The raised garden bed

Building a raised garden bed for our tiny outdoor patio was the kickstart my garden needed for intense and varied growth. It can be intimidating to start a garden bed - not knowing which plants, herbs, veggies, fruits and flowers can cohabitate, which combination of soil, sand and compost to add - and how much water and sunshine they all need.

My best piece of advice - don’t worry about any “rules”. I don’t, and my garden is flourishing.

The initial investment is a bit daunting but once the bed is built, the seeds are buried and the soil is watered the joy your garden will bring you is endless.

The bed we bought was from Amazon and is linked here. I did very minimal research but wanted a large wooden bed with wheels so that I could wheel it up and back as the sun shifted across our patio. The shelf is nice! But not necessary. It was fairly easy to assemble and came with a mesh lining to help keep the soil in. The bed is certainly too big for our space, but I prioritized more garden for less patio. Up to you!

I started by filling the beds with Miracle Grow potting soil, then generic sand, then more potting soil. I’ve intermittently added worm castings (not as gross as it sounds) and cinnamon to try and detract fungal gnats. I’ve read these tiny bugs aren’t a huge threat to your garden but I think they’re gross.

Next, I transplanted all of my potted herbs and veggies to the garden. This was messy but I didn’t follow any rules about spacing or what lives well together. Random!

I gave the whole bed a good watering and let it be (for about 8 minutes before I was out on the patio staring at my “bounty”).

After a day or two it felt like the plants took to their new home and we were on our way!

For watering and sunshine I didn’t look up anything. When the soil seemed dry I watered it, when the plants were out of the direct sunshine, I wheeled them into the light. If it seemed the leaves of certain plants were turning brown and soft, I watered them.