Raised beds on an existing lawn

[swanthingafteranother]

I have a patch of very scraggy lawn at the end of small urban garden (tis only 60 ft long the whole garden) on which climbing frame stood.

Climbing frame has now gone, lawn very uneven, generally bumpy lumpy and rubbish, also quite bad drainage etc. Large rowan and fig on two sides/bad winter shade but in summer it can get quite a bit of sun half the day.

My plan is to make three raised beds with wooden kit, say 2 x 2 m each with little hardstanding paths in between and around (loads of leftover bricks, paving cobbles etc) Will trees mind having raised beds over roots?
Will drainage improve dramatically with raised beds?
Do I need compost in beds or topsoil, or a mixture, or could I dig some from somewhere else in garden...

I plan to give a raised bed to each child to plant things in? My kids are 9 x 2, and 11.

I know what to plant (sort of), just wondered what joy others had had, and what you planted...

I'll be back later Swan, could quite happily chat about this all day. Your garden sounds just like mine.

I haven't had a chance to do raised beds, but I would be concerned about the trees. The trees would probably be fine, but could take a lot of the moisture out of the soil. Any heavy feeding vegetables might not do so well, unless you made sure they were as far away from the trees as possible. Raised beds is the PERFECT solution, but suspect you would need to make them a decent height. Are you filling it with specially purchased soil or are you just going to let them build up naturally?

I'm planning to do them too, but need to remove a few bits and pieces from the garden before I can.

Were you planning on digging the grass up?

One of the things I'm keen to plant is the popping sweetcorn. Think it will be lots of fun!!!

well, I wondered whether if I forked over the grass if it would matter if I didn't dig it up (mostly mud anyway)
Or will it die and leach noxious gases into my soil if I don't properly compost it...

Children so far have been extremely unhelpful whilst gardening as they take it as an opportunity to start fighting, deciding they are bored, pouring water on everything but the soil, smashing glass, locking each other in shed...making mud slides...But two years have passed since I last tried anything with them...and had quite a successful "plant miniature garden" party with the twins last March, so I thought I would try again

I meant theyhad been unhelpful in the past few years...

The grass will keep growing from the roots, the best thing is to fork it and get all of it out. Don't rotovate it, because that just chops it up and you NEVER get rid of all the roots. TBH it will take a few years to completly get rid of the grass anyway, but the slow manual method is best. (Sadly!)

I had an allotment for a bit but DS2 was too small to be taken and it got rather unkempt and they got all snarky with me so I gave it up. Have our own place now rather than renting so I can attack the garden as I like!

I'd get rid of the grass by digging turf off in squares, if you fork down a few inches you get below the roots and can lift the turfs off easily. I just shove ours in a heap behind a bush when the lawn encroaches on my beds, if there's a lot I would tip it.

I think the trees could be a problem, they will not only take all the moisture out of the soil but the canopy will stop much rain getting on as well. The shade might not be too much of a problem, our school garden is only sunny for part of the day (since the kindly developers built a house right up against the boundary), full sun is too much for many veg.

I have a similar sized garden to you, we have 3 x 1m square raised beds in a border. They are about 8inches deep and filled with a mixture of soil from the garden, bought compost and compost from the compost bin. Bought compost alone is too light and fluffy, and expensive. If buying topsoil need to make sure you get it from somewhere reliable, the last thing you want is to find it is full of weed roots. Maybe someone at your local allotment association might be able to advise? I top mine up every year with both sorts of compost.

If you are doing 2m square you will need to make sure there is kneeling room all the way round, at 1m you can get away with access from 2 sides.

Will come back if I think of anything else

yes, I think 2 m squares would be much too big, my garden isn't wide enough anyway

I also need a greenhouse of some kind to put seedlings in, if the children and I are going to do this!

Chitchat I was offered my allotment when I was pregnant with twins. I refused it . Probably the right decision! I don't think Dh was ever going to do any digging...Now it is a bit late to get one, because the demand is sky high round here.

