Raised Bed Garden (perhaps a little unusual)

[TnAndy]

TnAndy - the pics of your place never cease to amaze me!! I'd love to see your place in person!!

(NOTE: Not fishing for an invite! LOL! Just a rhetorical comment. But it would be cool to see!)

PM me. Tours given only on Mondays thru Sundays.

 

[DKCDKC]

Love the cinderblocks... I use them as well - but don't mortar them, just loose stack. I have 4 24" by 16' in what used to be my old garden. Age has caught up with me and I've gone to raised bed - and smaller. I am adding another row of blocks almost each year and will be waist high shortly. I am blessed with many acres of rich, creek-bottom soil I can fill the beds with. Really use very little fertilizer.

 

[NorTracNY]

PM me. Tours given only on Mondays thru Sundays.

Mark02tj is correct. The pictures of your place are amazing. I have taken note of several of your setups. Seeing that I will be leaving this state to retire, I am trying to note what I'll do different in my next homestead. Seeing that you're using the thinner concrete blocks, what have you done to keep them from bowing out. Are there rods tying the walls together?

 

[jaydee325]

One of my favorite books is called Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew. Look it up sometime. Great read.

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Thanks for the tip Moss. Just ordered the book!

 

[TnAndy]

Mark02tj is correct. The pictures of your place are amazing. I have taken note of several of your setups. Seeing that I will be leaving this state to retire, I am trying to note what I'll do different in my next homestead. Seeing that you're using the thinner concrete blocks, what have you done to keep them from bowing out. Are there rods tying the walls together?

The outer wall is 8" block, and the inside of the outside beds is 8" block topped with a 4x4x16 solid pc (used around here to make a lip on block to pour 4" of concrete up to).....see pic:

But that inside bed, I thought "heck, let's try 4" block and see if it holds".....apparently it does, no rebar. I DID plaster the inside with "Surewall".....a bonding cement with fiberglass fibers in it normally use to dry stack block and plaster to hold....so that surely added some side strength.....but honestly, I think the 4" block alone would hold. There is no pressure up in the bed other than the dirt fill, and it shouldn't be too much.

Ran PEX tubing under the center slab for solar hot water.

You can see the white Surewall. What I did was build the bed in thirds, filling as I did 1/3 with loader bucket, then backing my way on out the front doors.

I filled the bottom half of the bed with whatever clay soil I could dig around the place. The top half of the beds, we made a mix of compost, peat, perlite, vermiculite, sand.....then we add fresh compost to it from time to time. Only other additive is fish emulsion fertilizer wife uses.

 

[RalphVa]

Way too big without putting some pathways through/across it as others have pointed out. You never want to step into your raised bed. Been there; done that; doesn't work.

I bought some local garden soil to fill my 4x8 raised beds (have had it tested; supposedly perfect). Have yet to be able to grow decent okra in them. Bought some local Panorama Paydirt and have put a couple inches on top of a couple of the beds (the others are in asparagus; the asparagus I tried about 3 years ago is doing well; asparagus seems very particular in what it likes). The new Paydirt plus maybe using some 10/1 water/urine mix as my natural fertilizer will possibly give me some okra. Can grown most everything else (except corn; not enough room in raised beds for it anyway).

Really miss my big garden down below in creek overflow soil. EVERYTHING would grow in it. Okra was so high that I'd have to bend it down to clip pods from the top. Just too much work for me now.

Ralph