Potato raised garden is coming along now, I used glass (old sliding patio door) for the sides and south end, north end has doors that open that I just glued a couple old broken mirrors on. the side glass leans out for the summer time ventilation to keep it cooler, and tips in (locks in place) for spring and fall to keep the heat in.
of course this raised garden at 18 potato plants is not enough so I have started building another, larger one, 9 feet by 3.5, should hold roughly 27 potato plants

I don't know what happened to my middle row, I think I was interrupted when planting and forgot .

The whole thing is painted white, So I will refer to it as the "white house" from now on in my posts just so the alogorithms kick my posts of my potatoes up for human review at the NSA....they need something to do anyway.

I screwed up my seeds, what I thought I saved last year from short bush cherry tomatoes, turns out not to be so...I must start labeling everything so I don't mix things up. Quite the growth from the previous pic, I will soon be over run with tomatoes. (june 25, just spotted my first tomato, marble size)

Some things are ready to eat...

So this building raised garden/green house things is fun and I do like seeing what I can whip up but the time it takes is no good.....its time to standardize, reduce costs, and mass produce, I need to ramp up to at least 300 sqft raised, and for me raised is a minimum 3 feet to the top of the dirt (3.5 is perfect) when im 60+ (do to all my broken bones) there is no way I will be able to get down lower for gardening. So I followed industries lead and deceided Pallet racking was the answer, its usually expensive, but not now in recession Alberta. go to the scrap yards, or on kijiji and they are awash in the stuff, prices they ask are all over the place but you can make deals.
A few calls and I had pricing of end pieces (12ft high ) for 20 dollars, 9 feet rails for 15 apiece, this is for stuff with peeling paint and the odd dent..fine by me. So cost wise a 12ft end piece will give me 4 three foot pieces, and 4 rails to make two raised gardens. So 60 dollars in rails, and 20 dollars in one end piece = 80 dollars to build 2 raised beds to 3 ft height. Hell I couldn't buy lumber to build a single bed that high. so I now have the cost of one bed at 40 dollars in steel.
In the pic you can see I just finished one up, The top of the rail will be where the bottom of the bed is, the top part of the raised bed will now be built with ordinary lumber. It will be roughly 33 sqfeet for each raised bed I build. I think I will need to build 9 of these.

Very Clever indeed

Ok I have four of the steel frames made. So 132 sqft of raised garden in this pic, at the far end you can see I have just started building the top part, 10.5 inch deep will be these beds (I can go higher). the top of the dirt will be 3, maybe 3 .25 feet high from the ground, roughly 2.5 feet between the ends of the beds so I can walk between them. I will only get 4 done this year, other things are demanding my attention, but four more will be constructed next year. The next four will be parallel with these.

This is how the top part is being made. Not even a mouse will be able to get into these raised beds.

So easy, I didn't even have to drill holes in the steel as its so heavily perforated

Just a up date in case someone else does this. I couldn't here as the land I put these on is rolling sharply in two axis. but if you have a flat area and lay out one after the other as I have done, leave 7,8 9 whatever feet you want between the beds, then you can slap a 2x10 onto the sides of the beds extending between the beds to use these as the rails to build your bed on. this brings your average cost down to roughly 30 dollars each to get (in this case, (4 beds+ plus the space between them, so 7 beds) 7 beds at a height of 3 feet. That's very cheap . Also these beds I have built drain by way of a 2 inch slot running the length of the bed, so should exstream drought conditions ever come to alberta I could recover all the water the plants don't use.

hmmm. interesting.. very interesting

so the strawberries are coming to a end, only 33 pounds worth this year instead of a hundred plus, blueberries are ripe and being picked, first big flush of red currents ripe and picked and gooseberries are coming, first of the rasberries are starting as well.

peas are almost done, first push crop of beets are ready, and so much more hilled over 200 spud plants and so forth

Still working on the raised beds, building tops for them, with chicken wire to keep the deer out, and each will have a arched clear polycarbonate top for hail protection...if its good enough to do, its good enough to over do..

all beds filled with manure and I am stiring in grass, leaves and compost.

now eating from the garden, some tomatoes already turned red, and ready to eat!! peppers need more time though..

