Whether you want to bring some life to your outdoor space, you want to know where your food is coming from, or a combination of both, adding raised beds of food can be the answer you’re looking for. Contrary to what you might think, you don’t have to own a farm or dig up your yard to grow your food. You can decorate your home with creative and easy-to-access planters that not only add dimension to your outdoors but yield fresh food to feed your family.
All it takes is a bit of imagination, planning and knowledge of seasonal foods, and knowing what thrives in your area of the country.
Why Should You Start an Edible Garden?
Starting an edible garden doesn’t have to mean rows and rows of peas or corn fields of crops, so if you’re going to decorate your space with colorful flowers and shrubs, you might as well add in plants you can eat as well. Doing so brings beauty and practicality together, so the question isn’t why should you start an edible garden, but why wouldn’t you start one?
Whether you’re looking for a different way to bring beauty to your yard or you’re trying to increase your health, an edible garden is a good place to start. Not only that, but gardening is good exercise and relaxing at the same time, so if you need to wind down after a DMSO treatment or a hard day at work, gardening is a smart choice.
Raised Beds or Not?
When starting an edible garden, your first choice is whether to put your plants directly in the ground or build boxes to plant them in. You could certainly do both, but if you’re looking for a more decorative use of edible plants, raised beds might be the way to go. Not only do they have the benefit of interesting designs, but maintaining them is easier on your back and knees, and they’re less likely to grow weeds and grass to crowd out your plants.
Another benefit of raised beds is the accessibility of the plants you’ll use to make your snacks and meals for yourself and your family.
Locations for Design
If you decide to use raised beds, there are many ways you could use them to decorate your yard and up your curb appeal. One way is to use window boxes to grow herbs, edible flowers, or lettuce varieties. Not only can you paint them to match your house, but you can access your plants right out your window, so they’re readily available to eat without even leaving your house.
Another idea is to create a design around your patio with the same luxury of accessibility. Still, with your patio, you have the flexibility of shapes and materials to play with. Consider using bricks or cinder blocks to build your raised beds with openings to your yard in rectangles, ovals, or zig zags. With this location, you have easy access to your plants, and you can work on or harvest your gardens right out your back door.
But don’t limit yourself to the back because you can add raised beds to places in your front yard too. Aside from window boxes in the front, you could add these gardens to the top of the wall you might have to mark your property or carefully nestled in between your front bushes.
Maintaining Your Health and Your Yard
Gardening is a great stress-relieving activity that gets you outside and occupies your mind at the same time. Add to that some healthy foods to grow and harvest yourself, and you have the perfect hobby to take your mind off the day and fill your body with healthy foods you need to thrive.