My soil is good so found the plants have no trouble going right through to it. My trees are not in raised beds, but they look nice in beds. I like the beds as the soil warms up faster, so melons and corn and other things that like warm soil can be started earlier. Also in wet areas you can increase drainage with raised beds. I like it too because it defines a clear area for my brambles to grow. Any that stray out are removed. I will always use raised beds, the advantage is too great. I have another reason that is more specific to me. My dog has a hard time telling the difference between garden and grass. But it was easy to train him to stay out of the raised beds. I have to grow all vegetables in raised beds else my dog would stomp them into the ground. I grow blackberries in the ground and had to put a fence around them to keep him out. I could not train him to stay out, he didn't get it? The green posts with white tips hold a chickenwire fence, so he cannot run though the blackberries, which are currently buried under leaves for the winter. Burlap will go over them too. Putting it down Tuesday. Jesse will go right up to the raised beds and sniff in them, but is trained not to walk in them. (Chandler blueberry in full fall color) This post was edited by Drew51 on Sun, Nov 23, 14 at 18:22

My raised bed garden is about 13 feet square and surrounded by stacked bricks... can not remember the name now but they have plastic tabs in the back holding them together with a 14x10 inch cap. They work great and I can walk on them when I am working. I live in Chandler and have never had a problem with the heat but I keep the garden pretty wet. the price of brick is higher on the front end but they will last forever and look very nice. I took about 10 inches of dirt out from the bottom and put in all new soil. It was a long time ago but I know it was a lot. I add steer manure every year but need to add another 5 bags of soil, do not know where it is going. Every time I turn the garden over with the shovel the level gets back up near the top of the bricks. The soil is amazing... if I step in where I have worked my foot sinks about 6 inches.

I suggest #3 having done this several times now. You need a weed barrier before you add more dirt, that's what the cardboard/newspaper is for. Then after you put the new soil in you might consider putting more newspaper on top around your plants to keep new weeds down. You can put mulch on top of that. You don't need to add newspapers on top but your 8x12 size is big and would eliminate need to weed. Size: 8x12 needs a walkway down the middle to access the plants. 4' is the suggested maximum width to reach across. Layout: I've done square foot gardening as well as row gardening. SFG was fun but I "grew" out of it, lol. Tilling: the newest thinking is not to till because it disturbs the good microbes in the soil. I'm in favor of anything that requires less labor. just keep adding good soil on top and mulch. Tomatoes: a class all their own. They don't do well in Florida "soil" because of the nematodes living there. I've tried raised beds, amending/adding good stuff and nematodes always invade. I now only grow tomatoes in pots sunk in the ground. Good luck! Denise

At my last house I had raised beds - 4' wide by 12-20' long with wooden sides about 1 1/2 foot tall. Over two or three years we built 8 of these large beds plus several smaller beds for perennial crops like stawberries, rhubarb, and horseradish. For that situation, there were several advantages. It allowed us to have flat areas on a hill; we terraced with rock walls and put the beds on those flat areas, surrounded by woodchips for mulch, so there was no weeding at all. The beds were sunk about a foot below the grade, and we had to sift the soil, which was shallow over fractured ledge, to get rid of all the rock, and then we filled the rest of the beds with composted cow manure, thanks to our local dairy farmer. So, we ended up with no weeds & great soil in flat beds from an area that started out mostly rock on a steep grade. Other pluses were sitting on the bed sides to plant, screwing trellises for beans, melons, cukes, etc. directly into the bed sides, and the ablility to plant early due to good drainage and early season warm-up. We also sometimes put plastic hoops over the beds, tucking the hoop ends inside the beds to hold them, to cover with spun-bond or plastic. On our strawberry beds, we put hinged wire mesh covers so the chipmunks couldn't eat the berries. Between mulch and the high organic content of the soil, we only had to water when it had been dry for a couple of weeks or more. Our current house had a pre-existing ground-level garden which we simply took over as was since the house needed a huge amount of work, so that's where our efforts and energy went. I miss the raised beds, and find that I have more difficulty with soil-living bugs like wire worms in my potatoes and cutworms crawling in from the surrounding field. I can't work in the garden as long since I have to bend more or sit on & scoot along the ground. (I'm no spring chicken!) The grass and weeds migrate into the veggie garden from the surrounding field, and the soil needs to be prepped in the fall so I can plant peas, potatoes, etc. earlier in spring since the soil stays cold and wet for much longer. There are two only advantages I can see to the ground level garden: it's easier to till with a machine like a big tiller or tractor if you want to be able to do that, and any crops that need winter warmth can be well mulched and will stay warmer in the ground. Garlic, which is a bit borderline as far as hardiness here, has better survival rates, and my leeks and root vegetables overwinter better with a thick layer of mulch when they are in the ground rather than in a raised bed. So, like Lisa, I will eventually have some of both, but with most of my garden as raised beds and a smaller part of it in the ground.