My New Square Foot Garden Raised Bed

Yesterday I told you about my new PVC raised gardening boxes in the far top left corner.  At $59.97 each on sale, they certainly were not a cheap way to build raised garden beds especially since between the two I ended up with 16 square feet of growing space.  My husband doesn't like the new PVC beds so he picked up some spruce to build me a wooden raised bed.

The new raised bed is 4' x 12' x 10" giving me an additional 48 square feet of growing space.  The new bed construction took a couple of days due to weather but finally it was ready for soil.  Again we were delayed due to weather but finally the bed was ready to lay out the grid then plant.

The cost for the lumber and brackets totaled $38.45, considerably less expensive per square foot than the PVC beds.  I've had wooden square foot garden beds last well over five years so if you want neat and tidy raised beds that are easy to set up for square foot gardening, untreated spruce is more than reasonably priced.

By then end of the afternoon, I had the bed mostly planted.  Three squares remained unplanted.  I planted bistro salad blend, dill, habs, golden acre cabbage, super chili peppers, muskmelon, watermelon, holy moly peppers, celery and sweet million tomatoes, beefsteak tomatoes, roma tomatoes and lemon boy tomatoes.  Within a couple of days something had got to the celery and dill but the dill is coming back.  I noticed a couple of small grasshoppers so that is not a good sign.  Something is already eating the cabbage but I haven't seen what yet.  I'll just have to keep and eye out to identify the pests then work on control from there.

Happy Gardening!  

Garden Gnome
©2006-2012

My PVC Raised Garden Boxes

I use a variety of garden bed styles, preferring raised beds but like in ground beds for flower beds.  Shortly after arriving home from our spring vacation, Home Hardware had 4' x 4' PVC raised garden boxes on sale for $59.97.  As raised beds go, these were expensive but I reasoned the PVC would out live the untreated spruce I normally use for my raised garden beds.  The looked slick and a bit upscale.  I bought two of them.

The Canadian made (Home Gardener) PVC beds (Home Hardware, 5010-044) are maintenance free.  They are made of heavy duty PVC that will not rot or rust making them ideal for creating permanent raised garden boxes.  The ready to assemble boxes came in large, moderately heavy cardboard boxes. 

Each box is 4' x 4' x 15", providing ample depth for planting.  The design is such that the box could be moved to another location later if desired making it suitable for those renting.  The snap system would make it harder to disassemble the walls though.

The boxes are easy to assemble using a snap lock system.  There are no instructions included in the box.  Be warned when assembling that each side consists of two PVC boards one of which has a finished top.  Be sure you have the finished top upwards before snapping on an end post.  Given the way the boxes are assembled one side at a time, it would be easy to create the box around a pre-existing structure.

As promised the assembly was very easy.  I put both together the same day.  Assembly required no tools.  I thought there would be some type of bottom as the boxes are raised off the ground a bit.  There isn't.  Basically the box is just a fancy raised frame.

I put the assembled boxes along the back fence.  Although the previous owners had a garden in that location at one time the area is over grown and quite weedy.  It is going to take considerable work to make the area look nice.  The first problem is ridding the area of thistles!  Near the top left there is a patch of unidentified plants thought to possibly be in the onion family.

The raised boxes are nice and it would be rather easy to add a hoop house topper.   I planted strawberries in one and asparagus in the other.  I am rather up in the air as to wether I like the boxes as much as I thought I would.  They don't lend themselves well to establishing a grid for using the square foot garden method but they do have the benefit of not harbouring carpenter ants, rotting or rusting.  I will report back on how well I like them at the end of this gardening season.

Happy Gardening!
Garden Gnome
©2006-2012