First year garden

[jwmiller33]

I bought my first house almost exactly a year ago and am looking to put it in a garden which is kind of a new adventure for me. Since I don't have the best soil in my yard, I am thinking I am going to build some raised garden beds out of some 2x12s. I am looking for some suggestions on this. Is 12" of soil deep enough? Any do's or don'ts from people that have done this before?

 

I've never done a solo garden before, so I am kind of in uncharted territories. I want to make some salsa and possibly pasta sauce so what all should I grow? Tomatoes and peppers are on the list... what else?

 

I'm located in Duluth so temp/thaw wise, we are at least a week or 2 behind the metro still.

[Crow Hunter]

I did the same thing, only I used retaining wall blocks to build the wall. My bed is oval, about 25 feet long, the dirt area is about 4 feet wide, so we can reach anything without having to climb over the fence, we fenced the edge to keep the rabbits out. The dirt in mine is only about nine inches deep, so your 2x12 idea I think would be fine. I personally would not use treated lumber for fear of chemicals leaching into the soil. Since I was building this on a lawn area, after I built the wall I laid a fairly thick layer of newspaper inside it over the grass, then filled it with black dirt and compost. The newspaper will kill the grass, then decompose. Every spring I take a shovel and turn the top layer of dirt and fill it to the top with compost. We grow tomatos, peppers, green beans,  beets, lettuce, spinach, radishes, squash (we train the runners to lay on the wall blocks, so they are outside the fence), oregano which I have to cut back every spring, it is a perennial and will take over the garden if you let it spread. We have tried to grow carrots but they did not do well most years, so we grow beets instead. I have been very happy with the produce we get every year. Good luck.

Edited March 29, 2017 by Crow Hunter

[delcecchi]

Yes a 12 inch raised bed sitting on the ground, no bottom, is plenty deep.   You can even grow tomatoes in 5 gallon buckets, likewise peppers.    That sometimes works better than planting in the ground, especially in places with short seasons and cool weather....

 

For the beds, green beans, lettuce, beets, swiss chard, whatever you like to eat.   Tomatoes will grow there also, but they really like heat so location matters.  

 

Oh and radishes and scallions.    

 

I second the fence thing.  Rabbits and Racoons, and even deer will do serious damage.  

Edited March 29, 2017 by delcecchi

[jbell1981]

39 minutes ago, delcecchi said:

I second the fence thing.  Rabbits and Racoons, and even deer will do serious damage.  

 

Yes, definitely fence it if you are able. We have a large garden that we don't fence do to the size. Each year the deer do some damage but the worst is raccoons. We don't have many of them but they came through 2 years ago and destroyed our sweet corn crop. We had 4 rows, each over 50' long all gone in one night. It looked like they had a party with corn husks laying in piles all over the yard and corn cobs stripped clean everywhere. It was actually kind of comical to me but my wife was not pleased. 

Edited March 29, 2017 by jbell1981

[PEATMOSS]

Tomatoes, peppers and most other veggies can be easily grown in containers. This allows you to get your plants from the greenhouse and pot them up a week or two earlier if you have a sheltered spot for them.

 

Veggies can be mixed with ornamental plants in your containers and you can create some really cool landscaping. I have a ton of antique containers that I've integrated into my landscaping and they usually turn out great.

[delcecchi]

Also check out "straw bale gardening".