Raised Garden Beds

When you choose to garden using raised garden beds, you start with several advantages.

Container and raised bed gardens have advantages.

Raised garden beds provide many advantages and few disadvantages. Whether you want to grow gorgeous flowers, add foundation plants in front of your home, or grow delicious fruits and vegetables, there are many reasons to choose raised garden beds.

Raised garden beds are gardens created by building a box, container, or form, then filling the form with soil. The plants are then said to be raised because they are not grown directly in the ground but in the soil placed within the box. Raised beds may be created from many materials. The most common choices to build raised beds include untreated wood, pressure treated wood, special woods such as cedar, PVC or plastic panels, stone, rock and bricks. Many buildings plans are available online or you can easily create a raised bed on your own. You can also find raised bed garden kits at home and garden centers nationwide or garden catalogs.

Raised garden beds provide many advantages. You can create flower beds where none existed. Making small raised island flower beds creates focal points throughout the garden. You can use them as accents or to create an oasis of tranquility. Some people enjoy using rocks or natural stones to create raised beds around large specimen trees in the garden and planting a lovely shade garden, while others choose to place raised beds in sunny areas to cultivate flowers they can't grow elsewhere.

For vegetable gardeners, raised bed gardening offers many advantages too. Soil can be easily amended, and a rich soil leads to healthy, robust vegetables. Raised beds are usually narrower than ground-planted beds, making it easier to work among plants to do common tasks such as weeding, watering, staking and harvesting. The raised garden also prevents compaction. Compaction is when soil gets pressed down from people walking over it a lot or rolling heavy equipment over it. Compaction is bad because it makes it harder for plants' roots to grow and seek nutrients the plants need to be healthy.

The main disadvantages to creating raised beds are time and money. Raised beds take a few hours to make. You have to shop for the materials, find plans or sketch your own, and build the raised bed. Materials may cost anywhere from $5 per board to $25 per board, depending on the materials you choose. While you can always use recycled lumber from old barns or pallets, you'll have to replace it faster since the wood is already weathered. The trade off to save a few dollars on materials is an expense of time later to replace the garden beds more quickly than if you'd built it from scratch using pressure treated lumber, PVC, rocks or some other material that lasts longer.

Gardeners looking for inspiration for their own raised beds can find ideas in many places.

• Cooperative extension: Many state cooperative extension offices have demonstration gardens to show beginning gardeners how to do various gardening tasks, including making raised garden beds. Check with your local cooperative extension office to see where the nearest raised bed gardens are for you.
• Universities and colleges: Many universities and colleges with agricultural programs have demonstration gardens. The University of Kentucky near Lexington, for example, has a beautiful arboretum and demonstration vegetable garden, and the staff loves to share their knowledge of raised bed gardening with visitors. It's also free to visit. Cornell and other universities around the country offer similar examples. Look for one near you.
• Public gardens: Many public gardens offer examples of raised bed gardens. Famous mansions such as Biltmore in North Carolina and Old Westbury Gardens on Long Island, New York, showcase flowers and vegetables in raised beds.
• Local garden clubs: Your local garden club members are probably happy and willing to show off their gardens. Joining a local garden club is fun and lets you meet people with shared interests. Look in your local newspaper for meeting times and club locations.

No matter where you live, raised beds offer many options to create lovely garden spaces and practical vegetable gardens. Look for inspiration around you and experiment to find your own unique style.

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