Building raised beds.

A few years ago, after my wife and I bought our first home I built some raised beds and they worked wonderfully. I have since moved and needed to build new beds. I will walk you through the fairly easy process of building them.

First things first, you have chosen where you would like to plant. Now to need decide how you want to lay your beds out. The area I am working with is 43ft x 8ft. 

The original layout of my garden space consisted of 3 beds 4x4 in size. I wanted a much bigger garden and decided to make much better use of the area.

 

These beds were surround by rubber mulch.

I took all of the rubber mulch out and laid it aside for future use.

Rubber mulch on top of weed-stop liners.

After removing all of the rubber mulch and carefully placing it for reuse. I started building my beds.

I will be building beds 2ft x 8ft x 6inches.

I am fortunate enough in the backyard to have a dedicated water spout for my garden. :)

I always build a "floor plan" for my beds so I know exactly what I need when I go to the lumber store. Here is my bed layout.

 

When building my beds I bought 2x6x10 so that I could cut 2 feet off and use that as an end piece.

After I had all of my wood cut to the appropriate sizes it was time to assemble the beds using 2-1/2 inch gold screws. It is highly recommended to use untreated wood. It is likely the chemicals from the treated wood can seep into the garden soil and into the plants.

Several finished beds stacked on top of each other.

After I had built all my beds and placed them where I wanted them, I reused the weed-stop lining and the rubber mulch to create a nice decorate look around my beds. When placing the weed-stop lining I went around beds so the plants can grow a nice, healthy and deep root system.

Next I placed everything where I wanted. I filled my beds with a mulch, soil mixture.

Bags of mulch and soil before placing.

After ensuring the weed-stop was covering everywhere I wanted, it was time to keep it in place. Using lawn staples I placed them in every corner of every piece. 

Next it was time to take the rubber mulch and start laying back around the beds.

Placing the rubber mulch.

 

All done!! 

Once I was done with everything I set up my own drip-irrigation system using 1/2 inch PVC pipe, various PVC adapters and soaker hoses.