Creating a Raised Vegetable Garden

Creating a raised vegetable garden is becoming more popular in various parts of the country, because less soil preparation is needed, and the raised vegetable gardens can look very attractive and ornamental too. Working in the raised vegetable garden tends to be easier too, because you don't have to get on your hands and knees to remove weeds or pests.

Just like with any vegetable garden planting though, creating a raised vegetable garden starts with the planning stage. You'll need to choose a location in your yard which gets plenty of sunlight, because vegetables need at least five to six hours of sun each day. You'll also need to make sure you have plenty of space to accomodate the raised vegetable garden you'll be creating.

When you start creating your raised vegetable garden, you'll want to limit your garden bed to about four feet in width. This will make it easier for you to be able to reach the center vegetable plants throughout the growing season. The length you choose to use is optional based on your own preferences and space allotments.

If you need room to grow more vegetables, you can create multiple raised vegetable garden beds - either in different sunny areas of your yard, or clustered together. When creating more than one raised vegetable garden, be sure to leave several feet of space between each garden bed so you're able to get between them with tools, wheelbarrows, and so on.

Once you have your location chosen, creating a raised vegetable garden is fairly simple. Just build your garden bed border, using whatever border materials you'd like. You can use wood, rock, stone, concrete, plastic or anything else that takes your fancy. The garden bed border should be at least two feet high though.

Once you have the raised garden bed border placed, fill it with quality topsoil. When creating a vegetable garden, it's always best to mix in some compost or organic materials with your topsoil, so your vegetable plants will have plenty of vitamins and nutrition to grow healthy with.

When creating your raised vegetable garden, you can choose to plant your vegetables in traditional east to west running rows, or you can create square planting plots within the raised garden bed, or you can simple stagger the plantings a bit to make a more natural garden look once the vegetables start growing.

Regardless of how you plant your vegetables in the raised garden bed, be sure you leave enough space between them to allow room for growth, and to allow for weeding and mulching. Also remember that some vegetables need to be planted in mounds, and some vegetables planted together can help increase both flavor and yield, while others planted together can help deter pests.

One excellent idea for creating a raised vegetable garden is to build several garden beds in the same location, then put companion vegetable plants separately into each raised garden bed. Or you can create themed vegetable gardens into each bed instead. One bed can be an herb garden, while another is a salad garden, and a third could contain your root plants.

Remember to plant your tallest vegetables on the north side though, so they don't block the sunlight for smaller plants. If you're using multiple raised garden beds, you can simply put your tall plants on the north side of your northernmost beds.