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Built a raised bed without checking for level ground first
Last spring I set up a 4x8 cedar planter in the corner of my backyard in Denver. After I filled it with 12 bags of soil, I noticed the whole thing was leaning about 2 inches to the left. Water would just pool on one side and run off the other. I had to dig down 6 inches on the high corner, reset the timbers, and redo the whole thing. Has anyone else dealt with a sloped yard messing up their garden setup?
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phoenixgonzalez2mo ago
I saw a video from some gardener in Colorado who said the trick is to use a string level across the whole bed before you even put the first timber down, like check it in four spots not just the corners. She said Denver soil shifts a ton because of the clay, so you gotta dig down a bit on the high side first anyway, maybe 4-6 inches, and level it with gravel or compacted sand. Makes sense with the freeze-thaw cycles we get here, water pooling is a nightmare for rot and root stuff. I've been watching a lot of those short garden hacks lately, and they always say spend the extra hour on leveling or you'll hate yourself later. That 2 inch lean must have been brutal to fix after all that soil was in there.
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noahclark2mo ago
Mention @phoenixgonzalez but really she meant to say gravel on the low side, not the high side.
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