Early this year it was clear that the numerous raised beds I have at the back of the house were falling apart.  Partially through age (I built most of them over ten years ago) and partly through persistent grass forcing its way into the corner joints and blowing them apart.

It was time to bit the bullet and rebuild everything.  The first step was to lay some new flags (with a sub-base) between the beds, to give a stable surface to work from and establish the levels.

I resolved to build the new beds to the highest standard I could – still using decking boards but this time a much heavier (thicker) grade.  They were already pressure-treated against rot, but as soon as you start cutting them to size the new exposed edge isn’t protected.  So each board got six (yes, six!) coats of woodstain preservative.

Just as important, I used decking tape on the lower edge of each board that would be touching the ground, as well as wrapping it round each of the corner supports. Decking tape is horribly expensive but greatly increases the longevity of the structures.  Finally, I lined each bed with pond liner to keep the inner surface of the boards dry, tucking a skirt of the liner inwards, under the soil, to help stop grass interfering again.

The finished beds: two large, two medium and four small, along with two new boxed in areas at each side, are very solid and heavy and feel like they’ll last a long time.  And all new paving between them makes every bed accessible without having to walk on any wet grass.

It took a lot of work, some BIG deliveries from the local builders merchant, and my Makita power tools were an essential, but I’m pleased with the results.

Each of the large beds is 2.35 metres long, 1.6 metres wide and 40cm high.  That makes for a capacity of 1,500 litres – or 30 bags of compost per bed.  Once the beds were complete and topped up I quickly set about sowing and planting.

It was late in the sowing season by this time, mid- to late June.  So for certain things I got plug plants from the big suppliers, and used quick and easy seed tapes for others.  Others still I’d been carefully growing under lights in doors in the propagators.

• Tomatoes
  • Tomatoberry (from seed)
  • Aviditas and Crimson Plum (plug plants)
• White onions
  • Japanese Shyensu (from sets, overwintered)
• Garlic
  • Topadrome (from cloves, overwintered)
• Beans
  • Castandel dwarf french (from seeds)
  • Sutton broad beans (from plug plants)
• Carrots
  • Mixed: Amsterdam Forcing, Early Nantes, St. Valery (seed tape)
• Beetroot
  • Boltardy (seed tape)
• Cucumber
  • Euphya (plug plants)
• Courgette
  • Twitter (plug plants)
• Spring onions
  • Lisbon (seed tape)
• Mangetout and peas
  • plug plants
• Lettuce
  • Red and green Cos mix (seed tape)
• Herbs/spices
  • Genovese sweet basil
  • Coriander cilantro
• Peppers
  • Chilli heatwave (from seed)
  • Thor sweet pepper (from seed)

Well-established and growing anyway in the beds (I had to build the new ones around them without disturbing them), were various fruit bushes:  strawberries, blueberries, pink blueberries, raspberries and blackberries, as well as the herb bed with rosemary, oregano, thyme, sage, etc.

Now approaching mid-August, the verdict is in on various crops:

• The broad beans, bought as plug plants from Victoriana Nursery, were poor.  The plants had chocolate spot within days of planting them out. And the overall output was much lower than when I’ve grown from seed.
• I had to get refunds from Suttons Seeds for courgette and cucumber plug plants, both of which were delivered in bad condition:  either snapped or dried out.  I grew some replacement courgettes from seed and they’ve done really well.  But had to give up on cucumbers for this year.
• The Suttons seed tapes for carrot and beetroot just don’t seem to take that well.  You can see before planting that they’re well-spaced and so on but when the veg are grown there are always gaps in the rows.  The Cos lettuce mix is starting very well though.
• The Shensyu Japanese onions are great:  big and juicy.  I made sure to use onion fertiliser which probably helped, but they’re the best onions I’ve grown.
• The peas and mangetout are doing very well in their bed.  You have to be quick picking mangetout before they start filling out into peas, but if so they still make nice peas a week or two later!
• The tomatoes are doing very well, about a dozen plants with lots and lots of fruit but for now they’re all still green..

So a bit of a late start this year, but for all the best reasons.  And next year I’ll be back to normal sowing early again.  Meanwhile it’s a joy to be picking berries, peas and watching chillies and peppers grow.  With the promise of lots of beetroot, carrots and crisp lettuces in the coming weeks. Yum!