Gardening Question - Growing Wegetables

[ayceejay]

Put your Google clogs on and search 'Lasagne gardening' and see if anything there lights your candle.
In the olden days of double spit digging your upturned turf would go in the bottom spit, if you don't go this deep you will have problems.
If you don't fancy the deep digging and a raised bed suggest that, put the turf in a pile and use it after it has rotted.

 

[Pale Rider]

Cover the turf with some old carpet, then proceed as your original plan.

 

[accountantpete]

Whenever I have turned over turf the resulting soil has been a little stale - it may be due to the compaction of the turf layer/tight roots and too much rain.

Personally I'd skim the top inch of grass/turf off and decompose separately and use the remainder as planned.

 

[Chris Norton]

How deep are you looking at putting the turf? If they are going deep then no problem. I would do turf then about 6 inches or more of manure and then put another 6 inches plus of topsoil over the whole lot.

Spuds clear ground by the earthing up process. Works a treat but only puts the seeds back by a year.

 

[Over The Hill]

I would clear the path of turf and stack it up somewhere for a year.
We have a veg patch now with about 10 raised beds and have found the best start is to begin weed free and then keep it that way. Importing a load of weeds in to start that is well ahead of your seeds is not a good idea. At the end of the first year the soil in the bed will need a top up and you can use the soil from your heap.

First beds were low brick walls. Lots of work but nice and solid. Second batch were timber 4x2s nailed together. Then I tried eight concrete building blocks in an octagon shape (joined in a row of three) just held in place with string around the octagon. Final two were two slatted wooden bed bases, just chopped the legs down and stood on the ground. All suffer much less from weeds and from slugs and are much easier to net. Also our soil is quite thin so the extra depth helps.

Added a greenhouse this year which has helped to get more use out of the garden by bringing on early seeds.

 

[Fnaar]

If it's a fine-leaved fescue

I love that word

 

[Fnaar]

Put your Google clogs on and search 'Lasagne gardening'

Kewl! I didn't know you could grow lasagne

 

[PK99]

[QUOTE 2730528, member: 9609"]I'm in the process of creating a raised bed for growing vegetables, The soil for the bed is going to come from a path that I am going to create across the lawn.

If I just dig out the turf and turn it upside down into the raised bed, then cover it with soil and some well rotted cow muck - will it be ready for growing stuff in next spring. - will the turf have rotted down sufficiently?


EDIT; "Wegetables" ! jeez - what an eejit
Can't edit the title[/quote]

The problem with using soil dug from the garden is that it contains a large bank of dormant seeds, some of which will be brought to the surface, see the sun in spring and germinate, others only need a flash of light as you turn over the soil and they will geminate even if reburied just below the surface (Think WWI battle fields and traditional ploughed meadows) .Hence the term "sterilised loam" - which is steam heated not just to kill nasty bugs but to kill the seeds too.

One of the big advantages of raised beds is that they area "no dig" system: the soil never gets compressed by walking and therefore never needs digging - buried seeds remain buried.

So, if yo use garden soil the first season will be a weedy hell and future planting/harvesting will bring up old seeds giving you a perennial annual problem (ha!)

But, turf rots down to give a very fertile loam

So, If I were doing what you are doing I'd: bury the turf deep at the bottom of the raised bed (And I mean bury, not put simply put on the base of the bed), Use the garden soil mixed with well rotted manure on top of that and top off with 6 inches of sterilized loam mixed with organic soil conditioner.

The more work you put in at the start, the deeper the fertile soil, the better the crop and the lower future labour!

(ps if you want to gild the lilly, sieve the garden soil to remove stones before using in the raised bed)