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Chapter 2

Garden Beds

Once you have your garden location, orientation, and general area planned, it’s time to get to work on building the garden itself. This chapter will explain the reasoning behind using raised beds as well as the different options for materials. We’ll also cover the specifics of how to build your garden beds and offer tricks for building beds that will last.

Raised beds at Gardenerd HQ

Why Raised Beds?

Raised beds are a great way to organize your garden; they offer a clear delineation between growing areas and pathways, but most of the benefits reach beyond aesthetics. In climates where the ground freezes in winter, raised beds are essential. By elevating the planting area above ground, the bed soil will thaw and drain more quickly in spring, allowing for an earlier start to your gardening endeavors.

If you have heavy clay soil (read more about that in Chapter 3, All about Soil), raised beds can alleviate the days of backbreaking labor required to set up a garden as well as condition the soil each year. Raised beds don’t eliminate work altogether, but they make it much easier to add compost and improve soil structure and tilth as time goes on. In some cases, once you’ve built your raised beds, you may never need a shovel again. A hand trowel will often suffice to work the soil and plant crops.

If you choose to set up your garden with raised beds, you will also notice that they save time and valuable resources. Raised beds concentrate the areas that need water, so rather than watering your entire garden area, you’re only watering what’s in the raised beds. Because water is a precious resource, and droughts are predicted to become more frequent and long lasting in places that already experience them, it makes sense to put water only where it is needed. As a result, your pathways remain dry. Dry pathways mean fewer weeds, which equals less work for you. Mulch those pathways with wood chips or other biodegradable materials (newspaper, straw, and burlap sacks work well), and you will even further reduce the need to weed.

Raised beds are the method of choice for most biointensive gardening methods (more about those in Chapter 5) because they concentrate resources and allow a gardener to maintain the beds without walking on and compressing the soil. Raised beds are also handy for folks with lower back issues or certain disabilities. The elevated surface area makes it easier to garden without bending over as far, and often you can even build beds tall enough to prevent bending altogether. Elevated raised beds (up on legs) can be built for wheelchair accessibility. If you have trees or hedges near your garden area, you can line your raised beds on the bottom to prevent thirsty tree roots from taking over your garden. See? The benefits really do go on and on.

Vegetable garden beds don’t have to be boring.

Materials for Raised Beds

When it comes to deciding what materials to use for building a raised bed, you have a lot of options, depending on your budget and needs. If you strive to recycle and reuse found materials, then “urbanite” or broken concrete might be the way to go. If you’re in a tight space, thinner materials that allow for the most gardening area with the least bulk—wood or composite lumber—are better choices. Let’s take a look at the possibilities.

Wood

Wooden raised beds can be assembled quickly and last for years, depending on the type of wood you use. Douglas fir, which is relatively inexpensive, lasts about three to five years before it begins to decompose (though it can, in some circumstances, last for more than ten years in dry conditions). If you are building a simple frame for an experimental garden, or you plan to move in a few years, Douglas fir is good enough to use.

Redwood is a more durable option for wood-framed raised beds. It is an acidic wood, which makes it naturally antimicrobial. Redwood raised beds tend to last about ten to fifteen years longer than Douglas fir beds.

Cedar, which lasts twenty years or more, is a great option for long-term raised beds. It can be more expensive but is worth the investment if you plan to be in the same place for a while. Cedar resists decay and is often available as rough-cut lumber, which means it hasn’t been milled down to the standard (think thinner) dimensions. The thicker wood is more rustic, but those extra millimeters make it even more durable.

Composite Lumber

Composite lumber is another option for planter beds. This type of material is a blend of recycled plastic packaging waste and wood pulp. It is extruded into the shape of wood and is usually used to build decks and patios. Many companies offer prefabricated raised beds made from nonleaching and soil-safe composite lumber, but be aware that not all composite lumber products are safe for direct soil contact. Trex® decking, made by Trex Company (trex.com), is one of the few composite lumbers that specifically states that it is safe for direct soil contact. Some composite lumbers begin to disintegrate when they come into contact with soil. Veranda®, a thinner composite product found on the shelves of larger hardware stores, clearly states that it is not safe for direct soil contact.

A raised bed made from two levels of 2- x 6-inch (5- x 15-cm) Trex decking. With no known gophers in the neighborhood, we used chicken wire simply as a precaution. In the end, it was not necessary.

