and come up with a planting method that isn't just commercial farming changed to a smaller scale, like row gardens really are. It really does work well. His books are a good, easy read with lots of information. Very well suited to raised beds (which he reccommends in the new edition of his book, didn't as much in the first edition)

Jim