Soil & Garden Beds

Our Resources

• VIDEO: Making Raised Beds and Using Containers (below)
• VIDEO: Soil and Bed Preparation (below)

• GARDENS FOR LEARNING: Chapter 7 – Planting Your School Garden, pp. 56-59
• CSYSG TRAINING HANDOUTS: Download on bottom of the page.

More Information
Building Healthy Soil

• Download the whole story on healthy soil, preparing beds, and making compost from Center for Agroecology & Sustainable Food Systems (CASFS), UC Santa Cruz
• OrganicGardening.com (Non-existen/broken) articles on building healthy soil and related topics
• Try Cover Crops, crops you can plant outside the growing season that build up your soil, also from CASFS, UC Santa Cruz
• More Cover Crop Basics from OrganicGardening.com

Making Raised Beds & Preparing the Ground

• Sunset’s take on making raised garden beds in the ground and making planting boxes
• (Non-Existen on website) Annie’s Guide to Five Types of Children’s Gardens share tips for range of garden bed types
• Videos on making raised beds and prepping the soil from GrowOrganic.Com and from National Gardening Association

Calculate how much soil you need to fill planting boxes:

• • Gardener’s Supply Company;
  • Soil Buildings Systems (adjusts for settling);
  • Soil Direct (for different sized and shaped beds);
  • Convert from cubic feet to cubic yards.

• Gardens for Learning, Chapter 7 reviews double digging, a technique for improving your soil deep down, especially when you are breaking new ground.

Also Related: Making Compost and Amendments

• CSYSG’s Videos on Making compost bins and Worm bins
• Vermicomposting, or letting worms do the work, from CASFS

Raised Beds and Containers

Soil and Bed Preparation

DOWNLOADS:

Basic GardenTools

Garden Bed Types

Nitty Gritty_Determing Your Soil Texture

Soil and Bed Preparation