Raised Bed Revival

My first gardening challenge this year has been a big one:  re-build two raised beds.  I have a total of nine raised beds, scattered about our 1.3 acres in the few sunny spots available, since they are primarily vegetable gardens.  The one needing help, a sixteen footer next to the greenhouse, started out four feet wide, but as its hemlock sides rotted, it splayed out to over five.  While the plants don’t care, it looks awfully untidy, so re-building this bed has been on my seemingly bottomless bucket list for some time.

I’m a huge advocate of the many advantages of raised bed gardening.  Raised beds eliminate space-wasting paths between rows.  Not walking on the bed minimizes the back-breaking job of turning the soil.  You’ll also need less compost or fertilizer to make the root zone a happier place to grow.  Raised beds encourage the use of trellises for rambling crops like cucumbers and tomatoes, which keeps the area neat.  My old in-ground vegetable garden resembled a lost corner of the Amazon by August, so the inherent tidiness with beds is a tremendous benefit.  You can plant closer in raised beds, too, so less space is wasted (think “Square Foot Gardening,” created by 1980’s green guru Mel Bartholomew).  Closer planting means less area to weed, and if you mulch (and you really should), less mulch is needed. 

Of course, every upside has a downfall, and it’s my duty as an Extension Educator to give you both sides of the rutabaga here.  Eventually, wooden raised beds need to be replaced.  Starting with my first ones built in 2002, I have used hemlock lumber from local sawmills.  This material is reasonably priced, locally-grown and additive free.  In my experience, however, it has a life of about ten to twelve years, after which natural decay takes over and the sides of the bed fail.  Initially, I didn’t mind re-constructing them, but I’m at the age where I want something more durable.  I’m now using the newest generation treated wood, which contains no chromium or arsenic, chemical constituents in the old treated lumber which made it taboo for vegetable gardening.  Recycled plastic lumber, bricks, blocks – fancy and store-bought to found or scrounged, many materials can be made to work.  Necessity makes strange beds, fellows. 

Experience has taught me to adopt other raised bed upgrades.  Due to the wild ways of wildlife, I’ve deemed the installation of ½ inch galvanized steel hardware cloth on the entire bottom of all raised beds mandatory.  Moles, consummate diggers, construct terrestrial runways invaded by voles, vegetable eaters, and this duo has steadily made growing any unprotected root crops at my place pointless.  With the steel mesh screening the critters from below, I can grow dahlias, onions and even delectable potatoes in peace.  Additionally, the longest raised beds are now only eight feet, with reinforced corner blocks and plenty of deck screws to prevent the sides from gradually flopping.  If I added heated soil and solar-powered LEDs, I could probably grow year-round.   

David Chinery is the horticulture educator at Cornell Cooperative Extension of Rensselaer County