Composite lumber has its advantages. It is long lasting (Trex is guaranteed for twenty-five years but is likely to last even longer), it won’t splinter, and you never need to paint or stain it. The material costs about a third more than wood, but, given its durability, it’s worth the expense to know that you won’t have to build another raised bed for a very long time, if ever again. Composites are dense and heavy, so you may blow through a saw blade or two while cutting it, but in all other respects it cuts and behaves like wood.

Geeky Gardening TiP:

A Word about Redwood

Redwood is often sprayed with a solvent to aid the curing process. It takes a long time to dry redwood naturally, and milling companies have found that by spraying the wood with acetone or methanol, they are able to cure and dry redwood more quickly. While there is a process for removing the solvents after drying is complete, traces of these chemicals have been found in the wood and can leach into the soil. Ask your lumberyard professional to verify whether the wood has been solvent-dried or kiln-dried. You can often special-order kiln-dried redwood for your project.

Urbanite or Concrete Blocks

These are popular options for those who are looking to use recycled products. If you spy your neighbors breaking up their concrete driveway or sidewalk, ask if you can have the broken pieces. These concrete bits are great for building retaining walls that are thick and sturdy. They can also be used as paving material for pathways. If you decide to use urbanite to build a raised bed, however, be aware that it is usually 4 to 6 inches (10 to 15 cm) thick and can be cumbersome to climb over when reaching into a planting area. As mentioned before, wood offers the thinnest option for a raised bed, usually just 2 inches (5 cm) thick. Blocks take up a lot more room, so if growing space is at a premium in your yard, opt for something thinner. That said, if you are looking to make raised beds that appear earthbound, solid, and hefty, urbanite or concrete blocks can create this look.

Cinder Block

Cinder block, like urbanite, is a substantial building material for raised beds. Unlike concrete, though, cinder block is made with fly ash, a waste product of the coal industry. While there is no official study proving this, it is speculated that heavy metals present in fly ash—namely arsenic, cobalt, lead, and mercury—will off-gas and leach into groundwater and soil. Gardening forums have countless discussions on this subject, with healthy arguments both for and against the use of cinder block, but it deserves further investigation if you plan to use this material.

Wooden posts and stones create a vegetable garden with Japanese overtones.

Stones and Other Natural Materials

If you plan to grow mostly in-ground but still want to include some decorative elements of design along with a few extra inches of garden soil, stones or other natural materials offer a lot of flexibility. No mortar is necessary unless you are building borders that are several layers high.

Cob and Adobe

These earthen materials are used to build houses, retaining walls, and other structures. Both use a mixture of sand, clay, and straw to form whatever shape is desired. To make these structures durable as raised beds, and able to withstand constant moisture and soil contact, lime is added to a finishing plaster as a sealant. Alternatively, adobe bricks are often found in gardens designed using permaculture principles and are an acceptable material for raised beds. Earthbags are another earth-based building material, often made from otherwise discarded, misprinted polypropylene bags. They simplify the building process: rather than making adobe bricks, you fill the earthbags with native soil (with as little as 5 percent clay) and stack them together. Earthbags can then be covered with a layer of adobe for a smooth finish. Some earthbag aficionados suggest coating the soil side of the new retaining wall with a layer of cement-based stucco plaster to help prevent degradation from excessive moisture.

Guidelines for Shape and Size

When building your garden beds, there are several other things to take into consideration. Will you have small children in the garden with you? Do you want to bring a wheelbarrow right up to a raised bed? Do you have or anticipate having back problems? Are you a card-carrying neat freak? The answers to these questions will help you determine the size and shape of your beds and how much space to leave between them.

Just How Neat Are You?

Let’s start with the last question first. The “neat freak” bit. It might not seem like a factor in gardening, but it can make the difference between spending time in the garden or not. If you prefer to have everything in its place, but you now have an unorganized and random garden, you probably won’t want to be there very often. A soldierly array of crisp raised beds might just be the ticket. Conversely, if you’d rather your vines ramble, and you love the look of a lush, overgrown jungle, take this into consideration before installing formal square beds. Chances are high that a snaking border or keyhole garden is going to suit you better.

Evenly spaced and orderly is the way to go for some gardeners.

What Do You Want from Your Garden?

