#1 Reason Why Raised Beds Decrease in Productivity / Performance After a Year or Two
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 29 май 2024
- Have you experienced this: Your planter beds do great for the first year or so, but then veggies stop growing or are stunted? Christy Wilhelmi of Gardenerd will share with you today the main reason why that happens. It's the #1 problem she runs across in her business with new clients. Find out if this has happened in your garden.
Find help prepping your beds here: • Bed Prep for Fall or S...
Find more resources related to this video here: gardenerd.com/blog/youtube-wh...
Whether you’re new to gardening or a garden nerd veteran, there’s a place for you at Gardenerd.com Visit our website: gardenerd.com/blog
Consider becoming a Patreon Subscriber to support the free info we provide on this channel and at Gardenerd.com: / gardenerd
Purchase your copy of Gardening for Geeks updated in 2020: gardenerd.com/shop-gardening-...
Grab a copy of Christy's new book "Grow Your Own Mini Fruit Garden": gardenerd.com/mini-fruit-garden/
Follow Gardenerd on social media:
Twitter: / gardenerd1
Pinterest: / gardenerd
Instagram: / gardenerd1
Facebook: / gardenerd.com
#RaisedGardenBeds #VegetableGardening #GardeningTips 
Хобби
My tool of choice for dealing with invading roots is the mattock. While labor-intensive, it makes short (but sweaty & breathing hard like Bugs Bunny being chased) work of digging up roots. Tips to make it easier: pick a cool day (or cool-season day), do the work when the soil is dry (wet soil's heavy), enlist the aid of some beefy dudes, & everybody take turns hydrating & digging. PS, this is the ONLY time I step into my garden beds (to avoid compacting the soil). I start at one end & work towards the other end, so that all soil behind me has already been de-rooted. Hope this helps.
It was very nice to see the video, enjoyed it but...I was a little disappointed since there was not a real way to solve this issue. I'm tired of doing that digging every other year and was hoping to find a better solution 😪 😔. Thank you for your hard work and blessings 🙏💖🌻🍀
Have you tried the root barrier that I mentioned in the video? That's the only thing that has consistently worked for my clients. If you have raised beds, you dig out the soil, put down the root barrier and put the soil back in. If you are gardening in the ground, vertical root barriers along the garden edge are the best solution. It's hard work, but it lasts a long time and it totally worth the effort.
@@Gardenerd I will re-watch the video but we had put the weed barrier, a few layers of cardboard and debris from trees etc. I thank you very much for your kind reply. Blessings 🙏💖🍀🌺
@@mariap.894 Ah, I see. Over time the weed barrier can break down or roots can find their way in on the sides or corners. It may be time to redo the root barrier. Good luck!
@@Gardenerd Exactly! I just thought I could find a way to get more than 2 years .
Thank you for your follow up. Be well and be safe🙏💖🌻🦋
Christy you are great teacher thank u
Appreciate you watching and thank you for the nice comment!
Realy interesting i learn everyday ...thank you for this info 👍
I'm glad you found the information helpful. Thank you for watching!
You do an excellent job you need more views. Keep up the great videos thank you!
Appreciate the encouragement and yes to more views! Thank you for watching and supporting the channel!
Great video. My raised beds are at least 40 feet to the nearest tree. Is that too far to have root problems from those trees? I'll be looking forward to the nematode video. Thanks for sharing, you do a great job. Take care.
40 feet is pretty good, unless the tree canopy is close to the raised beds. Then they might be present. It's pretty easy to find out. Just dig in and see what you find. If it's really hard to get a shovel in there, you probably have roots. If it's still easy to dig, you're good to go!
That’s why I switched to pots gardening
Your Momma didn't raise no dummie! 😉
I have had tree roots in my compost pile and also leaf mold pile. I like partial shade under trees so things don’t dry out so fast. Could the tree roots also enrich the soil community by feeding bacteria.
I'm not exactly sure how long those roots stay colonized once they are cut from the tree, but they are populated initially so if you add them to your compost and leaf mold pile when freshly cut, those bacteria and fungi will travel with them and probably remain alive with the other material present in the pile.
I have a lilac at the end of one of my raised beds. Can I just dig down at the bottom of the raised bed to cut any roots that are trying to make their way into my garden?
You can do that, but you're likely to find a fine thatch of roots rather than one or two big roots. But you can cut them and leave them in the bed to decompose if you want to do it that way. You may need to repeat the process every year or two.
I have some problem. wonder why I found roots where no plants around it. I thought well maybe it was from previous plants but again the roots are kinda live so yeah plants seek nutrients. Nature is awesome. I have question; can you put half finished home made compost to your raised garden??
If your compost is half finished you can screen it to remove the pieces that have yet to decompose. Return those pieces to the bin. Or just accept that those bits will pull resources from your raised bed (microbial activity, some nitrogen) to complete the decomposition process for a short time. I'd say it's find to add incomplete compost to your beds in fall if you plan to wait until spring to plant in them. I tend to sift twice (first with a double layer of gopher wire, then with a 1/2" grid nursery flat) to get out the unfinished bits.
