When starting out gardening you may or may not have put much thought into the different ways of filling your plant containers or garden beds and the importance of choosing the right medium.

When I started off gardening, I honestly never considered the differences and grabbed whatever bag seemed right at the time based on the marketing title or picture on the bag. Sometimes I didn’t even care and potted up my plant container with whatever bag I had at the time. 

You may get away with this too, but why not understand the differences so you can make a better decision and provide your plants with the best chance of success. 

Who knew there could be so many options to use as “dirt” for gardening. Sure you have native soil in your own backyard which may be all you need, but then you find products on the shelves such as bags of compost, potting mixes, raised bed mixes, garden mixes, and even top soil among other varieties. 

So what is the purpose of all these options and how do they differ? Let me share the basics with you by providing a simple breakdown of the 2 main choices. 

What is Soil-Less Media?

As the name suggests, soilless media is a growing medium that does not involve native soil. 

Example of Common Soilless Mediums 

Soilless mediums are peat moss, coconut coir, vermiculite, and perlite to name a few. These components can be mixed together to create a growing medium that provides your plants the structure they need for stability, as well as provide the necessary water retention, drainage and airflow for the roots to grow.

Soilless Media vs Soil Amendments

Often associated with soilless media but are better categorized as soil amendments (or ways to improve the soil) are things like compost, worm castings, and composted manure. The purpose of these organic amendments is to add nutrients to your growing media. 

Inert or Near-Inert Matter

Soilless media are known to be inert or near-inert matter, meaning they contain little to no nutrition. Peat moss, coconut coir, vermiculite and especially perlite fall into this category, making fertilization important when growing plants in this media.

Understanding the medium you choose will help you be more aware of how you should amend the “soil” for the right growing conditions to meet your plants’ nutrient requirements.

What is Soil vs Dirt?

You may hear the word soil and dirt used interchangeably, or at least I treated them the same when I first started gardening.  Although they do offer different meanings, I’m not sure it really matters how you use the word as long as you understand the difference. 

Soil

When starting a garden in your own backyard you are working with native soil. This soil is made up of minerals, organic matter, and countless microorganisms. The life in your soil plays an important role in helping your plants access the nutrients they need to grow.

Dirt

When you think of the word “dirt” we are describing the soil that has been removed from its environment. This causes it to degrade and become low in organic matter. However, it is possible to bring it back to life over time by improving it with soil amendments such as compost.

When Should You Be Using Native Soil?

In Ground Gardens

Native soil is truly all you need if you are planting a garden directly into the ground, although you could benefit from additional amendments like compost or other organic materials. 

Raised Beds With Open Bottoms

Alternatively you can use your native soil in your raised garden beds as well, as long as they have “open” bottoms for drainage. If your beds are short enough, your plant’s roots may even find their way to the bottom and grow into the earth beneath as long as the soil is not too compacted for their roots to penetrate. 

Tall Raised Beds Also Count

You can also use soil in your taller beds as well. In fact that is what I did with my raised beds because I had already been saving up plenty of “dirt” from my other landscaping projects and knew I would be building my beds 2 feet high and would need plenty of dirt to fill them.

Just remember not all soil is created equal. Some soils have more clay whereas others are sandier in texture. Too much clay will retain a lot of moisture and sandier soils can drain too quickly. Understanding your soil type will help you determine what to amend your soil with to improve its texture as well as improve the nutrients available for your plants to take up.

When Should You Be Using Soil-Less Media?

Containers or Elevated Raised Beds

Soilless media is best used when planting in containers or raised beds that are elevated or have closed bottoms. In these situations, native soil can become compacted, making it difficult for water to drain and for roots to access oxygen.

Benefits of Soilless Media

Soilless growing media is lightweight and designed to maintain good airflow and drainage, which helps prevent waterlogged conditions. Unlike native soil, these mixes resist compaction over time, making them better suited for confined growing spaces.

When using soilless media you have a lower risk of disease as they are more sterile than native soils. Although not completely sterile, they still provide a cleaner and more controlled growing environment for plants offering better drainage, which is a major challenge when growing in containers or closed-bottom beds. 

If the growing media stays too wet, roots will suffocate and rot. Using a lighter, well-draining soilless mix will help you manage the moisture levels in your containers or elevated beds, which in turn will provide your plants with a healthier environment for root growth.

To Summarize: What Did You Learn?

Bottom line, it’s important to understand as a beginner gardener that not all “soil” is created equal. Understanding the differences between native soil and soilless media as well as soil amendments will help you choose the right growing conditions for your plants whether they will be in raised beds or garden containers. 

Hopefully this article has provided you with a more simplistic approach in understanding the options available today, and the best way to use them when starting your own gardens.

