If you plan the cultivation of vegetables correctly, you can provide for yourself from your own garden almost all year round. If you set up your raised bed accordingly, you can store all the tools you need in it, for example in integrated compartments and shelves.

The raised bed has many advantages

When is the best time to set up the raised bed?

If possible, raised compost beds should be created in autumn so that they can mature over the winter and you can finally fill up with fresh soil in spring. This will prevent the bed from collapsing once you have just planted it. In addition, more nutrients are available to your plants with this method. Raised beds, which are only filled with soil, can only be set up shortly before planting in spring - there is no danger of them sagging.

Choosing the right vegetables for the raised bed

If you are new to raised bed gardening, start by choosing vegetables that are as easy to grow as possible, such as lettuce, radishes, basil, zucchini, tomatoes and squash. Beans and peas also grow almost by themselves - as do parsley, chives, leeks and celery. In this way you gain a sense of achievement and can calmly build up the necessary expertise.

strain choice

Don't just plant or sow just any lettuce, consider the variety. Especially when it comes to cabbage, lettuce, celery and carrots, there are special varieties on the market that have been specially created for cultivation at different times of the year. With such variants, many types of vegetables can be grown all year round. "Early" lettuce varieties tolerate the cold temperatures better, while late varieties don't mind the summer heat and they don't flower prematurely. This flowering ahead of time is also called "shooting" or, depending on the region, "shooting". In particular, leafy vegetables such as lettuce, spinach and chard, as well as many herbs, tend to do so if the weather changes frequently, it is very hot or if they are planted out too late.

Sow or plant?

Many vegetables are sown directly in the raised bed. With some sensitive species, such as tomatoes, the relatively short summer in our latitudes is not long enough for the plant to have enough time for the fruit to ripen. The gardener circumvents this problem with a simple trick: he simply prefers sensitive vegetables on the windowsill, in the cold frame or in the greenhouse. These pre-grown young plants have a head start of up to eight weeks - in this way you can make optimal use of the valuable, limited cultivation area in the raised bed. Then only sow vegetables directly in the raised bed, such as carrots or radishes, which cannot be preferred.

cultivation planning

The right cultivation planning in the garden is quite complicated: crop rotation must be observed, certain vegetables not planted next to others and a break must be taken after a season. In the raised bed, gardeners are more independent of many factors: For example, the same types of vegetables can be grown in the same spot for many years in a row, after all, new soil is refilled every year. Nevertheless, it makes sense if you also observe a few basic rules of crop rotation and mixed cultivation in the raised bed.

crop rotation

Crop rotation is particularly important in raised beds

Crop rotation or rotation is the annual change in the cultivation of different types of vegetables. The reason for this is that vegetables from the same plant families should only grow three to four years apart in the same area in the same soil. In this way you prevent pathogens such as fungi or nematodes from spreading more and more in the soil. Above all, cruciferous vegetables, which include all types of cabbage, but also arugula, garden cress, kohlrabi and radishes are susceptible to the resulting diseases. In the cases mentioned, clubroot would destroy the harvest. This is a root disease whose pathogen survives in the soil for many years.

Optimum use of the different nutrient composition in the raised bed

A second aspect to consider in crop rotation is nutrient requirements. Vegetables and herbs are divided into high, medium and low consumers depending on how many nutrients they need for healthy growth. In a classic raised bed with layers of compost, the nutrient supply is very high in the first year - ideal for heavy consumers. Medium eaters follow in the second year and weak eaters in the next year. A crop rotation in the raised bed could look like this, for example:

  • 1st year: tomatoes, celeriac, cabbage, zucchini
  • 2nd year: Swiss chard, carrots, beetroot, lettuce and spinach
  • 3rd year: peas, beans, herbs, onions and leeks

Of course, you can also plant medium and weak feeders in the bed in the first year. They will then grow a little more luxuriantly and many nutrients will remain unused, but the cultivation still works.

mixed culture

Another strategy for as much variety in the bed - and thus a lower susceptibility to disease - is the mixed culture. Here, too, the nutrient requirements of the different plants are taken into account, for example heavy feeders are planted next to weak feeders (so that they do not get in each other's way), but also shallow-rooted plants next to deep-rooted ones. This method has several advantages: All nutrients are optimally used, and the denser planting means that there are no gaps in the bed. In addition, some species promote each other's growth, while others hinder each other.

  • Examples of good neighbors are carrots and onions; cabbage and celery; cabbage and marigolds as well as parsley and marigolds.
  • Bad neighbors are beans and peas; beans and onions / leeks; cucumbers and tomatoes; cabbage and onions; lettuce and parsley and lettuce and celery.

tips

So that you don't have to harvest all the vegetables at once and then don't know what to do with them: only plant or sow small amounts of carrots, lettuce, beans or peas at intervals of two to four weeks. This means that only a small amount is ready for harvest at a time, which you can easily use up before harvesting the next set.

Category:

Vegetable garden