Garden Boxes

A couple of years ago we decided to move our vegetable garden to the front yard, with the goal of reducing the amount of lawn we had and making use of one of the sunnier and less utilized spots in our yard. Our existing raised beds had been build by a previous owner, placed in the shaddow of a tall hedge running around the back yard.

They are about 11 inches deep, and roughly 4 feet across for easy access. We had planned to use these for the "Square Foot Gardening" method, but since decided that our root vegetables all end up too small due to being crowded. The boxes are filled with a planting mix from one of our local garden centers composed of equal parts soil, mulch, and composted cow manure, which has worked great for growing vegetables.

In the years since building the first two, I've added two more, and are planning to build two more this winter. With the four we have we were getting quite a few fresh vegetables and freezing some for the winter. Six will probably be enough for our family for a while. They won't entirely replace purchases from the farmers market and grocery store -- there are some veggies that are too tedious to grow. We mostly stick to tomatoes, peppers, squash, and a few root vegetables. Leafy greens are difficult to keep pest free, especially from leaf miners.

Sliding dovetail joint

I had to search a bit to find one that looked good, most look sloppier than this but are holding up well.

I built these from my own plans out of cedar, using a sliding dovetail joint to attach the sides. The first time I borrowed a router from a friend and tediously used the only dovetail bit he had to make four passes through the slot to enlarge it to an adequately sized slot for the boards to slide into. I had built a little fence jig to attach to my friend's router to help with this. The next year I bought a large dovetail bit and my own router, doing all eight corner pieces at once. The slot was not quite straight doing this even with a commercial mortising jig, and usually ends up a little loose. I often tack the boards in place with a brad nailer just to hold them together until I can put soil inside, at which point the pressure on the walls pushes everything into place.

This year I am going to try individual pieces again, but using a router table. In previous years as well as this year, I need to make several passes with a narrow straight cutting bit to cut the 3/4" deep hole before making a final pass to carve out the dovetail walls. I'll let you all know how it goes.