There many reasons to choose a raised-bed. In our urban setting, spaces are small and building a raised bed that will be planted intensively is great way to dedicate a space to our garden all while keeping it simple.
You can build on almost any surface turf, gravel or your driveway, opening up space possibilities for your vegetable garden. By building up, you don’t have to dig down and amend the soil which is very labour intensive and can take years before getting a good soil quality. For your raised bed, you can invest in a high quality soil mix for your vegetable garden. Adding fresh soil to your raised bed will limit weeds as your are not digging up an existing space. A raised bed means that you are not walking in your garden bed and keeping your soil from getting compacted and allowing for great drainage. You can also get started earlier in the season because the soil in your bed will heat up early in the season. If you have lots of trees in your yard, gardening in the ground can be extremely challenging because of the roots, your raised bed can protect your garden from the piercing tree roots. The nice wooden structure allows you to easily install a trellis or fasten a fence to protect your garden from animals. It even enables you to build a hoop house, if you want to extend your season into the cooler months.