Your garden should match your needs. Do you want high production, or do you just want to putter around? If you intend for this garden to produce a bounty of food for your family, you will benefit from structuring the garden with beds in full sun along with easy-to-access pathways with room for a wheelbarrow or large tubs. Build your planter beds wide enough to accommodate large plantings but narrow enough so you can access the produce without stepping into the beds. If, on the other hand, this garden is going to be a place to disappear and putter, then feel free to create cluster gardens, perhaps each with a different theme, and choose locations around your yard to tuck them into. Making choices that satisfy your needs will help you enjoy and use your garden(s) more thoroughly. Let’s look at some pointers for high-production gardens.

High-Production Gardens

Three feet (0.9 m) for kids, more for grown-ups: An adult can reach the center of a raised bed from either side most easily if the bed is no wider than 4 feet (1.2 m). It can be as long as you want—4 feet (1.2 m), 6 feet (1.8 m), 12 feet (3.7 m), or more—as long as you can access the midline of the bed on the two long sides. Some biointensive methods call for beds that are 5 feet (1.5 m) wide. To prevent soil compression that can occur while working these beds, farmers and gardeners usually keep planks of wood on hand to distribute their weight evenly. By laying a plank down across the area, a person can step or kneel on the plank instead of directly on the soil.

Children can’t reach as far as adults and will have to climb into your garden, disturbing the soil and possibly trampling seedlings if they can’t reach the center. Limit kid-sized beds to 4 feet (1.2 m) wide or less. A 3-foot- (0.9-m-) wide bed will be sufficient for adults, while giving children room to grow. A 2-foot- (0.6-m-) wide bed, while it may seem small, can be the perfect size for little hands in a school garden. While we’re on the subject of kids, this is a good time to mention that toddlers are usually pullers or diggers. They love to grab tiny seedlings and get a closer look. They like to dig tunnels for their rubber duckies. If this makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up, you might want to create a special garden just for the kids.

Twelve inches (30.5 cm) deep: Unless you have rich, loamy, fecund soil to begin with, you will want to build a raised bed that is at least 12 inches (30.5 cm) deep. Adequate root space is critically important to a plant’s health. Some gardening experts say that 6 inches (15 cm) deep is plenty, but the truth is that the deeper the soil is conditioned, the more easily plants will grow. Give your garden a good head start by building a foundation that is deep enough. For those using wood for this task, 2- x 12-inch (5- x 30.5-cm) lumber is best.

Two-foot (0.6-m) pathways (3-foot [0.9-m] for equipment): An average gardener needs only 2 feet (0.6 m) of space between beds to access the garden with ease. It is wide enough to kneel or sit down without backing into the bed behind you. If you plan to use a wheelbarrow or small garden cart, or need wheelchair access, make the pathways between beds at least 3 feet (0.9 m) wide. Better yet, measure your cart/wheelchair and base your pathway dimensions on that. Some experts reduce the amount of space between beds in order to fit more crops. If you are comfortable with navigating the foliage that will inevitably spill out of your incredibly productive beds onto the pathways, feel free to reduce the pathways to 19 inches (48 cm) or less. Just be aware that melons and squash will make for an interesting obstacle course.

Plan your garden accordingly if you will have little helpers.

Low-Key Gardens

If you plan to have a more low-key, meandering garden instead, keep these principles in mind.

Stepping stones are your friends: No matter how you set up your garden, you will be able to manage it more easily if you place stepping stones in strategic places to help navigate around your growing areas. A well-placed piece of flagstone or tile can help direct wandering guests and help prevent soil compaction in conditioned beds. If you plan to have growing areas that are wider than 4 feet (1.2 m), situate more stepping stones in the middle of the growing area to allow for ease of access.

Mimic nature: Nature presents itself in winding streams and spiraling vines. You can incorporate these elements of nature into the shape of your garden beds. A curving pathway through irregularly shaped beds can be more inviting to curious guests than a beeline entryway. You can also incorporate curves into the garden to capture water (more on that in Chapter 7, Irrigation). If you plan to create undulating free-form shapes, it is much easier to use adobe or earthbags, rather than wood, to build your raised beds. Bricks and stones offer similar flexibility. Just make sure your materials are not so thick and bulky that you lose access to the planting areas.

Where Will You Sit?

There are many ways to create sitting spaces in the garden, and raised beds offer a couple of different ways to rest. You can create a sitting rail around the perimeter of the bed by adding a “cap” of a 2x4 horizontally atop the frame of the bed. Secure the cap with 3-inch (7.5-cm) wood screws and add vertical supports—usually also made from 2x4s—that run top to bottom on the outside of the raised bed, underneath the cap. Another option is to place your raised beds closer together, with smaller pathways, so you can sit on the edge of one bed while working in the other. This strategy also helps those gardeners with lower back issues.

