Beginner Gardening Raised Bed Do's & Don'ts

0:44 Tip 1 Do Consider Raised Bed Height
4:19 Tip 2 Don't Think You Have to Do It All In One Season
5:06 Tip 3 Do Consider Your Bed Width
6:58 Tip 4 Don't Get Hung Up on Bed Length
8:15 Tip 5 Do Consider Space Between Beds
8:40 Tip 6 Don't Discount the Option of Using Treated Lumber
11:00 Tip 7 Do Fill the Bed to the Top
11:50 Tip 8 Don't Follow Between- Row Spacing Guidelines
12:53 Tip 9 Do Consider Irrigation Before Planting
14:04 Tip 10 Don't Plant Perennial Herbs in Your Annual Garden

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[frankdougherty]

Great presentation. Clear, straight-to-it, and giving us everything we want and need to know. Thanks for the share!

[generalchemistrywithmike]

I use old paver bricks for my raised beds. They retain heat well, don't attract wasps, and I found them all for free from torn down old-timey bridges with brick roads.

[floydbertagnolli]

Econo-Raised Beds: I use cedar fencing, 2 widths high, supported by 18” redwood 2x4s. Both rot resistant. Some going on 7 years now. 🧑🏻‍🌾

[carriecreates]

I am planting my first garden this year. Raised beds and pots.
Thank you, I appreciate your video about beds and organazations!

[floydbertagnolli]

Use a 2x12 board across the raised bed as a low bench = great access & doesn’t compact the soil. 🧑🏻‍🌾

[lindawynell]

Thank you for all the tips. I am
doing a small raised bed garden with my 6yr old grandson this year. He has become very interested in gardening. Time to share my knowledge. 😊 These tips will help a lot.

[carolanncruts]

I have 13 raised beds 4x8 and 5x8 all made from Trex, going on 20 yrs, best thing we ever did, also husband piped water to each bed individually so I can control watering based upon plant, and stop watering when a crop is done.

[LewisAcreFarm]

I am forced to change my entire garden to raised beds this year. My first 4 beds were built with landscaping timbers that are placed in layers so they are easily moved. I looked on Facebook Marketplace and found 1x4x4ft boards for $1 each if I bought 100+. That allowed me to build 6 more beds that are 4 ft x 2 ft x 2 ft. All of my beds are 2 ft tall. I am disabled and this allows me to use my wheelchair to work my garden when I need it. We're using our raised beds to place a perimeter around our mobile home lot, a sort of fence, if you will. We are going to be trying out the self-watering beds that you demonstrated at the Green Thumb Nursery with our new beds. It won't work out for the old beds. We also have 5 old tires that we are converting to growing areas instead of adding them to the land fill.The Marketplace is an excellent place to look for lumber for raised beds. I will be adding a video very soon, showing how we moved the raised beds and refilled them. We will be starting to build the new ones as soon as the weather cooperates.

[krazmokramer]

"Leave room between the raised beds for a wheelbarrow." OOOPs....I did not think of that. Too late now... I think I better SUBSCRIBE before I mess up again!

[THIAGOFLORIANO]

Wow... nice voice, very well written script, a lot of enthusiasm and charisma. Well done!

[CherrieMcKenzie]

I ran into this video and was very glad I did. I've had a garden for years but this year got serious with it and saw my yields increase. This video highlights a lot of the things I ran into and things to consider so that gardening does not become a headache or another chore that you end up spending a lot of money on. Great tips!!

[mikeg]

i liked how she highlighted that you dont have to build all the reaised bed you need to fill out the empty space in your backyard. im pretty sure some of us do feel that we need to fill it out right away. But if we are in a budget patience do go a long way.

[williamwaters]

I have two raised beds that I made, one wood, the other corrugated steel. Both and about 2 1/2' tall and both have issues with the soil drying out faster than ground soil. The steel bed drys out very fast because the steel gets very hot from the sun. I made domes for both so I can grow crops into the fall and early spring.

[mr.lourod]

Great INFORMATION for a noob like me 1/2 yr behind me now unto the fall (8b) part of things .. with only 4 (4x4) and 4 (2x4) beds your information will help greatly. THANK YOU!!!

[Metalgarn]

Good point on the row spacing, versus in-row spacing.
Never made sense to me that you could plant something 6" from another but needed 18" between the next row. Now at least I understand why that measurement is there... and it confirms my long held belief that I could ignore those values.

[miguelallen]

I got here after months of listening to your Podcast

[franziskani]

Quick and easy cheap border for slightly to medium raised beds: BROWN CARTON and branches. If you do not get your hands on lumber quickly, or do not have time or money to get it perfect right away. Or if you happen to get some soil quickly but do not yet have a plan. - It is possible to take BROWN CARTON (think packaging of household appliances, or TVs), cut off stripes and fold them over so the material is double. Lets say 50 cm wide stripes (so 25 cm when they have been folded in half lengthwise). 50 cm are approx 20 inches.
It helps to prepare the folding line by slightly ! cutting into the cardboard (with a carpet knife, even the blade of scissors work). The "border can be higher as well. It looks much neater if you have a long wooden board or straight piece of metall that you can use as "ruler" when you cut the stripes, so they are are all even stripes that have the same height and have a nice even folding edge (which is on the top so very visible).

