Raised bed help

[catbud]

Thanks everyone, I can't wait to get started!

[Alice]

Thanks to Wizer and Pigletwillie for photos of raised beds. They look great. Planning to start preparing some at end of summer so sure I will be coming back for advice and keeping you posted about how getting on. Wolf, if your photo files are too big use Picasa to resize them. The links are all on this site, search under - read before you post. Very easy to do.

[fisherlady]

Just to add to the potato debate - we didn't put tarp (or equivalent) under our raised beds and are currently enjoying utterly flavoursome second earlies (Charlottes)

Also to re-itterate prvious posts - keep the beds narrow. Length is entirely at your discretion. We did ours at over 2 metres and now regretting it!!

Good luck

[snohare]

Yes you can grow potatoes very effectively in raised beds, and no they don't need watering a lot, or even earthing up. In fact, if you know in advance that you will be growing potatoes in a bed, you can make sure of a bumper crop by varying the soil components you put into it so that the tatties have lots of manure etc to feed on at the right depth, and soil that's easy for the roots to grow through. That's for waist height raised beds though, so lower ones you are more likely to need earthing up with obviously. The two things you might need to worry about though are voles and moles... mulch matting or even ordinary plastic laid underneath the bed during construction will not only stop the likes of couch grass growing up through it (impossible to remove entirely ! ) but also stop the li'l critters making whoopee.
Hey wolf, what are gravel boards ?

[darren]

Im A New Gsrdner And No Idea When To Plant Out Anything Could You Help Me With This

[Squirrel]

Hi Darren and welcome. Your best bet is to start by working out which veg you like to eat! No good growing radishes if you hate the things! Once you have done that ask questions and we will be able to help you. Cheers!

[Shortie]

I agree with squirrel that there's no point growing what you don't like eating (unless of course it's for someone else )

Have a think of the things you like firstly, then maybe work out (if space is tight) what you'dlike to grow most in thyour space. I don't have masses of space so at the moment grow things that are expensive in the shops and/or taste better home grown. For example I am growing:

Butternut Squash - too expensive in the shops, especially compared to the size they can grow at home!
Runner Beans - I think these are far nicer staright from the plant and can be quit expensive in the shops for one dinners worth. In the garden you can get lots of prdocuse from relatively little space
Lettuce - I eat very little of this but it is nice from home and much cheaper
Rhubarb - okay this was already in my garden, but as other grapes mention, 3 sticks in certain shops can be around £2.50. A rhubarb plant will after the fist few years give you so much you wpn;t know what to do with it (schnapps is always a good option... )
Herbs - Bay, Rosemary, Thyme, Chives..... wouldn't be without these

Ofcourse you may really not like what I grow, but this is the thought process I use when trying to decide out of a million and one potentials, what I'm going to try out for that year.

Hope that helps

[nick the grief]

Im A New Gsrdner And No Idea When To Plant Out Anything Could You Help Me With This

Hi Darren & welcome to the vine,

I won't claim to be as good as Geordie but have a look here. There are some bits you can download that may help that I aquired elswher

http://warkcom.net/live/cme2052.htm