It sounds to me like you did not allow your materials to compost first which is a key factor in preparing the bed prior to planting. Lasagna beds are usually started in the fall and material added consistently throughout the winter until you are ready to plant in the spring. By spring, much of the material has broken down significantly enough to be ready for planting. Do you still have your old in ground locations? Maybe you should transplant while you still can. Then you can prepare the lasagna beds so they're ready for a fall planting.

I started a lasagna bed this year in the spring and planted in it only two weeks after I made it. So far the plants are thriving. So I'm not sure that the newness of the bed is the issue. I am using soaker hose as irrigation, so that is different. I just dug down to the newspaper level and then covered them with mulch. So far, I have been very happy with my results, because the roots get water without getting the foliage wet. This is my first year to lasagna garden and also to do a full scale veggie garden. So time will tell.

I also transplanted instead of starting from seed. The only thing I started from seed was my lettuce. But for those I made a couple of troughs and filled them with potting soil to plant in.

As far as what is causing the yellowing, my guess would be over watering. But I still have a ton to learn before I can be an authority on the matter. :) Perhaps you could post pictures?

Bunny

thanks for the thoughts so far. i read the lasagna gardening book which made reference to the fact that you can build these gardens and plant the same day OR "cook" them over the winter if you wish. so....being that i started this in early spring i figured i better start with fewer raw materials and more finished compost. that's what i did. as for my other area to garden....that would be at my other house, and i don't really want to rent my garden space back from my tenants =) my home now is an agricultural property with somewhat of a bindweed issue hence the raised beds. i'm going to try laying off the watering for a few days and see what it looks like. also i may try to keep the water off the foliage.....i really prefer a soaker i just haven't figured how to set one up in this area yet. oh, and i'm new to these forums so how do you post a picture??

Until you get your soaker hoses set up, you could fill cans or gallon bottles with water, poke holes with nails in the bottom sides and allow them to drip irrigate.

Here is a link that might be useful: How to post photos

that's a good idea violet. i'm thinking now that my issues are related to too much moisture. i have not watered in 3 days....except for some rain 2 days ago and when i poke my finger in the beds they are STILL damp several inches down. now, i am guilty of not really checking before i have been watering....again i'm used to everything drying out since i've always planted directly in the ground. is compost supposed to have such moisture retaining qualities?? WOW! since my restraint with the water the newer leaves on the turnips, basil, and zucchini are looking greener....maybe just because they're new...i don't know. it's really the corn and the tomatoes that have me puzzled. the corn started in the beds from seed...the tomatoes transplants from a nursery. i think the link should work so you can see what i mean.

Here is a link that might be useful: Photo Site

All that decomposition going on is bound to tie up a bunch of the nutrients so they aren't available to the plants, especially if you have wood products (newspaper) in there. I would think that the top half of the bed should be regular old soil plus fertilizer that can nourish the developing plants while the bottom half slowly converts to soil.

Also I wouldn't plant high-demand veggies in a new bed - I'd go for something like beans first.
-O

organica.....can nutrients be tied up even if my top "layer" is 6-7 inches of finished compost??? i thought finished compost kind of doubled as "soil" and fertilizer??

It's not tied up if it's finished compost.

Here is a link that might be useful: Compost in the Garden

I'm wondering what was in that purchased compost. If it's from a municipal source, the nutrient content may be sort of hit or miss; it often consists of lots of ground up woody material, which is lacking in nitrogen. I also built several lasagna beds this spring and planted into them shortly after, but used composted steer manure and horse manure rather than the "compost" offered at the garden center and am having good results. The photos on your site make me think nitrogen deficiency. I'm sort of an experimental, seat of my pants gardener, but if it were me, I'd top dress with steer manure or any other readily available source of N and see if the plants green up.

I made my first lasagna garden this year and haven't had any problems yet.

It sounds like to me there's something in the compost you bought that was too fresh. Does your garden smell rancid? I used a lot of aged horse manure and my garden doesn't smell at all, smells earthy.

I think it is the opposite - that there is a lot of woody/cellulose material in there, and not enough free nitrogen. This Wikipedia link explains this pretty well.

Here is a link that might be useful: Nitrogen Deficiency

no, my garden does not smell rancid at all...i would describe it as being earthy. i think i'm thinking nitrogen now too. the compost does seem rather woody and i did not add manure of any sort to the mix. probably should have. ignorance has been bliss since at my other home i just mixed some compost and peat into the dirt and up everything grew. EASY...no problems. i think i'll either top dress with some manure or i did buy an organic fertilizer that's a 7-4-5 mix. if i don't use it now maybe later in the season if there's anything left to feed. i also bought a soil test kit from lowes, nothing fancy, but it might help. thanks for all of your thoughts!!

You might consider a real soil test from a lab. Check with your state's Extension Service. Each county should have it's own Cooperative Extension Office which provides free publications and information for the asking. They will have valuable vegetable/gardening tables available specifically for your area determined by universities and horticultural research scientists who have collected data from growing those crops in your state. Your tax dollars are already paying for this service so you may as well get some use out of it.

Before you amend your soil any further by guessing, get your soil tested. Your Extension Service can provide you with soil testing information. Mine was only $9.00, less than the cost of some strictly pH over the counter tests, and far more thorough. No guessing at what might need to be added, no money wasted.

violet, i think i will do that at some point in the near future, but for now i used my cheapee test. so my pH seems to be 8. by nitrogen isn't even really on the playing field....lighter in color that even the "low" reading would be. my potassium is high and my phosphorus seems to be off the map the other direction (lighter than the lightest color to compare to and the light color is "high"). so do i just need nitrogen or do i need to bring everything in line with one another?? ie. bring down the super high phosphorus reading as well?? i know the pH would probably be better at a 7 or so, but it's my understanding that you can't change a pH overnight.....so believe me i will be removing from and reworking these beds in the fall, but for now i gotta work with what i've got.

sassylady,

The best thing you can do is post your results in the Soil Compost Mulch Forum for advice.

Here is a link that might be useful: Soil, Compost and Mulch Forum

violet...i already have...believe me i'm pestering anyone that knows anything about NPK, soil, compost and the like. by the way for anyone in this forum that knows about these things....what i posted above was not right...it's my potassium that's super high, and my phosphorus that is high. that's it for now.