Funny, I had to build the same cover with chicken wire, but to protect strawberries from birds. I got to admit, yours look, ahem, straighter...

Little HP also loved seeding multicolour carrots so she could play "guess the colour" before pulling them out.

Funny, I had to build the same cover with chicken wire, but to protect strawberries from birds. I got to admit, yours look, ahem, straighter...

I have been blaming the squirrels for getting my strawberries but you have me thinking maybe it is the birds?

Thanks, There is a simple trick to keeping everything straight....before I started I buzzed off a bunch of 90 degree blocks, by setting my chop saw up to make 45 degree cuts. Only takes a few minutes to buzz off a couple dozen blocks. With blocks in each corner nothing can go crooked. They are screwed and glued (tightbond 2, waterproof) in place...makes for strong straight corners, and no fumbling around with a square.

I have decided to make these raised gardens a "feature" in the yard so I am going all out to make them look good, using cedar to build the tops, staining with a oil based varathane to make them water proof, and turn a dark golden amber colour. A will even face the Pallet racking legs with cedar to dress them up...its over kill, but what the hell, its fun to do.

Looks nice. After I built my cover, I read a trick online. Apparently you can deter your local birds by painting small rocks red like strawberries and placing them by your strawberry patch before bloom. It's supposed to train them that bright berries = hurt beak. And this should entertain a child for an afternoon! 😉

Arrived at our new house. Owners started setting up the land for permaculture. They aborted the rest of their planting as we bought the house so the garden isn't fully planted. The place looks a bit bushy right now but we'll do some cleaning up once the house is a bit more organized. Apple trees are doing really well and I frankly didn't expect such delicious apples around Edmonton. Lots and lots of raspberries. Some onions and potato plants. There are some tomato plants going and we'll see how they turn out. I don't know if the strawberries yield much fruits, but they have runners going everywhere like crazy. Lettuce and spinach were not tended to for the past 3 weeks so are just big wild bunches past their prime.

All in all, we're happy with what we got, but it will take a lot of our time to get things arranged.

Oh and lots of bees around! Maybe I should set up a hive next year??

Sounds interesting, welcome back, I am sure you can save the garden from the(premies) permaculture inflicted on it (a sort of joke). Prepare for a explosion of things on your to do, can do, list. Now that you have rural land and elbow room ....your opportunities widen. Non identifying pic always welcome.
Bad news....winter is coming so be ready. My hop plants have stopped growing, and are working on buds now..we are on the short days to winter now...

Arrived at our new house. Owners started setting up the land for permaculture. They aborted the rest of their planting as we bought the house so the garden isn't fully planted. The place looks a bit bushy right now but we'll do some cleaning up once the house is a bit more organized. Apple trees are doing really well and I frankly didn't expect such delicious apples around Edmonton. Lots and lots of raspberries. Some onions and potato plants. There are some tomato plants going and we'll see how they turn out. I don't know if the strawberries yield much fruits, but they have runners going everywhere like crazy. Lettuce and spinach were not tended to for the past 3 weeks so are just big wild bunches past their prime.

All in all, we're happy with what we got, but it will take a lot of our time to get things arranged.

Oh and lots of bees around! Maybe I should set up a hive next year??

Lucky you on the permaculture, it does take work to have those food forests but so worth it, I am in the middle of a massive drought in my area and just like in 2012, the normal garden is pretty much toast and producing maybe a third it should but the hugelbeds, the multi-layed cropping an so forth, producing good to excellent..

only time will tell you what season the rasberries are but if you can and want to, get all four timed producing in, same with the strawberries, keep but tidy the older plants to see what you have next year and cut back and move 50 runners into new row and or bed, if you do not like the older ones next year then just rip them out and replace with the kind you want but if you do like, then you have a harvest from old and a perfect start to your new three year cycling bed.

Sask has amazing fruits tailored to your zone, you can now have apples, cherries, pears and so much more

Totally up to you on if you want the bolted to go to seed, might not be the year for it.. given every thing else on plate.