More Raised Garden Beds

This past weekend was busy with preparations for the farm. We have more than doubled our vegetable garden space for 2009 and we will have seeds in the ground much earlier. Not owning the house until May delayed our planting.

The thin (4 ft. by 16 ft.) bed in the front is going to be our strawberry field. We bought three chandler strawberry plants from the farmer’s market last year and they despite not yielding any berries, they multiplied a lot. They took over half of a 4 ft. by 16 ft. row. All of them will get replanted in to four rows. This year we will prevent them from multiplying to ensure we get more than two half eaten strawberries.

The bed in the back is a 16 ft. square brings our total vegetable space to six 4 ft. by 16 ft. rows. To maximize space, melons will be grown out in the orchard and potatoes will be grown in garbage cans. A neighbor helped helped build this bed on Saturday. He offered to provide labor in exchange for garden space. I think this makes me a feudal lord. Long live Sir Manfre of Cary!

Both beds were constructed with (untreated) 2 inch x 10 inch x 8 foot boards and 2 inch x 4 inch x 8 foot studs. The initial plan was to use cedar, but Home Depot did not carry any boards with a usable dimension. They also didn’t stock untreated 4×4 posts, so we made our own by nailing together 2×4’s. The center posts join the 8 foot boards together and ensure the frame will not shift. A 16 foot board could have been used to bypass this, but a 16 foot board is heavy to lift and difficult to transport.