Create the ideal planting bed by taking your gardening to new heights.
Raised beds are great for Iowa gardens for several reasons:
• They ensure the excellent drainage that so many of our favorite plants demand. This prevents winter losses since they’re not sitting with their roots in ice for months at a time.
• The soil in raised beds warms up more quickly in spring for earlier planting, blooming, and harvesting.
• Raised beds allow you to create perfect soil.
• They minimize weeding by creating the world’s best edging.
How to Build Raised Beds
Make them out of anything you like—concrete blocks, recycled bricks, landscape timbers, etc. Pressure-treated pine is a good option. It’s inexpensive and highly rot-resistant (be sure to get the type for ground contact). However, there is some risk of the chemicals used to preserve the wood getting into edibles, so if you want to be extra safe, use a naturally rot- resistant wood, like cedar.
Raised beds in most cases in need be only 4 to 6 inches high, though those that are 1 foot or more high are excellent. Make sure they are well-anchored, either with stakes or by burying at least 2 inches of the edging material into the ground. If the bed is only a few inches high, work in plenty of compost, sand, or sphagnum peat moss to loosen and enrich the soil and promote even better drainage. This digging is enough to kill any grass or weeds. No chemicals needed.
How to Fill Raised Beds
Fill a raised bed with the best soil possible. A blend of half topsoil and half compost is excellent. If you have good dark garden loam elsewhere in your landscape, you can use that as well.
You can purchase “garden soil” or “topsoil” at the garden center in bags. But if you need to buy more than a dozen or so bags, consider purchasing soil and/or compost in bulk from a landscaper or garden center. However, be sure to be home when it is delivered and be prepared to turn down the delivery if the soil isn’t fairly dark and crumbly. Much soil sold as topsoil is actually very poor quality. Be prepared to turn away the truck if necessary.
Raised Bed Myths
In most cases, you don’t need to lay anything down at the bottom of the bed. It will only get in the way of the plant roots. Landscape fabric or other materials at the bottom are not needed to suppress weeds since the soil on top of them will naturally suffocate them anyway. In some cases, a barrier may discourage burrowing animals, but even then, they can always go through the top if they’re determined.
Other Links of Interest:
Composting For Beginners In Three Easy Steps
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