A curving pathway can be both interesting and useful.

Geeky Gardening TiP:

Try a Keyhole Garden

A keyhole garden uses permaculture design principles that aspire to create more edges in the garden. The more edges you create, the more planting surface you have. This design is based on the shape of a keyhole and can be built as a waist-high raised bed or as low as a few inches (7 or 8 cm) above ground. Think of it as a circle with a pathway leading into the center from one edge. The circle is between 8 and 12 feet (2.4 and 3.7 m) in diameter. The entire area of the circle is planted, but not the pathway. Gardeners access the garden space from the center of the circle, along the pathway, and along the outer circumference of the circle.

Some keyhole gardens incorporate a compost pile into the center of the circle. If you would like to try this, make sure that your planting area is narrow enough so that you can reach it entirely from the outside of the circle. Keyhole gardens are an efficient use of space and break the straight-line boundaries of formal raised beds.

Raised-Bed Building Tips

There are many ways to build a raised bed, from Sunset Magazine’s basic structure (sunset.com/garden/perfect-raised-bed) to less formal beds made from recycled fencing. Sunset’s raised bed uses corner posts, but some gardeners prefer to reclaim those precious inches of growing space taken up by posts and build their beds without them. Either way, if you build your bed with materials that last, using a few helpful tips offered here, you will be able to enjoy your raised beds for years to come.

• Build on a level surface—It seems like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how many people try to assemble their raised beds in the garden among the foliage. Do yourself a favor and build the beds on a concrete patio or other level surface and then move them into place.

• Use deck screws—It will save you time (and maybe even a trip to the emergency room) to use 3-inch (7.5-cm) galvanized deck screws or stainless-steel screws instead of nails. Predrill your holes if you are working with materials like Trex® decking, which splits easily near the ends.

• Put the ugly side in—Lumber has an ugly side. It always does. Whether it’s a knot, a crack, or the neon-orange spray paint the company used to mark the product, you are likely to find flaws in the wood. Be sure to situate that flawed surface to the inside of the raised bed, where the soil can cover it. While you’re at it, check the wood for splinters or rough edges and point the roughest edge to the ground. This saves you the time and effort later on of either pulling splinters out of your thumb or sanding down your new bed.

• Hardware cloth, not chicken wire—If you have burrowing animals in your

neighborhood, there is one important step to take as you build your beds: line the bottoms securely with hardware cloth (welded wire mesh). Chicken wire is thin, and gophers can chew through it, but 1/2-inch (1.25-cm) hardware cloth will last for years and put your concerns to rest before you’ve even added soil to the beds.

How to Build a Raised Bed

1.Cut pieces of 2- x 12-inch (5- x 30.5-cm) lumber to the appropriate size. For a 4- x 8-foot (1.2- x 2.4-m) raised bed, purchase three 8-foot (2.4-m) pieces of lumber, and then you will only have to cut one board in half. Your beds will have an external dimension of 4 x 8 feet (1.2 x 2.4 m), but your internal dimensions, the actual growing area, will be slightly smaller.

2.Align the pieces vertically and bring the corners together as shown (see the diagram) on a level surface. Predrill the holes as needed and connect the corners with three 3-inch (7.5-cm) deck screws per side.

3.Once the frame is assembled, flip the bed over and attach hardware cloth to the bottom edge (if you are using hardware cloth) with 1/2-inch (1.25-cm) construction staples. Return the bed to the right side and position it in the garden.

4.Check the bed with a level to ensure that the foundation is…well, level. If your bed is sloped, water is likely to drain unevenly, and you may experience pooling in low areas.

5.Next, use a mallet or hammer to insert the 18-inch (46-cm) predrilled flat steel stakes against the inside walls of the raised bed. Place the stakes 2 feet (61 cm) apart. These prevent the wood from twisting or bowing under the weight of wet soil. It also prevents the bed from shifting over time, especially if you are building taller beds with several layers of wood. You will need to adjust the length dimensions of the stakes if you build taller beds. For a 12-inch (30.5-cm) bed, 18-inch (46-cm) stakes are appropriate. Hammer the stakes into the ground so that the top end of the stake sits about 1 to 2 inches (2.5 to 5 cm) below the top edge of the raised bed. You will not be able to see the stakes once the bed is filled with soil.

