I've been watering with municipal water for 30 years with no filter with fine results....but maybe they would be truly incredible with a filter! I wouldn't stress over that detail for now unless your water is super high in chlorine. Rain barrels and watering cans set out ahead of time to out gas chlorine and warm up are fine ideas for watering a 4x8 bed though, but not required with my city water. You can find good info for raised bed gardening in the square food forum linked below. I would go with spacings that weren't quite so tight as the square foot suggestions. Your soil should be okay, but it isn't the super specialized Mel's Mix on which the spacings are based. Here's one possible layout with my sq. ft modifications: 3 tomatoes in a row a foot in from a four foot edge (preferably the north end) with large cages or a trellis for support. This 4x2 foot area for 3 plants allows you to let the plants grow without much need to remove side growth. 4 peppers in the next row...make this row 30 inches in from the starting edge. They have a 4x1 foot area to grow The tomatoes and peppers can go in after your last frost date and will grow there all season til first frost. Buy young transplants at a local garden center. Save growing your own for another year. Pick varieties with short days to maturity. You will still wait till at least mid July for a harvest to start....maybe later. Tomatoes and peppers do well in large containers with potting mix (not soil) Check the container gardening forum for info. One plant per large pot is best. Look for tomatoes recommended for containers as some varieties are HUGE. The pot grown tomatoes and peppers may ripen ahead of the others since the soil will warm faster. Plant beans in the middle section and Spinach and lettuce on the other end. Adjust the amounts of each to suit your food preferences. Plant bush or pole beans after your last frost date. Direct seeding is fine although you may see transplants for sale. I'd only put in a few transplants if any since direct seeding gives a harvest almost as quick. Most bush bean varieties will be ready to pick in 7-8 weeks or so and may keep producing if you keep them well picked. Pole varieties need a sturdy 8 foot pole to climb. They will take a bit longer to start producing but should continue until frost if kept well picked. Space them as described in the sq ft charts or a bit farther apart (4-9 seeds spaced out in one square foot). Bush beans can be planted in two or three plantings put in 2 weeks apart to have a longer harvest time. Later plantings could go in where spinach and lettuce grew in the spring. Lettuce and spinach can go in early as seeds or transplants while we still have freezing nights. I'd go with seeds or else start my own transplants inside right now. Space out 4-9 seeds or plants per square foot and harvest some when young to keep the spacing okay. Harvest later pickings by removing the large outer leaves and letting the rest of the plant keep growing. Lettuce and spinach do not grow well in the heat of summer. They will send up a flower stalk (bolting) and the leaves will get bitter. Harvest them completely if this starts so you don't loose the crop to bitterness. Heat resistance varieties, shading and enough water can help, but figure on replanting later in the summer for a fall harvest. You may use the space where they grew for a mid June planting of bush beans. Perhaps remove an early bean planting for a late summer replant of spinach and lettuce. Starting them in the shade of other plants may help for the summer planting. Or grow transplants in a cooler area. Your 4x8 bed should give you a manageable area for a new gardener and allow you to learn a lot without being overwhelmed. Good luck. Hope you love it! Here is a link that might be useful: Square foot gardening

Hi Elane, Thanks so much for the interest. I wish I could post a photo, but I don't have a digital camera. As a matter of fact we lost our one and only camera and have not replaced it yet. We got out to that bed yesterday for the first time this season. It was a mess. Usually we are out there in early April, and put on a new layer of mulch. Not this year, and wow, we couldn't believe the weeds. So now it has a new layer of mulch. We dug out a few dead plants. I put a few annuals along the top of the rock edge, and added one ice plant that hasn't bloomed yet. Nothing much to admire this year, for sure. But it looks presentable now any way. As far as the photo, the best I can do is describe it. It is just a level flat front yard with a very small slope down toward the street. You wouldn't even think there was a slope unless you were trying to garden and noticed the run off. That is why I put a rock edge to the bed. The rocks are only about 12 inches high, flat stones stacked 2 on top of each other, along a bed that is about 15 ft along the street. The bed is bordered on three sides by the street, the driveway and the walkway and one side is bordered by the lawn. On the driveway/street corner, it is anchored by a small pennisetum grass with two phlox subulatas in front of it. On the opposite end next to the lawn there is a very pretty sedum Vera Jameson that is very dark almost chocolate color. Next to that is a creeping sedum that I don't know the name of but it is a lime green with yellow flowers. Next to that is the remaining plant which is a minature geranium with purple flowers. That is it. It was empty from the geranium to the corner with the grass and phloxes. So I put three silene plants and one ice plant there yesterday, none of which have blossoms on them yet. Actually, since all the corner plants are fine I just need probably 4 or 5 plants to fill in the middle again. The corner plants are simply foliage for most of the season, with the exception of the phlox in Apr/May at one end and the sedum late in August at the other. The geranium is finished flowering. So basically, I need 5 plants that will bloom in June, July and maybe August that are low growing and tolerate salt. That would keep my rock garden going. I was disappointed to notice that the ice plant is a zone 7? I think. So I am anticipating it may not get through the winter. I was just thinking, since the salt is a problem, and I need color for June and July, maybe I should plan on just using annuals every year? That might solve my problem. Well Elane, your post helped me think through some of my options. If you have any plant suggestions, that would be great. Thanks very much, Adam

If the temperature would really drop, your floribundas could be frozen back to ground level. If planted deeply they'd be okay, though I'd do as suggested by Sazzyrose, and cover them with peat moss ... just be sure to place some type of covering such as evergreen bows on top to help prevent the peat from being blown awawy. The more live wood that comes through, the bigger and fuller the bush will become, and of course you'll get more flowers too! Terry

Most of these types of containers come with recommendations for filler but if yours didn't then the norm is any quality soil-less potting mix. There are many brands available but the key is no soil, no dirt. Most contain peat, vermiculite or perlite, some bark fines, some lime to balance the pH, and some mild form of fertilizer (either organic or slo-release synthetics). You'll find more info on fillers for containers over on the Container Gardening forum here. I agree with all Lisa said, especially that your list is a big one for such a small container unless you only want a few of each with limited production. I'd suggest you find other containers for your strawberries and herbs and save the space for the plants that require more room. Plus they have very different nutrient needs. If this Rustic Elevated Bed is what you are talking about then about all it is going to hold is about 4-5 bush bean plants, a short 2 foot row of green onions, a couple of heads of lettuce, 1 jalapeno pepper plant (they aren't small plants), and even that is going to be crowded. You can plant your lettuce and onions from seed if you wish and in your location should get at least 1 crop of lettuce (use leaf rather than head lettuce as it needs much less room) and some onions but they need to be planted ASAP. Better yet buy transplants for both. Good luck and enjoy your new project. Just don't try to over-crowd everything as you'll end up with little production. Sometimes planting less = getting more. :-) Dave