A Raised Bed Garden Plan With String Tomatoes

David LaBrie’s Garden Story

My wife and I moved to this location two years ago. At our previous residence of 35 years, we had well-established, in-ground gardens. I didn’t want to go through all the trouble of starting a new in-ground garden from scratch; being older and retired, I didn’t relish the idea of dealing with plants at ground level. The new home has a very large 200-year-old barn that is filled with everything you could imagine. I built my new raised bed gardens from items that I scrounged from the barn. The 
raised beds are great; they are 18 inches tall and easy to maintain. I compost leaves, grass clippings, and chicken manure to ameliorate the soil. I also have a couple of worm farms that provide fertilizer for my plants.

The gardens give my wife and I fresh vegetables throughout the summer and fall. I also preserve vegetables through canning, freezing, and dehydration; we eat these items through the winter. I also heavily mulch my carrots and have access to fresh carrots through the winter as well. Cuttings and 
anything that we can’t use goes to the ladies in the chicken coop.

The Garden Planner has been a great tool for designing gardens. For my 2022 garden, I use it to take advantage of companion planting as well as crop rotation. I have been using the Square-Foot Garden tool as well; it helps to make the best use of the limited space. I tried my hand at growing tomatoes on a single stem along a string this year and had great results. Growing tomatoes this way forces you to pay close attention to the tomatoes while training the vine to the string and keeping the suckers pinched off. I grew several varieties in a limited space, and the daily inspections kept me ahead of the tomato hornworms. I had some trouble keeping even moisture in the beds as they are well sheltered from the wind and have full sun all day long. So, I invested in a drip irrigation system, which solved the issue.

All in all, I am very happy with the way the raised beds have turned out, and working in the garden is very therapeutic.

David’s Vegetable Garden Plan

(Campton, NH)

The Results! Beautiful Garden Photos

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