6.Secure each stake to the wood frame with four 1½-inch (3.75-cm) wood screws as shown (see “Metal stake placement inside front view” on the diagram). If you plan to attach a sitting rail or cap to the top edge of your raised bed, this is the time to do it.

7.Congratulations! Now you are ready to fill your bed with soil.

8.If you don’t have enough existing soil and compost to fill your raised beds, you will need to start off with bagged nursery planting mix, bulk organic vegetable garden soil, or a combination of ingredients. Once the beds are established, regular composting will keep you supplied with soil amendments.

A Formula for New Raised-Bed Soil

Before we get started, let’s get something straight: there’s no actual soil in potting soil. It’s a misnomer. Potting soil is usually made up of decomposed organic matter, like compost, wood chips, lumberyard waste, and peat moss. It also has perlite—that white puffy stuff that looks and sounds like Styrofoam when you crush it. Perlite is puffed volcanic glass that allows water to flow better through the soil medium. It doesn’t hold nutrients or add nourishment to the plants. It’s simply there as a placeholder for air and water.

Peat moss is widely used in potting soils to hold moisture and improve soil texture. It is acidic and can help adjust alkaline pH when needed. The trouble is that peat moss is a natural resource that is being depleted around the world. It takes about 3,000 years for nature to make a peat bog, and we’re using it up faster than it can reproduce. As an alternative, some forward-thinking soil companies are starting to incorporate a peat moss substitute into their potting soils instead. That alternative is called coir. It’s mispronounced by most, but the correct pronunciation (in English, anyway) is “coy-yer.” Coir works like peat to hold moisture and improve soil texture, but it’s made from a waste product, so it’s renewable.

Coir is made from the outside hull of coconuts—the part that is thrown away. The raw product has a high salinity, so it must be thoroughly rinsed before use. Thankfully, most manufacturers producing coir for the hydroponics industry are meticulous in eliminating salts before packaging the product. Investigate your provider before using a new material and inquire with your nursery professional about carrying coir-based products for your neighborhood.

That bag of potting soil from the store will probably say “organic,” but know this: there is no regulation about the use of the word organic in soil amendments. When we go to the grocery store and buy organic produce, we know it has been grown without pesticides and chemical fertilizers according to United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) organic standards. In the world of soil amendments, organic simply means “of, relating to, or derived from living matter.” Keep this in mind as you read about fertilizers as well.

So now that you have an idea of what’s in those bags, let’s talk about how to make your own raised-bed planting mix. Here’s the formula: start with 50 percent compost, 40 percent coir, and 10 percent perlite or vermiculite, depending on your existing soil conditions. Vermiculite does the opposite of perlite. It is a puffed mineral that is exploded like popcorn. It holds water like a sponge, which helps sandy soils retain moisture. It doesn’t break down, so you need to apply it only once. Vermiculite has a checkered past: at one point, a major mining source discovered that their vermiculite was contaminated with asbestos, but OMRI (Organic Materials Review Institute) put regulations into practice to ensure that each batch is now certified asbestos-free before sale.

You can also throw in coffee grounds and organic fertilizer if you like. This is just a starting point, however. If you mix in some of your existing soil, you will want to adjust the percentages a bit. If you have clay soil, add more compost to break up tight particles. If you have sandy soil, use more coir to hold moisture better. Play around with this. It’s all part of the experiment of gardening.

Now, to calculate your soil needs. If you have a raised bed that is 12 inches tall, it will be easy to figure out how much planting medium you will need. It’s simply length x width x 1 = cubic feet (because your bed is 1 foot tall). If you have a shorter raised bed, you will need to do a little more math: length x width x height, but this time the height will be a fraction of 1 foot. For example, let’s say you have a bed that is 4 feet wide, 6 feet long, and 8 inches tall. First, multiply 4 feet x 6 feet to get 24 feet. Then divide 12 inches into 8 inches to get 0.667 (this is the fraction of 1 foot). Multiply 24 feet by 0.667 to get 16 cubic feet of soil. If your bed is 10 inches tall, use 0.834 for the height; if it is 6 inches tall, use 0.5 for the height.

