Garden Bed Guide

Both work — the right choice is about your site. In-ground beds cost the least and hold moisture longer in dry spells, which suits good native soil and larger plots.

Raised beds shine when your ground is poor, rocky, compacted, or possibly contaminated. They drain better, warm up earlier in spring (so you can plant sooner), keep soil from compacting because you never step in them, cut down on weeds, and are easier on your back. They also let you garden on patios or in tight, HOA-restricted spaces.

Sun first: most vegetables and flowers want a minimum of 6–8 hours of direct sun a day, so choose your sunniest open ground. A few leafy crops (lettuce, kale, radishes, scallions) tolerate partial shade.

Put the bed somewhere convenient — near the house and a water source — because raised beds need regular watering and you’ll keep up with a garden you walk past. Choose a level site that drains well, and avoid low spots that stay soggy after rain.

Use your arm’s reach as the guide: you want to tend the whole bed without stepping in it, which keeps the soil loose. A bed you can reach from both sides works well at about 4 ft wide (up to 5 ft if you have a long reach). A bed against a wall or fence, reachable from one side only, should be no more than about 2.5 ft wide.

Length is flexible — roughly 4 to 12 ft is typical for a home bed. If you’re building with lumber, keeping boards to about 6 ft or less helps prevent warping.

Leave comfortable permanent paths between beds — wide enough to kneel and move a wheelbarrow through.

Aim for 6–12 in of loose, fertile soil. As a rule of thumb, leafy greens, beans, and cucumbers are happy with around 8 in, while deeper-rooted crops like tomatoes, peppers, and squash do better with 12 in or more. Beds can be built higher (even waist-high) for easier access — they just need more fill and good drainage.

A good fill is roughly one-half to two-thirds quality topsoil blended with one-third to one-half compost or other plant-based organic matter (pine bark or peat work too). Don’t overdo the compost — too much holds water and stays soggy — and skip straight potting soil in a bed, since it dries out too fast.

If you’re building on top of existing soil, blending a couple of inches of your new mix into the native ground helps water move between the two layers instead of perching.

Where you can, run rows north–south so plants don’t shade each other through the day, and set the tallest plants (corn, trellised tomatoes, sunflowers) on the north side so they don’t shade shorter neighbors.

Top the bed up with an inch or two of compost each season, and keep off the soil so it stays loose year after year.