Filling Tall Raised Garden Beds

Filling your raised garden bed.

Filling tall raised garden beds.

Just how the roots. The birdies beds aren t just sturdy but they provide great surface square footage with lower soil requirements than the standard home built wood garden beds. Now that we have a better idea of the types of materials we want to add to our raised beds it is time to fill them up. To fill a raised garden bed you ll need enough soil to fill the bed and some organic compost.

Yep our beds are 100 full of all this good stuff. A raised bed looks beautiful on the balcony or in the garden. Growing plants in a raised garden bed is easy. Preparations for the raised bed.

However if grass is growing in between. If you can t use native soil purchase a nutrient rich mixture from your local gardening store. Build a trench for the core. You should use native soil from your yard if possible since this will be best for your plants.

Regardless of size multiple raised gardens should be spaced at least 18 inches apart to make it easier to walk in between beds. These steps can be used whether you have an existing raised bed or you are filling up a new empty raised bed. 1 yard of compost is the equivalent of 27 cubic feet so we know we can divide that out and reach 59 yards of compost. It s a simple volume math equation of 4ft x 8ft x 1 2ft.

The volume of soil you need is 12 feet times 4 feet times 1 5 feet length times width times depth. When we do the math it tells us we need 16 cubic ft of compost. We re building hugelkultur raised beds which means we re filling 1 3 of them with rotting wood. A raised garden bed is a freestanding structure usually constructed of wood sides about 1 to 2 feet above the ground and can vary greatly in area.

If a 4 ft x 8 ft garden bed is 6 inches tall we can calculate how much compost will be needed to fill it. You can purchase a kit that comes with pre cut lumber and hardware or build your own raised bed in any size you need. If an existing raised bed is being utilized just push the soil to the sides or temporarily remove the soil. Build a trench around 8 12 inches deep and about 1 2 feet down the middle of the raised bed.

To give a comparison between that and other raised beds my square 4 5 x 4 5 x 24 beds take 40 5 cubic feet of soil or 1 5 cubic yards to fill. A raised bed is available in the trade alternatively it can be built by yourself it even works with pallets. All you need is a level spot in your landscape some plants or seeds and enough good quality soil and compost to fill the bed. Not only is this beneficial in more than one way it helps u.