Raised bed ideas

siochain

Hi Folks,

I have a raised bed that's 4ft high, 18 ft in length and 5 in width. Its on a SW facing wall that gets some early morning sun then again later in the afternoon. Currently its just covered with bark chippings with a good layer of compost underneath..

I'm looking to start planning the bed for next year and would like to know if anyone has some good suggestions, links or resources to help with the planning.

Ideally I'd like a to have a good mix of colour through the spring and summer.

Cheers

pwurple

Sounds like lovely growing conditions there, is it 5 foot deep?

Are you looking for herbaceous border type wild colour, or more of an all year round mixed shrub and herbaceous arrangement?

For mixed, start with your structure. A fwe evergreens of various shapes and heights. A holly, false box, and a prostrate juniper maybe.

Then I would put in a few roses and hydrangea, good long flowering season on them, choose whatever colour you prefer. Some tall herbaceous, like cynara, watsonia, or acanthus. Then bulbs and tubers mixed in, so iris, alium. A few easy filler plants you can propogate easily and fill gaps with..l use sedum and lupins. Then some tumblers down the front, maybe keep it to annuals.



Websites below are some I use.

http://thegardenaesthetic.tumblr.com/
Pinterest.com has some good garden pinners. Beautiful Backyards on pinterest is a board I follow.

paddy147

lots of alliums for a start.

siochain

pwurple Its 4ft of top soil just to the top of the sleepers then the previous bed beneath. Would be going for year round mixed shrub and herbaceous perennials arrangement. Thanks for the link.

paddy147 alliums look good. cheers

Qualitymark

Four feet of topsoil? Wow, the carrots and lettuce you could grow!

paddy147

With the compost,I would mix in a good bit of manure,fertilizer pellets/blood fish and bone and also horticultural grit.

This will give you good planting conditions and also good drainage,which is important with raised beds.:)

paddy147

Have a look at my post and pictures here..to give you and idea of what Im talking about.:)


http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=77779465&postcount=9

siochain

Qualitymark wrote: »

Four feet of topsoil? Wow, the carrots and lettuce you could grow!

Yeah had a patio put in and used all the top soil for filling up the raised bed. Though about and would really like a nice veg plot in it but it's hard enough to find the time to maintain the green house at the mo.

paddy147

siochain wrote: »

Yeah had a patio put in and used all the top soil for filling up the raised bed. Though about and would really like a nice veg plot in it but it's hard enough to find the time to maintain the green house at the mo.

How deep did the you dig down to remove soil and install the patio??

Just make sure that you didnt mix in any "subsoil" with the topsoil in the raised beds.

I would deffinately mix in lots of fresh compost,manure and grit too.

Xander_82

Carrots, lettuce, beetroot, celery and onions!