There have been a lot of changes in our vegetable garden since last we wrote. We now have 24 beds, each 3mx1m arranged in four blocks of six beds each. This allows us to easily manage a four-stage crop rotation system. The standard size for the beds is making it much easier to calculate how much of each vegetable we need to plant, for example we know we need four beds of potatoes, two onions, two garlic and four beds of tomatoes.
Having a standard size for everything also means that anything we make for one bed, will fit all of them. This might be nylon cloches for bringing on peas over winter, mini shade tunnels for shade loving brassicas, even support structures for climbing vegetables such as peas, beans and squashes. All of these can now be made, and reused across multiple beds as the crops rotate around the garden.
To construct the beds we used 4m planks. Trimming one metre off each plank means we can get a side and an end from one plank. The beds are three planks deep (30cm), so we used 6 boards per bed. Everything is joined together with stakes in each corner, and at 1m intervals along each edge to provide strength along the sides. This neatly divides the beds into 1m squares, making it easier to manage soil amendments such as compost, mulch, calcium and others, and watering.
Ever since we moved here, access to sufficient water, coupled with the heat in summer, has been a problem. In summer, between June and August, the mains water supply can become erratic, and sometimes gets cut off during the day for many weeks, forcing us to be more reliant on the water we can collect in our IBC containers. Some summers, even with sufficient watering, our crops have wilted and withered in the heat, and crop yields have been smaller than we would like. So last year we tried an experiment, and covered a few sections of the garden with shade netting. The result was amazing, better looking tomatoes, more of them, and the ground stayed moist for longer between watering. So all this winter we’ve been adding a support framework to all the beds which will allow us to cover nearly all our beds with 50% shade cloth when temperatures start to creep above 34oC. We’ve also planted many more fruit trees among the beds, but these will not grow big enough, quickly enough, to make a significant difference in the short term.
The higgledy-piggledy beds were so cool before, but this looks much more manageable and makes total sense.
I’m always so impressed with how much thought and effort you put into things.
Well done both.
Thanks G, yes we were sad to see the old beds go, but this layout makes life a lot easier! Every year brings new lessons and improvements to the garden and our life here 🙂