Yesterday I decided to go outside and clean up my garden beds because it is already nearing mid-October and honestly I’m tired and ready to wrap up the season.  As much as I would love to live in a state that has fewer winter months, I find myself looking forward to the excuse to throw in the towel at the end of the year and call it a day. 

My First “Real” Year Gardening

Even though I’ve grown a few plants before, I’m calling this my first real year gardening. In the past, I always relied on plant starters and kept things minimal. This year, I planted entirely from seed, and it’s been such a rewarding experience watching everything grow from scratch.

I grew up around gardens—I remember grabbing sweet peas and radishes straight from the dirt as a kid. But back then, I didn’t fully appreciate the effort that went into maintaining a garden. So when we moved into our current home, I knew I wanted to build raised beds and create that experience for myself.

Planning (and Failing to Plan)

The Importance of a Garden Plan

Because I did my homework beforehand, I knew the importance of creating a plan—what to plant, where to plant it, what grows well together. I started off strong with a notebook, jotting down companion planting ideas and grouping strategies. But soon enough, I was dumping disorganized thoughts into my phone, and my note-taking kind of fizzled out.

Something I’ll need to improve on next year.

Companion Planting Wins

Despite the chaos, it was well worth taking the time to understand companion planting, and the time spent learning about this paid off. I didn’t use any sprays or pesticides in my garden this year, and yet, pests were minimal. Although my kale did show a few holes it was still edible. I think the plant groupings helped, and the marigolds I filled my garden beds with likely played a role too.

Though… note to self: marigolds are beautiful and helpful, but I’m thinking about planting them in nearby pots next year. They completely took over sections of my garden beds and shaded out some of my veggies preventing them from growing to full maturity. 

Flower Power (and the Chaos That Comes With It)

Borage: Beautiful, Beneficial… and Huge

I tried growing borage for the first time this year after reading how great it is for pollinators. 

Spoiler: it really is beneficial, almost too much. Bees were absolutely obsessed with it.  However, there were a few lessons I’ve learned after growing it myself:

1. It gets massive – Way taller than I expected for my little 2’x5’ garden bed.
   
2. Strong root system – I had to pull mine out early in order to gain access to my cucumbers and other vegetables in the garden that I was unable to reach, and was amazed at how large the tap root was when attempting to pull it from the dirt.
   
3. Bee territory – Since I planted these flowers in front of my cucumbers, I was not brave enough to work around them in order to harvest my other plants. I’m working on this, but bees do terrify me a bit and I have yet to be stung.
   

On top of that, we had several windstorms that bent the tall borage plants right over. It wasn’t a pretty sight—especially since my beds are in the front yard and I try to keep a good aesthetic for my neighbors.

Borage’s Aftermath

Borage does produce cute little flower clusters, I soon learned that they can drop seeds like crazy.  Apparently, borage can self-seed and are tolerant of colder zones all the way down to zone 2!  So it’s safe to say that I’m a little anxious about what my garden will look like come next spring. Fingers crossed it’s not a jungle.

Garden Identification Issues

What’s a Weed, What’s a Plant?

One thing I really need to do better next year is to label my seeds. I grouped my seeds by companion planting but didn’t make any physical tags in the garden. I thought taking pictures of the seed packets in the general area I had planted them would be enough, but truthfully, it was not.

I referred to those photos constantly as things were starting to sprout, but I still ended up pulling out some of my flowers as well as some other lettuce plants, thinking they were weeds. Considering how large my flowers that I had not pulled grew, that may have been a blessing in disguise.

But next year, I will plan to tag everything so I can refer to my garden markers instead of trying to find the photos lost in my phone’s album that I took earlier that spring.

The Importance of Patience

I found myself too eager to keep my beds weed-free and pulled up some of the very plants I wanted. Lesson learned. Patience is key—I will try better next season.

Pest Problems and Protective Measures

Next spring when I begin planting in my gardens, I’m choosing to cover my beds with garden fabric right from the start. I used netting briefly this year in one of my beds, but a couple things I could benefit from if I cover them early would be:

• Keeping the fallen seeds from trees from taking root, as I would get so many helicopter seeds covering my beds every time when a gust of wind would blow.
• Repelling pests like deer, rabbits, and even the stray cat that I found walking through every single one of my beds as if they enjoyed leaving their little foot prints behind.
  

I can always remove the covers once the plants start to flower and need pollinators. By this time they will be actively growing and no longer competing as much with the weeds.  At least I’d be able to tell them a part more easily. 

Planting Strategy: Less Chaos, More Succession

This year, I wasn’t thinking of the big picture and I chose to plant all of my seeds in the garden at once and had not considered timing when the plants would be ready to harvest. 

When everything matured at the same time, I will admit I was overwhelmed with the amount of produce and had a difficult time keeping up.

