Well, I spent nearly $700 for PT wood beds and would not do it again. I had a lot of warping, for one thing. And its hard to get the wheel barral around them. Not impressed. Previously I had 4'wide beds, a little raised with carpet path. I would pull up the edges of the carpet to form somewhat of raised beds. But I just HAD to have the beds, not again. I will be taking them down. BUT, I used some PT 2x4 for some edging I will be leaving...

I still have a bunch of the 2x8s left over from when we had to rebuild the shop, and I also have a stack of lovely straight peeler poles that we could stake into place. I think they'd look kind of neat out there, and since we're not going to use them for anything else, why not there. As long as they're well staked (maybe with rebar) they should be fine. I'm certainly NOT going to go to the trouble of notching them for stacking, like a log cabin. I think I also have a source for a bunch of rebar for free, so I think it might work out well.

The problem with the wheelbarrow is just another indication that I'd need to do some measuring between the beds to be sure we could get whatever is needed down the rows. That's a really good point. I think I'd measure the width of not just the mower, but the garden trailer also, as well as leaving plenty of room at the ends of the beds to be able to turn the thing around. Thanks for mentioning it!

Pat

If I didn't have rocks and rock hard dirt I wouldn't do raised beds. I think in a hot climate, the raised beds cause soil heating and dry the soil faster.
They're great in colder climates where you want the beds to warm up and need super great drainage.
I also don't like the space constraints. I'd love to have a large parcel of land where I could have a small tractor with a little tiller and just go to town with it, mixing in tons of horse manure. I realize that traditional gardens also have their problems and are harder to keep weed free but if you want to grow space hogs like squash, corn or lots of potatoes, you really can't do much in little 4x8 gardens, anyway. Not enough to truly feed a family all year, anyway. Plus, raised gardens require you to do all work by hand, since you can't use a tractor and are limited by how much you can use the tiller or other equipment in them. So, raised beds are always going to be kept on a smaller scale. I would, however, continue to use them for my more sensitive and fussy vegetables, like carrots, which require such perfect dirt. Or, if voles and moles eat everything you put in the ground.

This year we put n 2 raised beds on the east side of our house. The reasoning for this was to protect tomatoes & peppers from the scorching west summer sun. So far, that has worked. Our beds are 4' wide and 20' long. However, we built ours out of cement blocks. DH got them from a company that manufacturer's concrete beams and these blocks were the "test" to see how strong the batch turned out. Then they toss them. They were happy to have him haul them off so they didn't have to pay someone to do it. That's a win-win situation! The blocks were 8" by 20" and we made them 3 blocks high.

Since they're concrete, they do hold the heat and we do have some leakage of water but not much. We also made the paths 3' between them. The bottoms are lined with about 3 or 4 layers of cardboard too. We also laid PVC pipe in the beds for more even watering and no splash. I would do it all over again. In fact, we may add a couple more next year. As we get older, it will be much easier on our bodies.

Momfryhover - I remember when you built those this spring and had such high hopes. I'm so sorry it didn't work for you. That's the pits. =(

Tracy, a big part of my problem is that we don't have a tractor. If we did, there's nothing I'd like better than getting the garden all tilled. Well, maybe not having to bend over so far to take care of stuff would run a fairly close second.

I don't need to grow enough to feed the family all year. I just want fresh tomatoes and enough green beans to put in the freezer. We'll grow maybe fewer squash, but continue with a few plants of lemon cukes and cantaloupe and the peppers.
I'm going to use cattle panels for upright support on the space hogs like the melons and cukes, as well as training the tomatoes on them. The way that stuff is all sprawled out now is just crazy, and it's not even workable. All the plants are overlapping each other and I can't even get in there to see or harvest what might be hiding. It needs to be manageable. I've got plenty of room to work with. I could probably make the garden as big as we'll ever need it to be, certainly for as long as I'm still around to tend it. However, most of my real energy goes into caring for the flower bed at the moment. I need to do some redesign work and map out the veggie garden a whole lot better than I did it this year. It's simply ridiculous.

The beds won't be more than 3' wide, but I haven't decided how long. Probably 16', to match the cattle panels. It's the only reasonable thing to do. They'll be lined with something to deter the weeds before I add in the soil. If I can get the raised beds built, I'll also install a drip irrigation system so that the watering is more efficient. I know there will be some seepage, but I don't think the water loss will be as bad as I have now, and if I use shade cloth on overhead frames, it should also cut down on the heat problem. At least I certainly hope so.
One of the benefits of having the plants up higher is that I can actually go in with the mower and/or weed-eater and knock down the weeds that grow in the paths between the beds. I might go so far as to mulch the pathways, but everything else would need to be done before I decide on that. It would sure be easier not to even have to mow; just snick off any stray stuff with the weed-eater, without risking chopping into the plants. What I found this year (no laughing, you guys!) was that the wider I put the mulch area, the further the plants grew to cover it. Last year the cukes grew up and over the 6' fence and kept right on going. I like the plants to be vigorous, but come on now!! There's vigor, and then there's VIGOR!

Pat

If you are leaving something in between the beds that needs to be mowed, make sure it isn't bermuda grass. Bermuda anywhere in the area will grow many feet to get to moisture and before you know it your beds will be full of the nasty grass.

Thats ok P-mac, live and learn. I am pretty sure I will find ways to recycle the stuff. I was really excited and then after ordering the wood, for a week after, I felt I should cancel my order...didn't listen to my gutt! Lesson learned!

