Raised beds

beautiful_ravens

Hi,
Any suggestions on whats the best, cheapest, easiest and least time consuming way of creating raised beds for growing veg? Ive got too much lawn to keep under control, veg would be more useful! Im not rich either

El_mag

Hi,
Search on the web for Lasagna gardening. It does work and you don't need to dig up the grass.
All you need is cardboard/Newspaper, soil, compost (home made will do), horse manure.
Just put the layers in and it will be ready to plant. I planted straightaway but some people suggest waiting for a few months.
Materials required are not expensive and you can source most from Freecycle / freegle.
Plenty of videos are available on youtube.
Hope it helps

Purplekylie22

As an Idea if you have any Ikea bag, know a builder who can spare used 1 tonne buider bags, or have plastic storage trays, you can use those, if it doesnt let water through then make holes in the bottom, then weigh it down with large rocks and stones, add a layer of pebbles on the top on top of that you can add newspaper / hay / grass cuttings and then soil/compost for your top growing layer. Make it as deep as you need depending on what you are growing (for carrots / onions add some sand into the soil to help drainage even more.)

Leif

If your soil is okay, then why need deep dig, and save the cost of raised beds? If the soil is stony, you'll have to remove the stones, if clay, throw in some compost etc. My soil was clay rich, but after digging and composting, plants are doing nicely.

Yorkie1

Why do you think you need raised beds?

valk_scot

Four sticks at the corner, string between them, cut and peel off turf inside string boundary, fork through exposed soil, slap a layer of compost/manure/topsoil into the space, plant onto mound. You don't actually need any sort of edge on the bed though if you want to build up the soil level then some sort of scrap timber (from a skip near you) or stones for edging does help. But it's not a neccessity to edge beds.

Eve4ever

I'm currently building some from scaffolding planks which have been decommissioned from their former life. This the guy I go to.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/110830211924?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649#ht_500wt_934

fawd1

I used scaffolding planks to create a raised vegetable bed. Didn't bother paying for them though. Go to any scaffolding company and they'll always have a couple hanging around they don't want. If they have any cracks at all, then they can't be used as scaffolding so just get chucked. Perfectly good for raised beds though, as sometimes it's literally a hairline crack!

budgetdiyer

I'm going to make some out of wooden gravel boards. A local fencing company sell pressure treated ones for about half the price of B&Q, wickes etc.

ally18

Hi,

Could I add a quick question please as I want to make my lawn into a veg plot for next year.

When you remove the turf, does it need to be removed completely or is it ok to just be turned over? Will it just carry on growing again if I do this?

Thanks

Yorkie1

Remove it, stack it out of the way (usually recommended to be grass side down) and leave it for a couple of years - you'll have lovely compost.