What I’ll Do Differently:

• Succession plant to stagger my plants and seed even a week or two a part should allow me less produce all at once, giving me more time to enjoy it fresh from the garden.
  
• Track seed-to-sprout timelines would allow me to understand how long it takes my plants to emerge in my own garden beds based on the amount of sun the beds receive in their location.
  
• Only plant what I can realistically eat or store is incredibly important. I read about this all the time but never truly understood until I was facing the challenge myself at the realistic amount of produce a plant can provide you.

These lessons may sounds simple, but it can be so easy to get carried away when sowing seeds in the spring when you’ve been waiting all winter to get out and enjoy your hobby again. 

Too Much of a Good Thing

As the header states, there is such a thing as having too much of a good thing.  I had so much produce from my garden that it felt impossible to keep up.  Although I did give some of it away to my family and neighbors, which did feel good to share, I also had to toss more than I’d like to admit.

If you’re new to gardening, plan ahead for how you’ll preserve your harvest. Whether it’s:

• Canning (learn it before you need it!) I would love to learn the proper way of canning, but had not taken the time to learn this skill yet. By the time my gardens were filling up, I could only think of finding ways to make meals, or snack while it was still fresh.
  
• Freezing will help preserve the life of your produce longer, but not everyone has the room available. Make sure if you know you want to freeze your harvest that you aren’t filling your freezer with other groceries.
  
• Dehydrating or fermenting is another option if you think you would enjoy eating your foods this way.
  

Having an idea of how you plan to use your harvest ahead of time will hopefully help you face some of the obstacles that come with growing a garden. Such as, not waiting too long while zucchinis are piling up on your counter.

Zucchini Overload

I have a funny story for you which definitely pins me down as a beginner gardener… Even though I considered myself somewhat prepared, little did I know that zucchinis were one of those plants that experienced gardeners are fully aware of just how well they produce. 

When I seeded these plants, I chose to place 2-3 seeds in a small grouping with the plan to thin them out once they reached a healthy size for me to choose which to keep.  Well, I planted 3 groupings which resulted in 9 successful sprouted plants and I soon realized I didn’t have the heart to toss them and replanted them elsewhere.

Yeah… I made so many desserts with zucchini this year that I’m pretty sure I gained a few pounds.  And don’t get me started on the cucumbers—I would dread walking by my garden knowing I needed to pull more off the vine that I was not ready for. 

I’m not sure I can eat fridge pickles anymore as I’ve had my fair share. bNext year, I’ll have recipes ready before harvest day to keep things interesting.

Finding Small Joys

Even through the chaos, I found things I loved.  This year was the first time I made homemade pasta sauce, using the Roma tomatoes from my garden. I learned how easy it is to freeze it in batches, and it felt good to preserve something I knew I grew and the money saved compared to buying jars of sauce at the store.

Final Thoughts: A Season of Growth

All in all, I couldn’t be happier with my first year of gardening. It taught me:

• The value of planning and labeling
  
• The importance of patience
  
• How much joy (and frustration) a garden can bring
  

All in all, I could not be happier with my first year gardening.  I learned how important it is to have a plan for all phases of gardening, and even though I feel I learned quite a bit this year, there is so much more garden knowledge I have yet to gain. 

I hope that by sharing my first year gardening with you and the lessons I’ve learned will be valuable information that can better prepare you to begin your own vegetable garden.  We will all face our own obstacles for various reasons, and if you’d like to share any of those with me, I’d love to hear about the successes or garden flops you may have experienced. 

Happy Gardening!

New Growth Accompanied by Confusion

Every time I see a little green sprout pop through the soil, I get excited—it’s like a tiny victory. If you’ve labeled your rows or have a mental note of where you planted things, it’s usually possible to tell what’s intentional and what might be a weed. Usually. 

That said, I’ve already taken a ridiculous number of pictures myself to try and figure out what is popping up in my garden by using Google’s reverse image search, so I can figure out if I should keep something or pull it.

In the early weeks, I definitely pulled up a few too many things I meant to grow (mostly flowers—oops). I’m slowly learning to be a bit more patient and let things grow a little larger before making that call. And honestly, it’s made me better at recognizing the “culprits” versus the keepers.

Why Instant Gratification in The Garden Matters

While we are doing our darndest to be patient for our garden vegetables to mature—like tomatoes, peppers, or squashes to name a few—it’s so rewarding to have a few plants that can give us something usable early on. Plants like this will hopefully help keep your gardening motivation alive. 

