TSC had some metal ones last season and had reduced a while back

. Now have been doing the inside hardware cloth(2 yrs of far) and welded wire ones lined with two layers of 4ft tall landscape fabric. then cardboard Got the idea from You tube. most of min are 3 or 4 ft circles. 3 ft high. Now I wish I only made them 2 ft high. they worked out just fine too. filled most of bottom withheld leaves and old broken dried branches etc. Best idea I ever had...wish I did it 8 yrs ago instead of straw bales, in ground, short wooden raised beds that rotted , in ground etc.....mostly from free pallet type wood

Now growing all in hoop houses.... I believeI have over 20 bins...LOL plus gobs of 18 and 24 inch "pots" nursery type or style

Just chiming in oh in my opinion ch wire not tuff enough like the hdwe cloth.

can I ask why you don't want to use wood? the reasons are not so obvious...

If budget was no object, I'd opt for Corten steel. If finances were more restrictive, then I'd use galvanized metal stock tanks.

Lady on the FB gardening forum I am on, used plastic kiddy pools.

Hi cloud_9,

My thought for not using wooden raised beds was, since the wood would be sitting there all season long, in our weather, I didn't want to have to keep replacing it every few years from rot or have to deal with any insect issues specific to that.

If I use hardware cloth as a double wall filled solution or some kind of sheet metal/aluminum solution, I would have a longer lasting solution.

Cedar - either Western red cedar (Thuja plicata) or Eastern red cedar (Juniperus virginiana) - as well as redwood, have strong anti-rot capabilities and can last 15-20 years in direct contact with the ground. And there are various eco-friendly wood preservatives that can be used safely with any edible crops.

Bill Duesing the Founder of NOFA CT had a radio gig years ago where he recommended using plain pine boards because they were a fraction of the cost of cedar. They last about 7 years before they need to be replaced. I have never regretted following his advice. I have had wire enclosures for my compost bins that have crumpled after a very short time. As far as any kind of metal - weigh the cost and make sure they can't rust.

My (untreateed) pine beds are going strong after 4 years. I just pulled a couple out to make room for a new water line going through, and the parts that were underground had very little rot.

mine last prob 4 years pine boards 2by 6 or 2 by 10 or so corners were 4 by 4 oak or pine and so they rotted too

Although we think of wood as something that is not permanent, but actually wood lasts longer than we think. And better quality wood or heat-treated wood, will be even longer.

However, as for other ideas for sides, I could suggest those resin bed kits. They will be a little costly but should last a really long time. I also got galvanized corrugated beds, and while that sounds good in practice, but the sun shining on the sides and light reflecting off them, makes them not really fun to be around. However, they are an option to check out if you want.

You can use fake wood boards. Usually used to build decks and porches. Works like regular wood boards, does not rot.

Congrats on your raised bed project - you should have some great growing this summer!

I want to comment on the proposed size of your beds. Raised beds can be of any length, but the width is constrained by two factors.

1. The first is simply how far can you reach and work them from the sides without having to step in them (which would crush the air out of the soil and compact it). Assuming you have work access to both sides, six feet is a pretty big stretch. That takes long arms and a lot of leaning over to work that soil, not to mention pick off bugs and harvest vegetables.
2. The second is the amount of pressure that the volume of soil will exert on the sides. Even a raised bed the width of four or five feet would need a cross-brace every four feet or so to hold the sides in place and keep them from bulging out. Six feet wide is an awful lot of pressure, especially at that height, and would require even more frequent bracing.

My final question is, why the 2 -3 foot height? That is a huge volume of soil. Do you have a problem with your back and you are trying not to bend over as much?

Food for thought:

Something that high is more of a big container than a raised bed - which are usually 4" to a foot high max. Most of the growing area of the bed is dug down into the existing garden soil. You are not trying to reinvent the wheel here - or in this case the dirt. You just want to make the soil better and more hospitable to roots and soil organisms. There is no way to do something that voluminous without abandoning your existing dirt and hauling in more dirt and lots of amendments from the outside at great effort and expense. Why do that when for 1/3 of the cost and effort you could just dig a foot down in your current soil and turn it over adding in some compost and other amendments? Doing that alone would raise the soil level about 5 or 6 inches. Put an 8 or 10 inch border around that and you have room for future compost and mulch - all without hauling in a pound of topsoil from some other unknown location.

How about old used solar panels if you wanted beds 600-800 mm high there seems to be a fair few around