"New Additions to the Garden......"

I built 2 more raised beds for the garden.  This time, I made them 2' tall and 4' x 4' wide, thinking it might make it easier for picking produce.

As I did in the larger raised beds, I used baled straw as the base, packed tightly, and layered old straw (still in the wheelbarrow in this photo) on top of that before adding the soil mix.

Also, once again, I used bags of "Wholly Cow", a mixture of composted cow manure and peat moss, on top of the straw bales (the baling twine was cut to allow the bales to expand so they will absorb water/rain easier).

I used 5 bags of Wholly Cow in each bed, filling in the slits along the sides, too.

The main part of the bed will have strawberry transplants (from the low bed on the right), but I am going to try planting some bush green beans in the narrow side slits to see if I can get a Fall harvest.  I planted some bush green beans in the 4' x 8' raised bed (behind these in the photo), but slugs have taken their toll on them and I have only been able to harvest enough green beans for fresh eating.  I finally figured out it was slugs doing the damage (totally cutting the bush beans stem off at ground level) so I set a bowl of beer in the beds soil and my slug problem disappeared quite quickly.  I had never had to use the beer remedy before and was really impressed with how quickly my slug problem was cleared up.....literally overnight!

Tomorrow.....transplanting time!