I’m still very new at gardening so I’m sure there are more options out there that I haven’t discovered yet, but I wanted to share a few “quick-win” crops that I personally recommend you give a try in your own garden to bring you some of that early joy and usefulness. For me this year, the plants I enjoyed using early this spring have been:

• Radishes – These were super fast growers and perfect for snacking.
  • Days to Maturity/Harvest: Typically 4-6 weeks (dependent on seed packet)
    • I started to harvest around the 4-5 week mark.
      
      
• Spinach and other Salad Greens – Things like kale, arugula, and various lettuces are not only quick to sprout, but you can start harvesting baby leaves early on too.
  • Days to Maturity/Harvest: Typically 3-5 weeks (dependent on seed packet)
    • I started to harvest around the 4-5 week mark.
      
      
• Dill – This herb is almost too easy to grow as I planted some seeds years ago and they keep popping up all over.  Dill is perfect to use in sauces or salads, among other things.
  • Days to Maturity/Harvest: Typically 4-8 weeks (dependent on seed packet)
    • My seed was planted a couple seasons ago, but they started showing usable growth in late May.
      
      
• Chives – Truly a hardy herb to plant in your garden, and you should certainly try growing in Minnesota!
  • Days to Maturity/Harvest: Typically 8-12 weeks (dependent on seed packet)
    • I actually grabbed a chive plant on clearance last fall and was amazed when I saw the green sprouts popping out of the snow this year. It was pretty exciting to start harvesting before I even thought about starting to plant my garden.
      

Consider Succession Planting

I don’t have a ton of space in my garden, so I have to be strategic. One thing I’m learning is how to make the most of that space by practicing succession planting. For example, once I’ve harvested my radishes, I can go ahead and simply re-seed that same spot with something else. 

If you do choose to seed quick growing crops like mentioned above, pay attention to the time of year you will be planting. Depending on the weather, you may be able to harvest the same crop, however make note of the upcoming temps so you aren’t dealing with early bolting on plants that require colder temps to grow.  

Experiment with the Whole Plant (if edible)

One fun surprise this year was discovering that you can use radish greens in cooking. I made a batch of pesto with them last week, and it turned out surprisingly good (with enough garlic added, haha)! I love the feeling you get when you can use something from the garden in your meals, even in small ways.

I don’t have an exact recipe to share with you but I had found a 1:2:3:8 ratio online as a general rule to follow when I was making this myself–as well as simply tasting as you go. 

You will always want to start with your greens “8” and scale down from there, from oil “3”, cheese “2” and nuts “1”, later adding garlic, lemon with some salt and pepper based on your flavor preferences. You should give it a shot when you have the opportunity. Pesto is great in so many ways and an easy way to get some nutrition in your diet too. 

Final Thoughts

If you’re just starting out like me, consider mixing in a few quick-growing plants to get that early feeling of success. It makes the wait for the bigger harvests a lot more enjoyable—and helps you stay connected to your garden each day. I’m still learning, and there’s so much more to explore, but the plants I mentioned above will definitely be part of my garden every year going forward.

If you like what you see, or learned anything, please tell me about it by commenting down below!

Happy gardening! 🌿

My raised beds were originally planned up to prevent some invasive vines against my neighbor’s fence, which you can read about on my post Building Raised Garden Beds to Fix a Problem with Invasive Grape Vines.  However I have always wanted to grow a vegetable garden, and this was one of our best (possibly only) options in our yard to add a garden. 

Planning Ahead

If you are coming across my post too late in the growing season, try to make this garden bed a goal of yours to plant your vegetables in, next spring. Reason I say this is because building beds can take time and when the clock is ticking you don’t want to miss out on getting plants in the dirt, especially since our growing season is so short here in Minnesota. No need to lose out by waiting to gather your supplies and build your beds. 

Temporary Garden Ideas

You can make a temporary bed, like I did, and have just as much fun this year while you begin your real planning for next spring.  

One day I decided to grab a couple 2×4’s in our garage and cut them enough to build a frame with the length I had available.  These were nothing special, and were simply built because I had the itch to grow some vegetables, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to get my true raised beds built for a while yet. 

Honestly, garden beds really don’t need to be anything special, since plants just need some good soil and sun anyway.  I just ended up tossing in a couple bags of quality dirt over my existing soil, and added starter plants that I picked up from a local garden center. 

Temporary Beds Provide A Great Trial Period

This worked great, and truthfully, planting in this temporary bed allowed me to gauge the amount of sun I would receive, where I planned to build my actual raised beds later that year.  

When it came time to build our beds in this very spot I had been growing my temporary garden, I had to dig out all my plants and move them elsewhere. I wasn’t sure where this could be, but I noticed we had this broken wheelbarrow that we haven’t thrown out yet, so figured I could just move my plants to this for a bit.  

This held all of my pepper plants very well, and because I had full expectations that it wouldn’t be long before I’d transplant them back to my newly built beds, I wasn’t worried about their growing conditions in this small space.  

