i'm in the same boat. i have several beds that have been dug out and refilled with a mix of what was there and a ton of compost. i just add a layer of compost every year, not wanting to dig up any old seeds, and i get better results every year so it must be working. i had much more luck than i thought i would with straw bale gardening for my viney things like squash and pumpkin and other thing like tomatoes and peppers. i did not try flowers but have seen some amazing photos of flowered covered bales, so i know it works with annuals. i was encouraged enough to want to do it again this year, but i am buying my bales the next time the snow melts. it took much longer than i thought to get them ready to plant, longer than directions said, but despite the late start i had decent results. and the best thing is it just breaks down and after a few years you have a nice bed. worth looking into.

It was so nice to check in this morning and read all the nice comments from you all. THANK YOU so much! I am praying that all of you who need rain will get it soon. It has been so hot and dry here too and dragging the extra-long chain of garden hoses around from garden to garden is getting tedious and tiresome. I do so love all my gardens but I realize I am in over my head right now. I was not surprised that many of you chose 'Marietta Warrior' as a favorite. John Shooter sent me that one as a bonus and looking at the photo of it I wasn't all that thrilled by it (but happy because I would never spend $75 on a daylily...haha). Then it bloomed....and it was instant love and amazement. It has to be seen in person to fully appreciate it. The red is so bright and the shape is circular, with that dramatic green eye. It looks much bigger than the 6 1/2 inches it measures. I wisely planted it in the border by the road and I have had people pull their cars over to get a better look. Some have asked what 'kind of flower' it is and when I tell them it's a daylily they don't believe me because the only daylilies they have seen are ditch lilies or Stella...LOL. Mantis...the huge tree with all the trunks is a white pine. It is enormous and unfortunately shades my gardens but it would be too expensive to have someone remove it, especially so close to the power lines. I have a lot of huge trees because my property was all wooded when I moved here. Jean...I will give 'Wonder of it All' another year to shape up. It's my husband's favorite (even though I have to drag him out to look at my flowers). It's one of the only ones that is in full sun so I don't know what more I can do to get it to open better. I will make sure to include photos of the kitty family in my next post. Once again, I appreciate your taking the time to comment as I know we are all busy lately. Celeste

A word of caution: I don't know about your kind of grass, but with bermuda or zoysia, I'd recommend 1) you start a few inches below the soil level with your landscape timbers, 2) Use Hi-Yield Killzall to eliminate the grass -- wait a couple of weeks, and spray again, until all grass is absolutely gone, 3) line the inside of your walls with roofing paper. Otherwise, aggressive grasses can go right through the slightest cracks into the bed, or slip under the timbers and climb right up the walls to the top. I am speaking from experience - didn't know any better, so now I have a lovely raised bed full of zoysia grass. While it may be a slow spreader, it wasn't at all bashful about invading my daylily bed, which is 7 landscape timbers in height. I'm going to have to remove all the daylilies before I can eliminate the zoysia, unless someone here at this forum knows a magic formula to kill the stuff. Nancy

I do. I simply placed my frames on the soil I used for my row garden. In fact the only real amendment I routinely use is leaves. Tho last year I did mix in a half bag of purchased composted manure for my heavy feeders and started using compost tea. Made by simply putting puchased composted manure in knee-high nylons (after I get done wearing them, of course ;-) and soaking in rain water. Seemed to stretch my manure, plus the plants seemed to like it. If (like me) you don't wear knee-highs, simply go to the dollar store, 3 pair for a buck. Oh, also last year, I put a knee-high in a bucket I used in each bed for watering. So far this year I haven't had to water much because of the rain (but then the garden isn't growing either but I don't think I will be using the buckets in the beds. I am thinking about trying the tea 'brewing' method (using MY compost) recommended by DCHall in the soil forum this year. http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/soil/msg0300105612497.html Back to the topic....I do, I just find watering a challenge in SFG beds because of the close spacing. Good Luck, Gumby_CT Here is a link that might be useful: Deep watering for heavy feeders