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Raised Bed Gardening
If you're thinking about building raised beds for your vegetable garden, definitely go for it. Plants do better in deep soil and as long as you don't walk in the beds, you'll also avoid soil compaction. Now what root wouldn't want to grow in nice loose, deep soil? If I was a root, I'd tell all my root friends, "Hey come on guys, nice deep, loose soil over here, let's go!"
But this weekend, I had my first bad experience with raised beds. You see there was a root invasion from trees that were pretty far away. The closest trees to my vegetable garden are at least 30 feet away but I guess that's just a short hop for tree roots. It's almost as if one of these roots said to all his buddies, "Hey come on guys, nice deep, loose soil over here, let's go!"
So on Sunday, I was planning on planting some more salad greens but wound up spending the afternoon digging and pulling roots out of my beds. I always wondered why Mel Bartholomew in the book Square Foot Gardening
Well, I was wrong about that. After pulling a few giant piles worth of roots out yesterday, I made an executive decision. Whenever I build a new bed, a bottom will be a mandatory feature. I don't think I'll use a sheet of plywood for the floor as suggested in the book, but at a minimum, I'll load the bottom up with landscape fabric. Usually, I'd layer newspapers to stop weeds and because I know they'll break down and feed those earthworms that I was talking about. But since I want to avoid future root invasions, I think I'll pass on the newspapers. Do they make landscape fabric out of steel?
Mr. Bartholomew, sir, I'm sorry about the Square Foot Craziness remark. You were right and I should have listened. It won't happen again.
16 Comments:
My friend had a similar situation with pecan trees and added a couple of inches of gravel and landscape cloth to the bottoms of his, yet the roots came back anyway. This scares me.
I'll have to measure how far my trees are when I get home. They certainly look a long way away.
Beds made from Trex sound really nice. I built part of my kid's swing/slide set with Trex and I love the stuff.
Kelly,
I read your post and we're definitely going through the same thing. I also concluded that this root digging would become a regular chore that needs to be done every year or two. Let's compare notes throughout the season.
Plantingoaks,
Yes, I'm amazed at how far the roots can travel.
I guess I'll plan on putting in a bottom for next year.
It is called a 'kill mulch'. A layer of cardboard, chunks of wheat straw from a wheat straw bale, then load in your compost and wet it down really well. Wait a week, add a layer of green stuff(about two inches), then more compost on top of it, wet it down again. The heat from the decomposing green, will flat out cook everything underneath it.
My advice is to either continue doing what you're doing and digging the roots out or put a bottom on the raised bed.
I'm thinking of using the 'septic' or landscape fabric on the bottom. Then, I'll try to find some left-over or trashed vinyl siding to line the sides. It's a pretty big job digging out all that dirt and then moving it all back. I have two 4x20 beds. I'd like to go down only a foot; line the beds; then build the above ground sides up higher....but lumber/trex is pretty expensive. Thx again.
Would you expound on the 'french raised bed'? thx!