Well plans change, as they often do, so my peppers did remain in this broken wheelbarrow for the remainder of the growing season.  

Sharing this with you, because I’ve learned that this too is another option if you have something similar that can hold dirt.  My plants did very well in this shallow filled broken wheelbarrow in a semi sunny location.  

It’s odd to me sometimes how things just seem to work out.  I was picking banana peppers, jalapenos, and a couple bell peppers at the end of the season from this little garden I created.  Not a crazy amount of peppers, but I was so excited every time I’d go outside to check how they were doing, I knew then and there that gardening was for me. 

My Process Before Building Raised Beds

It started out with me measuring the area I had available so I could determine the size of beds I’d like to build.  Because these beds would be next to my neighbor’s fence, I wanted to make sure I allowed enough space between the back of my beds and the fence for yearly maintenance.  After all, I need to get back there to trim all the growth that occurred that year. 

Measure Before You Build

Please make this a priority of yours before you begin any project, because it will truly help you figure out how much material you need to buy, and how much room you can work with. 

When you really begin to measure the area you will start to think several steps ahead and may be able to catch possible flaws or other things you want to change in your design before you start to buy your materials and build your beds. 

During my process, I will begin to mark the area for each bed in my lawn. I even changed it a handful of times before I ended with what I have today.  I knew I didn’t want to build a bed right up next to our backyard fence, so I left a good amount of space before the first bed.  I thought this could be a good area to store pots, or for a bit of time, our yard bin.  Either way, I left this available for whatever I might find useful for this space. 

I also knew I didn’t want my beds to go much beyond our neighbors fence, so I thought lining it up with that would look much nicer overall.  Especially since their vines would fill in the fence and they wouldn’t have the back of my beds to look at. 

Now that I had the location for my outside beds figured out, I was able to see where the remaining two beds would go, and how much room in between each bed I would have. 

Consider Bed Access When Choosing Your Dimensions

As mentioned above I plan to build my beds with enough space between the back of the bed and the fence, so this removes some of the room available to me between the side of my house  and front of the raised bed.  I needed room to allow a comfortable walking space in between, so I chose not to build my beds too wide from front to back.  

Width: 

Think about how little you want to strain your back when having to reach into your bed to access your plants.  Most often you will read others providing a recommended width of around 2 feet around your bed.  This should provide you with a good reach without having to bend over into your garden too much, which the comfort aspect is one of the reasons to grow in raised beds anyway. 

Depth: 

Another measurement to consider is how deep you want your beds, or another way of looking at this is how tall you want your bed to be.  Beds can either be ground up, or you could build it with legs, which would certainly keep you from having to fill so much of it with dirt or other yard materials if you chose to layer the bottom first before adding in the soil.  

The lovely thing about building your own raised beds is being able to scale it to you specifically.  I based my bed design on what I would personally find comfortable for me, but I also took into consideration the wood dimensions when I was deciding how much lumber I’d need to buy. I try to consider my budget when I come up with projects like this, and felt an added layer to make my beds taller wasn’t necessary. 

Length: 

Now if it were up to me, the more room to grow vegetables the better!  However… of course I needed to give myself an easy way to get in between my beds for the aforementioned yearly maintenance that had to be done still.

Because I had around 30 feet to play with and I wanted a comfortable enough distance between each of the beds, I decided to space them 2-3 feet apart, which by doing so would allow me to build four beds that were 5 feet in length. 

Plan Out Your Shopping List

Before I bought all of my materials for this project, I planned out what I would all need by searching online and adding everything I believed I needed into my cart.  

Print It Out

This not only allowed me to see how much this project could end up costing me, but It was super helpful once I got to the store, as I brought a print out that I marked with the isles on so I knew where I needed to go once I got there. 

I don’t know if you’re like me, but for projects like this that I’m not familiar with, I get overwhelmed and will forget something, or it will take me forever and a day to find it.  It also included the pictures of each item I needed, so I could pick it out much more quickly too.  

Take Notes

Another thing I chose to do and mentioned previously, is to find the lumber lengths that would allow me to get most use from.  I knew the width and length of my beds, so I simply tried to see how many cuts from a single board I could get.  

Once I figured out the best length to give me the most use, I chose to add that length board to my shopping cart, and determined how many boards I would need. I suggest taking very good notes (or sketch this out) while you are figuring out how many boards you will need, as it can get very confusing once you go back to reference all the lengths from each board.  

Concerns Around Pressure Treated Wood

You will notice that I chose to go with pressure-treated wood to build my beds as I believed this would provide me the longest life during our winter seasons, however I know there are a lot of gardeners growing organically today where this would raise concern.  

