Of course gardening is all about growing, learning, and trying new things. Sometimes we harvest, sometimes we don't.
We recently upgraded our vegetable garden and it got me thinking of how we would do it if we had our time over, but knew what we know now. The mistakes often made by overly eager or inexperienced gardeners can be costly or labour intensive and over time they need remediating. Here I thought I'd break down what we have done now; what we would recommend; and what we wish we had never done. Hopefully sharing our failures and losses to help save you time and money so you can focus on growing more and growing better, faster.
Lets start with the soil. Our soil really isn't so bad down the back where our vegetable patch is. When we moved here it was much drier and whilst there is a layer or hard clay there is also some silty spots. The biggest concern is the lack of drainage we had though so without thinking, along with knowing we had plenty of garden debris we could use, we had originally opted for raised garden beds filled in a hugelkulter style. The beds were made with treated pine sleepers. 2.4 x 1.2m in size. We made 4 that quickly became 8 then suddenly 17. The were filled with logs and stickes, garden mulched leaves, and topped with bought in sandy loam. Also with gravel paths.
What. A. Mess.
The paths looked great for about a month. Then the weeds and grasses took over. And the chickens and dogs started to mess the garden up. We then decided it needed a fence. This is one thing I have no regrets on. The fenced area is a must if you want to have free ranging animals, and kids for that matter, but want to successfully grow veggies. We topped the failure of a path with pine chips and it was so much nicer. Softer underfoot and on the eyes despite it being round 2 for the paths. Another substantial cost if you've ever paid for stone you'll understand. Plus it now absorbs water better too helping the garden
The hugelkulter was working well but the gardens were shrinking in depth as the logs began to breakdown. We retopped them all with sandyloam and compost. This became a nearly annual task. Annoying. We also added frames with some recylced pine to help us trellis veggies better too which have only just began to rot through. Painting them helped but they really eeded to be a hardwood or treated. Another lesson although not a costly mistake as we had recylced the timber to begin with.
Five years later and we have had this setup work well for four seasons now but the beds are tired and aesthetically they were a bit disappointing.
Recently with some sudden health challenges and some time to spare we decided we would refresh the gardens. No longer in the trenches of pregnancy, a newborn and little little children we can find more time to focus on our gardening and self sufficiency journey. So we have now been focused on replacing three of the beds with a bigger growing patch for mini crops such as sunflowers, garlics or potatoes; and are removing one bed for a potting table to be included inside the patch instead of lugging it all to the greenhouse and again to the outdoor table to wash and trim etc. The beds were only one sleeper deep and we have started to make three sleeper deep now. A big investment financially but saving our backs long term as we weed or plant, and it looks much better while also offering better growing conditions as we can control the soil much deeper now.
To save on some of the costs we have added a bale of pea-straw to each bed before topping with sandy-loam mixed with cow manure and mushroom compost. The beds have been over filled to create a mound so as the straw breaks down it will level the beds but also encourage them to be full of worms and good bacteria. The straw will break down quickly too so over a season I would exect this to be level. Its saved us heaps of money doing it this way but also compliments the exisiting hugelkulterset up that was in some beds still breaking down logs into fin wood dust. The moisture and water absorbtion in these beds now is amazing yet the drainage is way better because of the depth.
So to summarise what we wouldn't do and what to do instead:
Don't rush; Make sure you know where you'd like your garden and how it'll be used. We have one gate and it is annoying to walk around just to get to the greenhouse. Better layout for not just sunlight is cruitial. Take your time to be confident you've considered this all including if you were to upsize or downscale our setup. Moving beds aroud is fine but it was alot of work and for not much point other than to make it neater and more functional. Just taking a few weeks to consider how you'll need the space will save you heaps of money, labour and stress.
We wouldn't use dripper irrigation in grids. While fixing the garden beds this time around so many dripper lines broke or needed replacing. They never watered the whole bed effectivelly and looked messy. Even though it was convieient and better than none. We will use ollas and handwater moving forward temporarily but are looking into soaker irrigation and a swirly layered effect not cutting them into a billion pieces with billions of attachments where blowouts happen. If this whole paagraph felt stressful then good. Thats how we felt about the irrigation we had. Don't do it!
We would do deeper beds first if you can afford it financially. Of course you can garden without raised beds and it's gorgeous in its own right. Cheaper too. Like farmers have fields of gardens without any raised beds... We just don't personally like the look of it. If you are going to have raised beds though deeper is better and something durable first off. Iron gets hot but looks neat and doesn't rot. It can rust. Hardwood costs a bomb but works for longer than treated pine and don't even bother if its not treated itll give you a year at best and be the biggest waste of time and money.
Do use pine chips as a path way. Unless you have enough pavers or are happy to weed forever to have clean gravel paths. They really have been a great choice and I highly encourage it in all kitchen gardens.
Do fence the garden; as I explained earlier. We'd have it no other way. Worth every cent of fencing and fencing that keeps dogs and chickens out.
Do invest in soil health. That may mean adding lime, or compost, or having hugelkulter beds. But whatever it is the best harvests start with the best soil health no matter what the garden is like. Havign poor soil is like using pine for beds. It might work for a short time but really it isn't going to yield the result you likely are setting out to achive.
Lastly just kow its okay to fail and try again. We only now five years after doing this can confidently say we are on top of our soil health, irrigation, succession planting and weeding plans. It is not going to happen over night and even those of us with qualifications don't get it right all the time. The best part of gardening for self sufficency is the journey too. Not just the homegrown harvests. It's the workout building the garden, the patience learnt in growing and then the reward come harvest. Then sharing the glut with family and friends when it works!
So when planning your garden consider some of these lessons and it may just help you save some money and some time. Or not, as every garden and climate is different and so is each experience. If you got this far though thank you and we truly hope it has helped you to make some easier gardening choices. We'd love to know how your garden is growing and what style of garden you're planning to build.
Happy gardening.
Clair
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