We just use one of those small portable plastic covered greenhouses on the patio.

1m squares aren't actually very big, if I was starting from scratch or had more space I think 3 beds of 1x2m would be good for us. The ones at school are about 1x3m.

I've had my name down for an allotment, since I got made redundant a couple of years ago, the site is very close by, but now I am working again plus running the school gardening club I doubt I would have time to do it.

I have grown seedlings in window sills and they did brilliantly. Some can go into a warm cupboard (where your boiler is is ideal) until they have sprouted then need to come out into the sunlight. They can then go into a cold frame for awhile before being planted outside after the last frost date.

Have you thought of "lazy mans grass"?

It's really fabulous and its always green and pleasant to walk on even in the soggiest weather. If your hubby or yourself, brother, father cousin etc is handy with a saw and electric drill and screw driver you could build your own raised beds.
Take a look at this easy how to video on raised beds halfway down the right side of this link: www.organichomegardeningideas.com/

Raised beds are fabulous, keeps poisonous plants out of the reach of pets and kids and is easy on the back. :)

Back later...

Just a couple of things to consider. The height of the raised bed will determine what you can grow or decide what you want to grow and then look up the height of bed you need. In a nutshell, if you want to grow things that develop underground like potatoes/parsnips/carrots than you need about 60cm high beds, if you only grow things like peas than you could just have 20 cm.

I would err on the higher side because it gives you more options.

Also, you should grow different crops in succession (google crop rotation).

If you are growing under trees, then there will be shade, so crops that need a lot of sun to mature will be difficult (think tomatoes, peppers, aubergines, sweetcorn). There is still a lot of veg that will be fine with some shade (lettuce, peas, courgettes,...).

I would take the lawn up and dig out any perennial weeds and then fill with good quality topsoil or (even better) a raised bed mix, compost is expensive and will dry out more quickly than a loam based mixture. Try to go for a local supplier as the delivery cost will be lower. It pays off to get the best possible quality. Have it delivered in a builders bag rather than individual bags as is cheaper. Yous kids are old enough to help with filling in wheelbarrows and filling up raised beds.

Yes, we grow potatoes in sacks because of lack of depth in our beds (not enough room anyway), but shallow things like lettuce, radishes, onions, beetroot and climbers like beans and peas are great. We do grow carrots but harvest them fairly small and I am thinking about putting them in a deep pot or two next year.

I think I will be planting quite a few flowers, not just veg, which gives more options on shade front. I've always grown potatoes in very deep trugs, but they were v. watering intensive so I will bear the depth in mind if I move to beds.
Just need to wait for seed catalogues to browse now to get some idea of how I want them to be laid out, look, with plants inside.
There's a lovely book called The Cutting Garden by S Raven I remember from a while back, might try and find an old copy on Amazon.

When I grew potatoes in a sack (well, 5 sacks actually ) I found it really hard to get the soil moist. The water seemed to just trickle down the sides of the sack. I used to put the nozzle into the soil and that helped, but it wasn't great.

When I had the allotment the pototoes were a lot easier to keep moist, and to harvest as I wanted to.

I agree re the sacks of potatoes and watering, but we haven't got room to grow them in the ground. We don't get very good yields, but we hardly eat potatoes anyway (DS and DH don't like them), it is more just a fun thing for me and DD to do.

I think potatoes are one of the most magical things to grow! Digging them up is like finding treasure. And they taste and smell completely different, even just in B & Q compost...

Agree Swan, I love putting my hand in the sack and delving around for the spuds and they do taste fantastic. Somehow the fact that we only get a few meal's worth makes them taste even better!

I use water spikes with plastic bottles as they get the water right down to the roots, I also mix the compost with a bit of topsoil for water retention. I still give my potatoes extra water with a can but the spikes help. They are probably the thirstiest crop. You an also use potato fertiliser to increase your crop, have also used bone meal successfully.

I'd say copious and regular amounts of water when tubers are starting to form (after flowering) are the most important factor for a good crop