If you are concerned about chemicals leaching into your soil I have seen people choose to char their wood for similar protection so they can purchase non-treated wood (alternatively you can choose the more costly cedar or redwood).  Another option is adding a fabric barrier between the wood and soil like I had done.  This isn’t perfect, but I mainly chose to add this to keep from any dirt seeping through the wood if it happened to shrink. 

Although the wood I chose is pressure-treated, it was treated with the chemical ‘MCA’ according to Home Depot’s website.  This chemical is known as Micronized Copper Azole, which is considered safe for vegetable gardens. Even though it may still leach some copper into the soil, it should not be significant enough to be absorbed by your plants. 

My Shopping List:

Take Advantage Of The Free Services

I’m not sure about all home improvement stores, but one reason I love going to Home Depot for these types of projects is that they will cut your wood to your specified lengths.  At least they have during the times I’ve been there. It can be hit or miss however, and sometimes it depends on who is available to help.  I suggest going earlier in the day, and flag someone down to ask if there is anyone that can help. 

Be Prepared

I do suggest coming prepared however, so that when you find someone that can help you, you can easily relay to them what you need.  Thankfully I thought about this before heading to the store, so I had my cutting lengths all written down and was able to share this with them while they were grabbing the boards from my cart. 

This too makes it easier for transporting back home.  These boards can be incredibly long, and even with a truck it would not have been possible without them being cut before leaving the store.  

Reminder During Checkout

Just remember to face the barcodes all near each other because the individual that has to check you out will be very confused by how much lumber needs to be charged since it appears like you have more than you actually have.  This again is where it is helpful to have a print out to easily share with them the number of cut boards you have, and also to ensure you are charged appropriately. 

How To Build These Raised Beds

Because you will likely be working with your own measurements based upon your personal needs for your own raised beds, I’m not going to break this down into my exact measurements. 

I do believe you will gain enough knowledge on how I built my beds, to be able to turn this around and build your own beds to your desired measurements, by following the general design of my beds and planning ahead, like explained above. 

Start With Your Base

After you return home and have all of your materials available, you can start piecing your beds together.  Now that you already have all your boards cut to size, it will be a breeze moving right along. 

Group Your Boards By Length

I suggest organizing all of your boards together in piles based on the length so you can ensure you have all the correct pieces, and will not have to make any correction cuts at home.  You will likely have a few stragglers that don’t belong in the project and were leftover cuts that you will not need, and might grab by mistake if you had not already grouped everything together.

Start Framing Your Base

Take your two front and back as well as width length boards and line them up in the shape of your bed.  You will then grab your 4×4 corner posts, which will be your support boards, and what each outside board will be screwed into – making sure the first row is level. I do wish I had taken a picture of this part, but it escaped me as I was either holding the boards together or clearing out the area of our yard to place the finished beds. 

I chose to keep the 4×4 corner post a bit shorter than the overall height of the bed because I didn’t want it showing up once I filled the beds with dirt.  Just make sure it’s tall enough to screw the top board into. 

Once you have screwed in each board to the height you wanted, you can begin on the next garden bed as the privacy panel will come later.  

Consider Additional Support

If your beds were longer than 5 feet, you may want to consider including another board in the center front and back for additional structure, but the boards I bought were pretty solid already so I was not worried about them warping once filled with dirt. 

At this point it might look like you just built a bunch of coffins, haha.  That was my very thought when we were moving them to our front yard for placement alongside the fence.  Don’t worry though, it will look better once you fill it with plants. 🙂

Incorporate a Privacy Panel (or Garden Bed Trellis)

Normally when I think of raised beds, I don’t think about adding a privacy panel or permanent trellis on the back because if you have a spot to place them and access them from all around, there is no need for this.  

However my beds were serving multiple purposes, and I needed to incorporate a back panel so I could prevent my neighbors’ vines from growing into my beds.  I thought the look of these smaller wood slats would look nice and cover enough of the view from behind the beds, so I chose to go with this look.  

Add 2×4 Vertical Supports

For this addition, you will simply tip the bed forward and screw in a couple 2×4’s at the height you want your back panel to be.  

I chose to go with a height of 5 ½ feet because I didn’t want to run into any issue with this being considered a “fence”, which I believe you are not able to install at 6 feet.  Besides, this height was just enough to keep from seeing most of the vines peaking above. 

Once you have your 2×4’s secure, you can start screwing in the wood slats.  

How to Evenly Space the Wood Slats

Spacing your 1×2 wood slats was a little more of a challenge, and when I had my Dad here to help, we were moving a lot faster with the three of us.  However what we did was grabbed an extra slat of wood on the flat side, we stuck it between each section to get the same distance and screwed them into the 2×4 from there. 

