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Fri, Mar 2, 12 at 14:53
| i started my raised bed in the fall and foolishly did not research the soil mix, so i filled the box with topsoil. as it happens, i didn't buy enough to fill the box, but didn't think much of it because i figured i could wait until spring to get the soil ready for planting. in the meantime i noticed that every time it rains more than a drizzle, the raised bed filled with water.
i thought raised beds were supposed to have good drainage. the bed has 12" cedar plank sides and rests on soil that is mostly red clay. is there something that i can mix into the soil? thanks in advance! |
Follow-Up Postings:
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| Is the area well drained outside the raised bed? I kind of assume that the underlying soil does not have good percolation. I don't think that you have the bathtub effect as the bed is fully above ground? At this point you might drill some holes in the cedar boards to let out water. Also, if the soil you added is not sandy, adding some medium to coarse sand could help. If I was starting a raised bed where the soil was on the wet side, I think I would want to crack the soil open some with a broadfork or potato fork before adding the dirt. |
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| As a rule raised beds do have good drainage, but that also depends on the soil mix used. If the soil under the bed does not drain well the raised bed might not too and if the soil mix put into that raised bed is similar to the native soil that can also create drainage problems. So what was this "topsoil" that was used? Contrary to what many people lead us to believe "topsoil", the top 4 to 6 inches of soil, is not some magic elixar. If it comes from some place with soil similar to what you have you will have soil similar to what you already had, nothing different. How much organic matter is in that raised bed soil? In sandy soils organic matter will fill in the pore spaces and help hold moisture and nutrients in that soil. In clay soils organic matter will seperate the soil particles so moisture and nutrients are more readily available to plants and excess water flows through more freely, creating better drainage. |
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- Posted by tn_gardening (My Page) on Sat, Mar 3, 12 at 7:34
| Did you happen to fill the bed with bags of topsoil from the store? I've discovered that those bags at the store are full of clay. My suggestion would be to add compost, peat moss and/or vermiculite. |
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| yes, it was those bags from the store! i think kimmsr might be right - it is probably clay-ish topsoil over hard red clay. i'll try adding peat moss to one area and see if that improves anything. thanks! |
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| i wouldn't have used soil to fill them, use of a more organic material like compost, mushroom compost or humus might have done better. also and i don't mention this much as there are some hard case gardeners out there with their own very secular opinions. the use of gypsum before starting the raised bed see our presentation, so in that light until there is enough organic material for the worms to get going with and they will amend the clay over time, the drainage issue will be there only temporary of course. gypsum is our stock in trade for gardeners, cheap and can't be overdosed, never failed us. len |
Here is a link that might be useful: lens straw bale garden
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- Posted by nancyjane_gardener USDA 8ish No CA (My Page) on Sat, Mar 3, 12 at 21:32
| I have heavy clay and can only dig during about a 2 week period in the spring when it's between soggy muck and concrete! When I started each of my beds (usually one per year) I broke everything up with the spading fork as deep as I could (about 8-10")then added aged horse manure. Put my gopherwire lined boxes on top of that and filled with good vegegarden soil from the soil store (about 2 small truck loads per 4x8 bed) I then add my own compost each winter to finish up in the garden, topping the whole thing with shredded leaves (free leaf shredder from a yard sale!) to keep the weeds at bay. I'm loaded with earthworms and have digable earth under my compost pile! If you don't have wire under your beds, I would just do some digging (forking) and get it loostened up. Nancy |
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- Posted by tn_gardening (My Page) on Sun, Mar 4, 12 at 7:05
| Amending the soil in your entire garden might get a little pricey, so I can appreciate your idea about doing one section at a time. Compost is your friend. |
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| Some topsoil is better then others. I am with wayne 5 & nancyjane on the digging before the the bed goes in. The harder it is to dig the more you need to dig. I believe even a no-til bed should have at least 10-12 inches broken up under it. I know one of the reason for no-til popularly is it is easy for new comer to gardening. But I still think the prebreak of top soil is of importance to the health of the bed. |
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