Volume = 4 feet x 6 feet x (8 inches/12 inches) = 16 cubic feet (or 4 feet x 6 feet x 0.667 = 16 cubic feet)

Once you have figured out the cubic footage, multiply that total by 50 percent to find out how much compost you need. Then multiply the cubic footage total by 40 percent for how much coir, and then by 10 percent for perlite. For example:

Our bed needs 16 cubic feet of soil.

50 percent of 16 is 8 cubic feet of compost.

40 percent of 16 is 6.4 cubic feet of coir.

10 percent of 16 is 1.6 cubic feet of perlite.

Most bags of nursery potting soil and compost are sold in quantities of either 2 cubic feet or 1.5 cubic feet. Divide your totals for each material by the bag size you plan to buy, and that will tell you how many bags to load into your car.

Geeky Gardening TiP:

Old-School String Lines

When setting up mounded raised beds, place stakes at each corner of your target bed area and run string along the sides to map out clear lines for your beds. Whether you are building stacked mounds with layers of organic material, or just hilling up soil and compost, these lines will ensure that your beds are straight.

Berm Beds

Often called unconstructed beds or mounds, berm beds are the right choice for those who want to build a garden without actually building anything—not even stacks of organic matter. These beds also allow for more creativity. They can be formed into any shape, length, and size to accommodate your grand garden vision. Do you want a snaking berm with sunflowers along the pathway? A circle mound for your potato patch? Start digging.

There are several ways to build an unconstructed bed. A common practice is to mark out the bed areas (see the Old-School String Lines tip above) but instead of digging inside the bed area, dig soil out of the pathways and dump it onto the bed areas. This leaves the pathways lower than soil level and the beds higher than where they started. This technique was used by indigenous cultures to irrigate their crops and is often used in commercial agriculture today. The lower pathways fill with water, and the water is absorbed at the base of the mounds. Plant roots reach deeper for water, making them more resilient and drought tolerant. In permaculture, a variation of the pathway-turned-trench is called a swale and is often used to divert water away from flood-prone areas toward plant root zones (we’ll talk more about this in Chapter 7). Turn to Appendix D for other ways to build mounded beds, including “no-dig” beds.

Mounded raised beds are usually between 4 and 8 inches (10 and 20 cm) tall, though some adventurous gardeners have been known to build them waist-high. Pathway soil is mixed with compost to create loamy, well-drained soil that will hold together in mounds. The sides are sloped, and the surface of the mound either is flat across the top or has a gentle convex curve.

The theory behind this kind of mounded bed is that it creates more surface area. Sloped sides plus a flat top equals more soil exposed to the sun, which means that the soil thaws and warms more quickly in spring. Some gardeners take advantage of the extra surface area by planting crops on the slopes of each bed. You gain up to another foot of growing space if your beds are 6 inches (15 cm) tall. Be aware that slopes can erode during watering, so keep the slopes, if not the whole bed, well mulched to retain water and prevent soil loss.

In-Ground Planting

While unconstructed, or berm, beds are essentially the same as in-ground planting, the difference is height. An in-ground garden bed is made by loosening the existing soil of the desired planting area and working (digging) compost into the top 4 to 6 inches (10 to 15 cm). If you have existing soil that tends toward sand or loam, this is a fine choice. Those with clay soil will find it difficult to cultivate a garden this way without adding copious amounts of compost. In fact, clay soil is the reason raised beds were invented in the first place! Because clay soil doesn’t drain well and takes longer to thaw after winter, use this method only if you have sandy, well-draining soil.

Be sure to test your soil before planting in the area. Most university agriculture departments offer basic soil tests, and some will test your soil for heavy metals. Do you know the history of the land you plan to cultivate? With all of these good intentions for healthier living, it would be a shame to inadvertently poison yourself by growing food in soil contaminated with heavy metals, so be safe and get that soil tested. We’ll talk more about soil nutrients and heavy metals in Chapter 3.

Conditioning an in-ground planter takes about as much sweat and elbow grease as an unconstructed bed. Many first-time gardeners like to try this method before committing to a formalized garden layout. It doesn’t require a lot of planning, just a lot of compost. Work the compost down into the top 4 to 6 inches (10 to 15 cm) of soil. The deeper you loosen and amend the soil, the better your crops will grow. You can add decorative elements, like stone or brick borders, and put stepping stones throughout the planter to avoid compacting the soil.

No matter what type of raised bed you decide to use, just know that good planning pays off. Your garden will reward you with a bountiful harvest if you put some time and energy into the overall design and structure. Build your beds once and enjoy them for years to come.