Alternatively, if you have any Trigger Clamps this was incredibly useful during this step of the project to secure the wood slat on one end as you screw in the other. 

Include the Mesh Screen (If Needed)

Once you have your back panel built, you can now staple on your mesh screen if you need to prevent anything from growing through your wood slats.  This is much easier to do before you fill your beds with dirt since we could just tip the bed forward again, and stretch the screen over the back and start stapling it into the 2×4 on the back.  I chose to keep the top and bottom alone so that whatever may fall into the back can easily be removed without getting stuck in between.  

Stain Or Paint Your Beds

Now that your beds are fully built and ready to be filled with dirt, you can choose whether or not you want to add some color or maybe even additional protection by staining the outside of the beds.  

I chose to stain the bottom of the bed the same color I have used on another bed of mine in the backyard, which was made of concrete blocks.  You can read more about that under my post 5 Steps to Build a Budget Friendly Raised Bed Using Concrete Blocks if you are interested. 

To stain your back panel, I would strongly suggest getting yourself this Stain Pad Applicator because it made my life so much easier when trying to get enough coverage on each wood slat.  This thing made this part of the project so much faster and smoother over trying to use a normal stain brush which I can picture dripping stain everywhere. 

I also used this for the base of the bed which was fairly quick as well, but a little trickier near the bottom of the beds as I’d get too close to the ground at times, but not an issue at all since this is just outdoor beds after all. 

Time To Start Growing!

Now that the beds are built and ready to go, all that is needed now is to start filling your beds with dirt and add some plants. 

I took awhile to do this only because I wanted to fill my beds with dirt from another project I’m working on that would give me plenty of dirt to use.  I started off by adding sticks, leaves, and grass clippings for the remainder of the season, which would all get very packed down after winter, leaving plenty of bed to fill yet.  

Once I was able to start adding in dirt from our backyard, I filled it a bit over half full, leaving enough room to add in bags of really good soil and compost to mix in with my existing dirt.  I knew my free dirt had a lot of clay in it, and I wanted something to help with drainage and reduce the clumpy-ness so my seeds had a good chance to take root once I began to plant. 

I hope I have been able to share enough with you from my own personal experience, that will give you plenty to base your own project off of, and allow you to build the raised beds that will work best for you!  

Thank you for taking the time to read my story, and if you have any comments to share down below, I’d love to hear them.

Happy Gardening!🌿

At least this is what I thought at first until my Mother-in-Law gifted me with a Peony and I wanted to find the perfect place to plant it.  I realized before that, I wasn’t opening my mind to the possibility of simply creating a spot in the sunniest part of our yard for this sole purpose. 

Before I really started gardening, I could only imagine landscaping around our house, but as I’ve continued my new hobby I’ve begun to become more confident in expanding my options. 

Why Consider a Pollinator Garden?

We all know too well that we can’t survive without bees, so why not help support the environment by contributing to their success and provide our beneficial insects a place to nourish themselves. In addition you will be rewarded by being able to enjoy the butterflies and bees in your yard, jumping from flower to flower. 

What You Need To Know Before Starting A Pollinator Garden

Sun Requirements

Most flowering plants will do best under full sun, so try finding an area of your yard that you know receives sun most of the day, or at least 6 hours.  This should provide you the best chance of success with plenty of blooming flowers. 

Understand Each Plants Watering Needs

When I was choosing my plants, I tried paying attention to the drought tolerant plants because I do not have irrigation set up, and only plan to hand water this garden.  

It’s always advised to look into plants that are native to your location too. This way you should have great success in them flourishing since they are created to survive your exact growing conditions, and often do not require much water either. 

I had not considered native plants in the beginning (although I’ve started to incorporate them this year when I had other plants fail on me).  I started my garden only focusing on which plants fit my design I’ve drawn out, shown in the image below.

Seasonal Interest

When you add plants to your pollinator garden, try paying close attention to when they will start to bloom.  I sort of accomplished this in my own garden, but was so focused on the look of the plants, that I forgot to ensure they would look amazing throughout the entire season as well. 

I do love each of the plants that I’ve added on their own, but if I could do it all over again, I would consider adding various types of plants that achieve the same look I was going for, but extend the blooming time. 

For example: I absolutely love my purple Salvias, but they bloom earlier in the season during the Spring-time while everything else is still green, or waiting to come up.  If I considered including later blooming Salvia’s, or another plant I found known as Liatris Spicata or Blazing Star (native to Minnesota), I would be able to retain this same color when my other plants finally start to come alive mid-summer. 

Know the Mature Size of Your Plants

This is often one of the hardest rules to follow.  It’s difficult to see all that space between each tiny plant when you start off your garden that first year. You can see in my picture below, that there was plenty of space left when I made my plant placements.  It is so hard not to want to fill it in so that we can achieve that full look, and see all those pretty flowers next to each other.

