A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2007 I've finally done it!!!!!

It's taken me the good part of 6 months, but I have finally built my raised vegetable bed, for the purpose of square foot gardening!

It's taken so long for the following reasons:

I had to chop down and remove five 12 foot leylandii conifers!

I had to get a guy in to grind out the roots.

I then had to big out my area for the bed, as land is on a slight slope, and also quite a lot of rocks!

I had to find a supplier of pressure treated timber (not that easy for some reason round here?!)

I then had to build the bed, and "install" it, which for some reason took me all weekend long! Guess my electric screwdriver running out of power, then snapping in half, and then my arms giving up on me didn't help

But I can start planting in it soon

good for you!

you are so lucky!

i cannot wait to get started...there is 6" of snow on the ground! i think it will be a while!

Pressure treated wood may not have been a good choice for a veggie garden raised bed. I think it leaches something into the soil that isn't good for you. But someone will be along that knows where that link was or have the information about that.

It sounds like you did a great deal of work. I know what you mean about rocks. Where I was born is very very rocky soil. But it's great soil for all of that.

Pressure treated is toxin free. It's the only type of wood suitable for making a veggie bed from (or so all the books I've read on the subject stipulated). Hope that's what they meant any way

Daniel, from the sounds of it, you've really done a lot of work to get started on your square foot gardening! (Did you think about taking before - during - after pics? I hope you took pics when the conifers were still there, but if not, you can start now & let us see how things are coming along.)

Good for you.....cant wait to see some pics!!!

I have lots of pictures, just need to get the time to load them somewhere

As for the CCA issue, I did mention to the guy I bought it from that this was for a raised vegetable bed, so he should have known if their were toxins on board! Been looking into this a bit (as have built this for the benefit of my young family!), and see that the EEC (European Council) were planning on banning CCA in the EU, so will have to see if they have?

Thanks for the link though -- but has me a little worried!

Well done, you deserve lots of "growing" success

Sales people aren't always the best people to ask. They are all about selling and may not be as forthcomming as they should be. Since you've already bought it I don't know how you would find out what it was treated with.

Maybe to be on the safe side you could line it with something like pond liner material to provide a barrier between the wood and the growing soil. Something that is water proof anyway. Just a thought.

Very cool! Glad you got it done!