How much does using the landscape fabric underneath limit the root & general growth of the plants you are planting in the raised beds? Is that why you do it as a final resort or because of the amount of labor (or both)? I’ve got blackberries I want to keep out and some bindweed issues to boot in my OVF plot that I’d like to protect against. I’m already reworking the raised beds and plan to use hardware cloth/chicken wire to keep the gophers out so wondering about the pros/cons of adding the landscape fabric to the mix. (This is your neighbor Liz by the way 😉)
Hi Liz, I don't generally recommend weed fabric for keeping cane berries at bay. It may redirect them to an edge or work for a little while, but it's best to install a root barrier in front of cane berry plants instead, if possible. If you can use a 2-foot deep vertical root barrier (the thick plastic kind used for street trees) that will be more effective. It's still work, but it's worth it.
@@Gardenerd Good to know, thanks! I became well aquatinted with that hard plastic barrier some years back after neighbors at our old house planted bamboo on the other side of the fence from my veggie garden. I dug a 25 foot x 2.5 foot trench in soil that was hard clay below the top 9 or so inches! 🥵
I just noticed the Hackberry tree’s roots have invaded our raised beds. Would the pitchfork method suffice for disrupting the root growth for this season or would I need to dig it up? I placed hardware cloth on the bottom but not landscape cloth. Cheers!
A digging fork will help solve the issue for this season, but if you are able to make a plan for a full overhaul before your next season, that will be a much better solution over time. Admittedly, I'm kind of doing the same thing here at Gardenerd HQ until I can find the time.
@@Gardenerd Depending on time and energy, I might just remove the dirt and roots and then I’ll line the beds with double landscaping weed cloth. I also have cardboard i could add as well for extra measure. Thank you making this video and the reply. Have a great day!
It’s helpful just to know that others experience this. I found out that tree roots invaded my raised beds this year while I was pulling out my garlic bulbs. It made me so mad. I dug out the soil and put cardboard down, but I hate that I will have to do this every couple of years. I don’t think weed fabric would totally prevent it. Anyway, thanks for the video!
We've had a couple of experiences where we've had to re-dig after a few years, but for the most part, if you come up the edges of the raised beds, it keeps them out pretty well.
This was WAY above the average info we can garner on RUclips! You explained it well. I'm with Maria P. in the messages, I was hoping for an easier solution. But it sounds like sweat is the only option. I had no idea this would happen. I should have, we live in the high deserts of New Mexico, and IF you add water, things will find it and grow! I did try landscape fabric when we put my raised bed initially, but it wasn't very effective against bind weed or tree roots. Oh Man. Now I have to get to know my shovel a little better. ; ) I clicked that button right away. Gotta see what all you know. Haha. Have a great day.
Glad you found it helpful. Bindweed is another animal altogether. It can spread 30 feet from a single root. Keep after it though, and it weakens over time. Thanks so much for subscribing!
Aww mittens
Couldn't we just dig up the tree roots and, then, leave them to compost in with the soil? I mean. once dug up, aren't they, then, dead? Thanks
You absolutely can leave the severed roots in the soil. They are colonized with microbiology and will break down over time.
that feels ironic. you want to not disturb the soil so as to preserve the microbiome, but you have to disturb the soil in order to get the tree roots out in order for anything else to grow at all.
It's true. I feel that push-pull of no-till, but when the tree roots want my veggies as much as I do, something's gotta give. This year, I used a digging fork to lift the soil in clumps to sever the roots, but didn't turn the soil at all. That may be a happy medium between the two extremes.
I have a silver maple aprox 20' away from my raised bed. Tons of wild smaller natural vegetation within a few feet. I know the pain of these crazy root mats that are taking nutrients away from this bed. I also have a number of large containers in the same area that have the same soil as my raised bed and they don't suffer the way my raised bed does.
I'm beginning to realize that for this space that I'm using to garden within that I should probably be focusing on containers and replacing the traditional raised bed with some kiddie pools that I could drill holes into the bottoms of.
That is the way to go. Although I was just with a client where we are growing in half whiskey barrels. The roots from a nearby ficus hedge got in there through the drainage holes. So make sure to elevate your containers a little bit to avoid those hungry infiltrators.
@@Gardenerd say the whiskey barrels/kiddie pools had holes drilled 2 to 3 inches up on the sides instead the bottom? Would there bottom portion be to soggy? I suppose a gardener could stick any old container on a pallet but I'd rather not have to make a special trip to Hannaford just to steal pallets.
@@Gardenerd it's wonderful to hear from content creators btw. Ty for responding.
@@thuggedwhiteboy Pallets or bricks or plant feet are great ideas. You might have a soggy bottom if there are no drainage holes in something as big as a kiddie pool. But give it a try. If it's shallow enough, it might dry out sufficiently.