Vegmonkey and the Mrs.

We seem to get a lot of searches for raised beds on the blog, so i thought i’d do an update. It’s too wet to go into the garden with the camera, so the pic above was taken about the 5th of May.

I like the way we’ve set our garden up, and it works. We have the grass space and patio for sitting…and the veg at the back. I built the wall higher to create a step up to the veg part, giving us 3 distinct areas.

The cold frame on the right-handside was built from an old Argos wardrobe that i no longer had need for. It houses peas in guttering ready for planting out, and some seedlings, at the start of March. The shelving unit greenhouse thing at the back was free via ‘freecycle.’ It is invaluable when growing seedlings that need higher temperatures, and for things like potting on.

Also at the back are three potato pots - 2 earlies that have been harvested, and 1 maincrop. There is also a compost bin at the back that is nice and compact, and takes all compostable kitchen waste. The tomato plants on the left are in growbags. Everything is being eaten by slugs as a general rule!

The beds work on a 4-year rotation. The bed on the left, closest to the grass, houses cucurbits (pumpkins, courgettes) - although they have yet to go in, the bed currently houses last years Japanese Onions and the rest of the Early Potatoes that are almost ready to come out. The bed behind that is Roots (carrots, onions, parsnips, leeks) - this is the one that gets filled quickest! Behind that is the current Brassica bed (cauliflower, cabbage, brussels) - this is the messiest of beds, no matter how hard i try to keep it tidy. The slugs love that particularly. I’ve built a frame to keep it covered this year, to avoid the horrid attack of butterfly and caterpillar! They destroyed one massive broccoli plant last year. Finally, on the right, the Legumes (peas,beans) bed which seems to house a variety of oriental greens at the moment.

The planting plans are at the top which explain the above in a lot more depth…i pretty much have them memorised, but change them constantly anyhow!

The soil is compost, with added manure and sand - to help drainage - i also add blood, fish and bone to increase the amount of nutrients that the soil needs. The rotation from legumes, to cucurbits, to roots to brassicas enables each veg to help the next over the years.  The beds themselves are made of wood that i bought, and spent a weekend screwing together with coach bolts and an old knackered drill.

It’s simple and it works. If we were to have children, cats, chickens etc…it might not, but at the moment, it does.

Being a primary school teacher means i get more extended holidays than most people. This enables me to spend lots of time out in the garden during the main planting time of Easter, but also to get on top of things during the Winter season. The last day or so has been spent looking at the successes, failures and ‘missing parts!’ of last year’s veg planting plan and doing lots of scribbling and crossing out to improve it.

The main changes are:

1. The plot will be a lot fuller (i forgot to plant many ‘leaves’ this year and hardly any winter veg that grew.)

2. There will be no flowers growing in the beds (they will have their own pots…somewhere as they seemed to take over, particularly the sunflowers, as the beneficial insects are only good if there is space to grow!)

3. Potatoes will be added into the rotation (i’ve decided that First Earlies can go in before the leeks need the space.)

4. The colours have been changed to make the plan easier to read.

I have included the ‘winter veg planner’ below. Click it or print to make it easier to read. This is the best quality i could get it before it became too large for the page! Things like tomatoes, sweetcorn, lettuces etc and herbs will all be grown in pots, hanging baskets or in the beds where there is space (!?). I will add a section for these later next week. I know a few people have been following some parts of the plan. I hope that things have worked, and would love to hear about any successes, failures, questions or recommendations!

I know the plan may look a bit ‘much’ but i know that this way, we are more likely, via the 4 year rotation, to have less diseases in each veg family, to know exactly what and where we can grow and to grow plants in an order so that the previous years plants prepare the soil for the next years!

 Happy planning!

The planting scheme (click right and up…) above, on a separate page is up and running and being used, Its purpose it to enable us to maximise the space we have by sowing veg that grows relatively quickly, that we will use and that doesn’t take up too much space at the times when it is needed!

For this reason we’ve omitted potatoes from the scheme. Of course, the plan is flexible!