I’ve been doing raised bed gardening for over 40 years. I started in Jr. High when I planed a “French Intensive” 4 x 4 foot garden in my parent’s side yard. My enthusiasm waned over the summer, but it did produce a reasonable amount of food and I loved the “Intensive” idea.
When I bought my house 30 years ago, I took out the front yard – which was small – and brought in lots of straw and landscaping timbers that were about 4 inches in diameter. I removed the sod and double dug the whole yard. That was a months work. I was able to borrow a sod tool – it cuts the sod then scoops it up. that helped. I double dug by removing the first foot of soil and piling it elsewhere, flipping the next foot to the top level, and gradually flipping and loosening two feet of dirt all the way around.
I the result was beds about 8 inches higher than before, and place for vegetables. The area on the near side of my walkway I planted flowers and herbs so that the vegetable part would be more hidden from anyone coming down the street or to my house. More on that later.
As the years went by, I tried a few different styles to enclose the raised beds. But I stayed with the basic principles, no wider than four feet, and never ever allow anyone or any animal to step foot in the beds.
About 15 years ago, I started buying pallets of retaining wall blocks, about 1 foot wide and eight inches wide. I bought all “seconds” at half price. They were available each spring, as they started up production of the blocks and the colors weren’t exactly right. So they were about $1 each. Over the years I ended up with close to $1,000 of these concrete pieces, that can be stacked to make a wall, and that are designed to curve as well. I created beds in teh front yard that were a bit abstract, but that curved around the yard with narrow (too narrow it turns out) paths in between. I also built planters at the end of the driveway, which I have recently taken down and used to build my beds higher.
The joke is that the older you get the taller your garden should be. Well, if I had it to do over I’d have them tall decades ago as well. They now range from 3-5 rows high, so about 2 feet or a bit more. The blocks are wide enough you can sit on them or even stand, and since the distance is never more than 2 feet to the center everything is easy to reach.
At the lake I have another garden, with 20 raised beds so far, and all but four of them (which are planted with blueberry bushes) are also two foot high, but put together with inch thick boards as the sides, and 2×2 or 2×3 posts in each corner that the boards are screwed into. That gives some protection if you are dragging hoses or electric cords around the gardens, the taller corner posts stop you from pulling that into the garden and onto delicate plants.
This time I knew the importance of wide paths, and had the space to do it. The beds are all three feet apart at the lake. Wide enough for a lawn mower, as well as stray pumpkin vines that might make a run for it.
In both cases, it is pretty easy to then get great dirt or even pure compost and just fill up the beds. At the lake garden, the soil is awful. It was dredged up from the lake bottom, and then a sheet of black plastic was put down, followed by sod. My parents “improved” the garden soil for years, but it never really flourished. Filling the raised beds with pure compost trucked in form The Ann Arbor Composting Facility has been great. It isn’t organic, being city compost, but it is organic since it’s compost. Either way, it grows great plants. Just to give you an idea of the scope of things, we have trucked almost 20 yards of compost into Chelsea, Ann Arbor, and Warren for the three gardens we maintain.
For my Ann Arbor garden I also bought 9 yards of dirt long ago from a local nursery. That has done well. And in the beginning, that was what also introduced some great weeds into my garden. Weeds that I can eat or harvest for medicinal or therapeutic purposes.
Each year, I “tilth” the garden by using a pitchfork to fluff up the soil and remove the grass and weeds I don’t want. I say each year but will also admit there are some years parts of the garden have gone unplanted. Life goes on. One year the garden was very neglected, and I ended up with a beautiful crop of goldenrod. I was able to make tissanes, tinctures, and dry some of the flowers for later use. It looked and smelled wonderful.
I did all of this on my own, and when Tom came along he wasted no time giving advice and pointing out where I could make improvements. And of course we started using the Olla irrigation system he designed.
He also looked at the garden where I was growing flowers and herbs and asked why I was giving up the spot with the best light to non-edible plants. I had to stop and consider. Why indeed? I hadn’t thought about that in almost 30 years. Since the time I was trying to hide my vegetable garden and not offend anyone with front yard gardening. Well, there was my answer, and of course the reasoning behind it is now obsolete. There are plenty of front yard gardens in Ann Arbor, and times have changed radically. I don’t have to hide anymore. I moved the plants that were there, and ended up producing an amazing patch of kale that overwintered and fed be for more than a year.
I believe raised beds are the best. Since they are never walked on, they remain fluffy and easy for roots to grow deep. They are easy to plant, and maintenance of the soil is also decreased. They work well with Ollas. They are physically more comfortable to work than being on the ground, they can be planted more intensively, they are easy to amend with compost or good soil, and they are also lovely to see. If you add a couple raised beds each year it is a manageable project.
In about 40 years I’ve gone from a single raised bed of 16 Square feet to over 500 square feet of gardening space. I can grow most of the greens and veggies I will eat all winter, as well as fresh food all summer. I love the gardening shortcuts – the primary two are the Olla watering system and the tall raised beds.
