Raised beds - what and what not to plant

[David]

Hi all

I'm about to start constructing some raised beds as my soil is a bit poor and thin, not to mention hard after the first few inches.

So I can plan properly can anyone say what should not be planted in this way? ie do I need to leave some of my plot as normal beds?

Thanks for any help you can give.

David

[Tigger]

I've got all of my veg garden and my cutting garden laid out as raised beds. I've been using them for 20 years and I can't think of anything that I haven't been able to grow in them. The trick is not to walk on the soil, so don't make them too wide.

[Ian F]

I agree with Tigger, you can pretty much plant anything.

If your soil is thin you will need to be aware that raised beds can drain quite quickly. It will help if you are able to bulk them up with organic material. They will also tend to be a bit warmenr than the surrounding soil, so I find that you can plant crops a couple of weeks earlier than you would normaly.

[Laurie, Old severn bridge]

hi, best results for my first raised bed year(last year) runners along the trellis at the back of one bed, sweetcorn went mental, corriander the biggest ive seen,carrots very good along with much salad pak choi,lettuce mixture,radish ect. failures, sweet peas,i think they got a bit dry. the higher the bed the drier it gets , i am trying some leaky porous pipes this year, i did not fill them to the top, this left growing room when i placed an old piece of secondery glazing over the top, brilliant early starter!!!! which is what we are all trying to achieve ....

[pigletwillie]

Hi, all of one of my plots is down to raised beds (17) and soft fruit.

Tigger is bang on about not making then too wide. All of mine are four ft with one being 5 ft which is nearly too wide for me.

They are drier as by their nature they drain well but I have been fortunate to fill mine with 15 year old manure which has a consistency of compost but really really holds on to moisture well. This is the key to success with raised beds because in hot weather, the soil drying out can cause some crops to bolt or fail. Aim to get as much organic matter in those beds as possible, even if its just putting grass cuttings in the bottom before topping up with soil.

You will find that your crops will do very well in raised beds especially onions, carrots and all salad crops. The only crop that I fear you may get hit and miss results with are brussels sprouts as these prefer firm soil whereas with raised beds you aim to have an open soil structure which doesnt suit them.

Give youself enough space to walk between your beds comfortably, some of mine are only 12 inches apart where 18 inches to 2 ft would have been more user friendly.

A further tip to bear in mind if you are starting raised beds from scrath is to make all the same width as you can then make up some netting or fleece cages to drop over the top of your beds and hey presto, one cage will fit ALL of your beds.

[spinningfishwife]

My entire plot is made up of 22 raised beds, marked, dug and mulched over the course of my first five years on the plot. Now they`re no-dig and a great timesaver.

They`re all 4ft wide and vary in length to suit the plot. However the 18` long ones I find a bit too long to walk round so I`m going to divide them. I make the paths 15" wide, but that`s because I have a nearly limitless source of old carpet tiles to use for paths so the beds are laid out to fit them.

I grow everything there is to grow in them except for rasps and current bushes. Even potatoes do just fine...you can grow them under a layer of mulch and just keep topping it up rather than earthing it. (Last year I used a mix of grass clippings and newspaper run through the office paper shredder as mulch.)

[Tigger]

I'm returning the compliment to Piglet - do have some consistency in size to make it easy to use fleece or net frames. I've got two sizes - square or rectangular and frames to suit both. Makes life easier. Better still if you buy your fleece and net from Poundland.

I haven't dug over our beds for many years because I haven't walked on them - just titivate the top layer to accommodate the top dressing/manure/compost/feed/whatever.

The other thing to mention is that you can plant much closer in a (non tread) deep soil raised bed, so you get much more for your space.

[Carole B.]

I was a 'raised bed sceptic' until I tried it last year and it is great,even the sprouts did well.Working out the spacing for potatoes was tricky,I ended up with a staggered double row which was a bit cramped so I think this year I'll put a single row down the middle and have a salad catch crop either side.I can't think of any veg crop which wont do well in a raised bed.
Carole.

[David]

Thanks for all of your replies - one further question: On the ordinary plot I'm advised against manuring the carrot bed to avoid forking etc - but raised beds especially new ones seem to be 90% manure - think they'll be ok?

Thanks

David

[Beccy]

Yes. This is one of those garden myths that people repeat, but that has no foundation in fact. Experiments have shown that manuring does NOT cause forked roots in any root vegetables.

Cheers

[mazmezroz]

Having never had raised beds, sorry to sound a bit thick. Do you just pile the compost/manure over the top of existing soil? My allotment plot is thick with couch grass and bindweed which I am constantly battling. Would raised beds still work???

[pigletwillie]

Hi Maz,

you can either clear the ground and dig over beneath the beds to try and prevent couch etc coming through but unless you are really thorough it still will, or put some weed suppressing membrane down underneath your bed which will stop it from happening. For this however you need to have raised beds at least 8-9 inches deep or you will have no soil to plant into. A third option is perhaps to spray with glysophate to ensure that the perenial weeds are dead before constructing especially if your timber isnt that high, you can then dig the bed over and incorporate manure etc to build the levels up

My beds have membrane underneath all of them but the first two and these two still get the odd bit of couch coming through a year after construction whilst all the others are clean. I used scaffolding planks for the sides as these give a good useable depth to plant into. Dont be tempted to use plastic under your bed as it doesnt drain and after a year will become brittle and can split.

[mazmezroz]

Thanks for your reply Piglet - very clear and understandable.

[Johnboy]

Hi Beccy,
I hate to disappoint you but it is not a myth that manuring a carrot bed will produce forking.
Carrots need nutrients but if you dig in manure and a Carrot main root manages to hit a clod of manure on its path downwards then it splits into two or maybe even more roots and Stones will produce the same effect.
I experimented with manure and carrots last year and in Autumn 2004 I spread the bed with manure and allowed that to leach into the soil over winter and prior to sowing my Carrot seed I removed all traces of the manure remaining on the surface. I then lightly forked the bed over fetched up a fine tilth and sowed my seeds. I had a wonderful crop of Carrots of two varieties: Early Nantes 2 and Autumn King 2.
I had previously found that Carrots were in need of a feed at the end of June/mid July but last year they needed no attention at all apart from keeping weed free. The whole crop was covered with Anti White Fly netting which excluded all Carrot Root Fly and I had a completely fly free crop.

[Beccy]

Johnboy what you have written confirms what I have read elsewhere. It is not the richness of the manure, it is the clod or as you suggest stones that cause the forking. So if you have clod free manure it's not a problem.

And yes I know a lot of manure does have clods, but the three year old manure we have had in the past doesn't. So I guess like many gardening questions the answers should start 'well it depends....'