That can create a "border" for a slightly to medium high raised bed - and hold soil in place in an rectangular (or even a round) shape. You need branches rammed into the ground to hold the carton in a vertical position, the branches will carry the weight, the carton is the wall that prevents the soil from falling away. Some of those branches might surprise you by sprouting (red currant for instance, we had some at hand from cutting the bushes). The border stripes have to overlap at the end, 10 cm = 4 inches is more than enough (and a supporting branch should be nearby.

Rain will not weaken the carton much. The cardboard border will last at least for one year (we are in a temperate climate zone with winters and had extended periods of rain this year). During that time you can make your first experiences with gardening at that place and at that height, make a plan where to put your permanent beds and how high you want them, source affordable materials or paint your wooden boards with lenseed oil. Or get your hands on old lumber, bricks, pallets, or make your own metal beds etc. Or wait for the end of saison sales for raised beds. It is also a good solution if you want to set up quickly a space for some winter gardening (hardy frost resistant salads, kale), but are not sure if the bed will stay at that place and the weather does not allow for much outside building activities.
Or if you get a chance to get some soil quickly, but do not yet have a plan where to use it.



If you have your technique (and tools) down to cut your stripes (2 persons make the job much easier) and to prepare your sticks (we use a machete) that border is built very quickly.
The carton is bleached by the sun over time, but as long as it can dry out from time to time it will hold up.
If you use cardboard as weed suppressing sheets (so it is used in a horizontal position not vertical) it MUST be covered by a good layer of soil, compost, mulch - then and only then it will rot quickly. If it is moist all the time, the rainworms and other parts of soil life will process it quickly. Cardboard at the surface (or with too little mulch on it) has a surpising ability to dry out if there is wind or sun. It is astonishing how well these carton borders hold up against the elements and the pressure of the soil (well the branches are holding most of the weight).
Even laying on the ground after weeks of rain carton pieces will be fairly intact.

Part of the carton border can be "anchored" in the soil - of course there it will rot faster, it might not even be necessary to dig it into the soil. (we did because one onf the strawberry beds has a slope - we assumed there would be a bottom gap and soil might be washed out - but in hingsight that likely was not necessary).

Carton (especially in double layers that are in a vertical position) is surprisingly robust if it can dry up from time to time. Even if moist soil is on one side, or when it gets wet when you water regularily the plants from top etc.

The stripes (the border - it replaces a border made of wood or other hard materials) have to be fixed with branches that are rammed into the earth. I think we used 20 cm = 8 - 9 inch distance, it looks neater with less distance between the branches, but you can chose wider distances if you are in a hurry. You can add branches later if that is necessary for stability or optics). Our branches are not very deep in the underground, you have to test it. 4 inches = 10 cm might be enough depending on your underground (if you are next to a stone border and tarmac that is certainly enough, with sandy underground you might need to ram them deeper into the soil. Just do a test run over a short distance, fill up with soil, water the soil and see what happens. If the bed area is on a slope you need more stability of course. The branches we use are not massive either. You can cut them to the same visible height - but only at the end (if you cut them to the same lenght, you would have to ram them into the underground in the exactely same manner and that is more work, easier to cut them off when you are done).

The branches can be all at the outside - when the setup is finished there is the soil, then the cardboard "wall" next to it and in direct contact witht he soil, then come the branches as supporting structure). Or the branches are alternating at the outside and insde of the carton. In that case the carton stripe would be "woven" in between the sticks.

So you start with putting most of your soil in a rectangular shape. it is easier because when you have to add a LOT of soil later you have to take care to not tear down your border. But when working with the carton and the branches you can leave a little gap and fill that up later.

I think weaving the stripes in after the branches have been rammed into the ground could be more tricky. I am not sure about the optics long term, and do not think it adds stability. We have all the branches outside and they hold up well. Like all good provisories - this solution is still in place and we did not yet change it for a more permanent solution. But one year of gardening with it was helpful, we changed our plans. What we will grow there - most likely we will get a slug proof metall fence there - and before that we will add more soil.

It looks better, if the stripes end at the same height (same for the branches), are neatly folded (in a straight line) and if the visible side of the carton is brown with no print on it. Ideally it is made from the same (type of) carton, so the brown will fade in the same manner. Large brown cartons from household appliances work well for that purpose. And use brown, not white or any other color it blends in better with a natural environment.

We used carton without a glossy surface. (those will not rot and it is generally advised not to use such cartons for composting). At some point you wilreplace the cartons stripes and will need to compost them. Btw. if cartons gets wet it becomes much easier to remove adhesive tape, labels - it is even possible to remove a glossy top layer (that is relevant is you use carton sheets for weed suppressing, I do not recommend it for optical reasons.

The quick and easy (and cheap) solution buys you at least 12 months to source your materials, to get clear on the final position where you want your beds, to paint your wooden boards with lenseed oil (which takes at least 1 month to fully cure), to check out how other folks build their raised beds. And to wait for good weather if you can only build outside ;)

[dsws]

Great video! I have 13 beds and am in the process of building the 14th. As a short person, I built 3’ wide raised beds, and they work well for me. I also have a sitting garden cart, so I’m able to work my 16” tall beds easily. I wish I’d made my paths 4’ instead of 3’. My beds are a mix of pressure treated and non-treated. I’ll be interested in how long the non-treated last.

[kirkb]

You are so correct…good soil makes all the difference in the world…..great video

[deliachitts]

Thank you Hun that’s being very informative I’ve learnt a lot. I’ve been gardening for 20 years and I’m always learning😊