[Vienna Phil]

Hi Everyone,

As I stated in my welcome post a week or so ago, I am new to gardening. I recently read about the deep bed method, or raised deep bed method in John Seymour's book, The New Self Sufficient Gardner. I am really interested in trying it next year in my little plot in Vienna. Does anyone have any experience and/or advice?

Looking forward to your posts.

Phil

[Space_Cowby]

If you mean raised beds then loads of people have them including me.

We went for this approach for a couple of reasons.
All our veg is grown in garden so wanted something that looked nice :-)
Raised beds meant we did not have to walk on the soil so less digging,

down side was

needed loads of soil and wood
probably needs to be watered a little more than regular beds.

Im sure the other members will have differnt thoughts as well though

[rainie]

Hey phil, I found it.  

The raised beds offer ease for weeding, and less bending down. The beds are of a size comfortable to yourself to use and you should be able to reach half way across one, comfortably, then move round to the other side and be able to do the same. Paths are put between them.  I see them as container planting on a very large scale.
Hope this helps. Hopefully more suggestions and experience with raised beds will follow from others on here.

[peapod]

Ive just got my plot, and was intending to use raised beds for ease of weeding, spacing and just to look neater.  However, the lotty hadnt been used for growing for at least 5 years (chickens were kept on it), so the soil is lovely and fertile.  So im using the beds I have dug 'straight in to the ground' with a border of wood to define the edges if you know what I mean! However Im still using the same rules - no walking on the beds
When the time comes, Ill have a look at raised beds, in about 3 years or so, but purely because then I'll need to improve the soil quite a lot and can have that as an option.

Paula

[SnooziSuzi]

Hi Vienna Phill,

I'd say that as one bit of advice, don't put your beds too close together - I'm in the process of setting up a series of beds, and haven't left enough room for my OH to walk down one side (I'm 5'3" and only 8 stone so quite slim, but OH is a fair bit wider than I am  :oops: ) and as a result he keeps stepping on my cabbages and kicking the sweetcorn  :evil:

I thought that I'd make the most of the space I had in order to fit in more beds by reducing the width of the path in between but of course it's OK for me but not anyone else!  

Also, you could do yourself a big favour and put down some type of weed suppressant in between the beds so that you spend more time gardening and less time weeding!

Hope this helps  

[Vienna Phil]

Hi Everyone,

Thanks a lot for the posts.

Regards from rainy Vienna.

Phil

[Minty]

We have only had our plot for 4 weeks now and have got 9 raised bed's in and it's worked out great for us and it all look's less daunting.The bed's are 8ft x 4ft and made from what our local wood yard call's gravel boards,it cost's £20 for 3 bed's cut to size which I think is pretty good.

We also have 2 heaps of soil on our plot which must total about 20 ton's so that's being used to fill the beds along with some well rotted compost but I think if we didnt have that available the cost would be abit too much if we had to buy the soil in.

Alot of the old boy's on our site who come for a chat have said that if they were starting all over again they would go for the raised bed system.

[peapod]

Alot of the old boy's on our site who come for a chat have said that if they were starting all over again they would go for the raised bed system.

I wonder when you are classed as an 'old boy' (in my case 'old girl!)..5 years...10.....30?


     

[Minty]

Alot of the old boy's on our site who come for a chat have said that if they were starting all over again they would go for the raised bed system.

I wonder when you are classed as an 'old boy' (in my case 'old girl!)..5 years...10.....30?


     

A lot of the old boy's and old girls on our site have been there for over 40 years.They are a brilliant bunch and always come over for a chat and to offer advice.

[growmore]

Hi and welcome.

One potential problem with the raised bed system is that the weeds lurk under the paths and spread into the beds. I'm not knocking the system which I think is great but if you have something like mairs tale or bindweed roots under the paths then they will spread into your beds.

I have just got hold of a full size plot n my site - upgrading from a quarter to a half to the 'big one' and have decided that there will be 'no paths' between beds as they just harbour roots and therefore weeds.

Just my opinion - for what its worth - some people on our site do raised beds and dont seem to have a weed problem - maybe its just my paranoiaia

[upert]

i have grown whopping, happy crops in my deep raised beds. they do take a lot of soil unless you chuck on the stuff from the paths, and a lot of my raised beds are unsupported with wooden sides because wood has been a problem to get. if you don't want to bend down you'll have to raise them a helluva height and that takes masses of soil.

[blackisgreen]

raised beds offer the oppertunity to grow at a manageable level i.e less weeding ,more crops together and ease of manageability.
they are therefore ok to use but you can only grow so many in a smaller space. certain cropslike aspagus thrive in them others dont upto what you want .
The thing about old boy made me laugh old boy here  is son whereas old chap is dad,if an old boy is a son or an older gentleman is that a young old boy or an old old boy? who knows .

[Bombers]

One thing that I've learned about raised beds in a relatively small plot, is that when you need to consider next seasons crops, it's really usefull to be able to move beds around. I have a number of 8' x 4' beds made with old 3" x 3" fence posts. I haven't screwed them together, and because they are quite bulky, they don't move around as would a smaller section of timber. That said, now i have a space where this years tatties were, I will just 'up sticks' (Scuse the pun) move the bed to that space, and use the old bed for next years First earlies.(If that makes sense??? :roll: )