However, even when I thought I was doing a good job at keeping my plants far enough apart so that they would not overcrowd each other once mature, I’m already finding that they are just too close and I will have to remove some of them from the garden next year. 

You can see how my plants are starting to crowd each other in the image below.

Choose Plant Placement on Height

As mentioned above, it’s important to know the mature size of your plants, which not only is regarding how wide they get but how tall as well. 

Another thing I chose to ignore or overlook was the bee balm that I planted in my pollinator garden. I suppose I thought the bee balm I picked up was one of the taller varieties, but that was quite the opposite.  I don’t believe these plants have gone over 10” in height if I were to take a guess, but you can see them hiding in the picture below. 

If I considered this, I should have planted these on the outside or in front of the taller plants, but instead they were tucked in the middle and have been hidden since day one.  I plan on moving this too next Spring so they have a better chance of seeing the sun.  They really are a beautiful magenta color when they first bloom, and I’m missing out on getting to see it before they begin to fade. 

Other than that, I feel I did a pretty good job with placement as I focused my taller plants in the back or closest to the fence that I included for added interest. 

7 Steps to Create Your Pollinator Garden

As I’ve shared above, there is a lot that goes into planning out a garden, and I’m a true believer in having a good idea of what your next moves are before beginning a project.  I think it allows everything to move a lot quicker, and you have more confidence going into it than you would if you were to make it up as you go. 

1. Layout Your Design

I find it very helpful to have your physical plants before you start digging, because you can visually see what it may look like before even starting. 

Of course, these plants are at a much smaller scale, but you will give yourself a chance to rearrange or reconsider the placement before putting them in the ground.  I have done this with every garden project I’ve started.  I’m a visual person, and struggle seeing the full picture without having it in front of me. 

2. Mark Your Garden Bed Area

You may have already decided how far out your bed would be before your plant placement, but I have found myself expanding or reshaping my garden beds after I made my final decision on plant location, so be flexible and allow yourself more room if you can allow it.  

3. Remove the Turf

I’ve mentioned this in other posts I’ve written, but this has to be my least favorite part of landscaping. Thankfully I’ve accumulated garden tools that have made this task a bit easier, but by no means do I look forward to this step.

If you want this to be a little less difficult, check out this Saw-Tooth Edger, which is one of the garden tools I highly recommend if you have to deal with removing turf, or simply cutting out and shaping your garden bed

4. Add Edging (If Using)

If you plan on using edging, I like to start placing this around the shape of the bed after I’ve removed all of the grass.  It starts to pull everything together, and holds in the mulch when you add it at the end. 

5. Start Digging

Now that you have your garden space cleared out, you are ready to dig the holes for your plants.  I like to have a bag of Epsoma’s Plant-Tone All Purpose Fertilizer and Bonide’s Root & Grow Concentrate nearby as I have had great success in my plants growth when I’ve started them off right from the start.

Make sure to dig your holes wider than the pot the plant came in, but just as deep so you aren’t burying your plant lower than the current dirt level removed from the pot.  

Tousle the side of the dirt to loosen the roots, but not too forceful to cause damage to them.  Just enough so the plant will want to start feeding off and start growing through your own garden’s soil. 

Sprinkle a small handful of fertilizer pellets, and water your plants with your root concentrate and finish by filling the rest of your empty hole with more dirt. Depending on the condition of my soil, which I work with a lot of hard clay soil, I like to incorporate some compost as well if I have it on hand. 

6. Water and Set Your Plants

Continue to water your plants once all have been put in the ground.  This should hopefully keep them from too much transplant shock, and be happy in their new home. 

7. Finish With Mulch

I like to include wood mulch in my gardens, directly surrounding my plants to provide insulation and shade from the sun.  It also keeps the weed seeds from germinating and filling up my beds.  

Besides serving the functional purpose mentioned above, I think mulch adds the final touch needed to your garden and makes it complete.  You may notice after a year or two, you will need less and less of it as the plants start to mature and fill in the space. 

Here is a finishing picture of my garden, including my little helper who was happy to know his mama was finished playing in the dirt and ready to play ball with him.

Final Thoughts

Now that I have been enjoying my pollinator garden for a few years, I’m starting to think about ways to update it based on my suggestions above. I think I will start by removing some of the plants I have multiples of, and that are too short for the space they’re in. 

I’ll need to find a new home for those plants, which may just mean I need to come up with a new garden bed elsewhere. 😉 Then I think I’ll replace the plants removed with native plants that will fit the space and provide me with more seasonal interest that I can enjoy more than I do today.

If you like what you see, or learned anything, please tell me about it by commenting down below!

Happy Gardening!🌿