I have raised beds with 4' wide paths and the garden is pretty and functional. The paths are mostly maintenance free, and I can move my wheelbarrow around with ease. I used plain old pine and even my 4 year old beds are holding up well. In previous years I patted myself on the back quite often for having such a pretty and low-care garden.

This year I am cursing myself. No matter how much I water, the raised beds just drain too quickly. Part of the problem is the height (6"). That might work for Mel, but it's not a good plan for Oklahoma in drought.

One of my many plans for the future is to increase the height of the raised beds to 18" and add pvc irrigation. If I had to do it all over from scratch, I suspect I'd do heavily amended small in-ground beds with some kind of moat around and/or running through them.

Jo

In Oklahoma, we were in one of the wetter areas of the state but we still experienced dry summer months. I still wanted (and made) raised beds but just did humped rows with no sides. They weren't terribly high but made it clear to everyone where the planting spots were and where the planting spots weren't (paths). It made it so much easier for the kids to respect the boundaries and not trample everything. If I'd lived in a drier part of the state, I'm not sure I'd have still wanted raised beds.

Here, excess moisture seems to be more of a problem so we're doing permanent raised beds for much of the garden. (We'll be leaving part of it ground level for corn & potatoes.) We are using 4 x 4 lumber so warping is not much of an issue. We have a free source for the 4 x 4s or we'd not be able to afford the luxury on such a large scale. Right now, we're doing 8" high beds but will likely add on another layer or two as we build up the ground. (Hubby made me lowered paths instead of raised beds on most of it. LOL) We've stuck with 4' widths and they're incredibly easy to work at that width but I have long orangutan arms.

I'm thinking ahead to the future, trying to set things up for old age when I'm not so strong & nimble. Those 4' widths should still be workable for my long-armed self. The final height of the beds are not yet decided. We'll just have to see what works best as I experiment. The length of the beds is roughly 45-ish feet, then a nice, extra-wide path, then another set of 45-ish feet beds. The paths between each bed are wide enough for wheelbarrows and small garden tractors while the main path dissecting the garden between the rows is big enough for larger equipment such as our skidsteer to maneuver should that be needed at some point. All pathways are being mulched very thickly as we bring in more wood chips. I didn't have much cardboard to put under the chips but the few weeds that do come up in that thick mulch are easily pulled. That uber-thick mulch in the pathways will allow me to concentrate on tending the planted rows, rather than spending hours weeding the paths as I've done in the past (when I didn't have access to as much free mulch as I do now). Hopefully, I'll just have to add a bit to the paths each year to maintain the level since they don't break down as quickly this way. The rows themselves have just native soil in them plus we added Garden-Tone. From here on out, I'll just be adding mulch each year and that will be the soil's feed (and, therefore, the plants' as well) unless some crazy deficiency pops up.

In a nutshell, having raised beds is important to me mostly for the permanent pathways, the clearly-marked boundaries since my kids have free reign in the garden, and to help with the excess moisture this place tends to get for a good part of the season.

Diane

Oh, my. Lots of good information in those posts.

Carol, that's a very good point about the Bermuda. My garden area is full of it, both the long-runner lawn variety and the tall hay kind. If it doesn't have roots to China, it's not for lack of trying. I picked up a brochure at OSU yesterday when I dropped off the soil samples. It said to get rid of Bermuda before installing raised beds, to put down a layer of black plastic over the area for several weeks to kill it, or to use a glyphosate herbicide, or both.
As a rule I truly hate black plastic. However, I've seen it in use temporarily in big farming or wine grape production in the past. Although I'm not positive, I think it was being used to sterilize the soil for the big viticulture operations. It seems to me that it would be preferable to using herbicide, but what will it do to things like the worms??. I'm afraid I'm going to have to cover the paths between the beds and try not to allow anything to grow there. I've seen what it can do in just six weeks if it gets any water at all. It's an absolute jungle.
I also still have the remainder of the giant roll of weed barrier as a base, and we're saving all of the feed sacks this year instead of getting rid of them. If they are laid out flat and not allowed to crumple up, they work pretty well.

Jo, the water drainage issue has been brought up by other people also. When so many folks are having a problem with it, it's obvious that it's something I really need to consider. I'll definitely have a drip system in place, but that isn't really descriptive, because I use the little mini-spinners for most things, instead of drip emitters. I'm not locked into them, but that's what I use for large areas. I have them mounted on special short risers that put the spinner level about 4" above the ground. Most of the ones I use for the big garden have a wide spray pattern of 12-15', but I'll need to step it way down to use in a raised bed. I think I've found a source for the individual stake variety that are used for pots in commercial nurseries, and I might switch over to those for certain specific plants. With those, each emitter only waters a single plant, so it takes a whole bunch of tubing and isn't practical for a large area or something that has a wide root system.
I think (at least I hope) that installing a shade cloth over the beds when it warms up in the summer will help control the temperature and possibly extend the season a little. I need to give that a lot more thought.
I've also wondered, since I do have a lot of that weed barrier left, if it would be an idea to run that or something else all the way under the beds and up the insides to prevent excess seepage. The thing about the weed barrier is that it does allow water to flow through. It just slows it down. I certainly don't want to use anything that would prevent natural aeration and turn the beds into a foul mess. What a disaster that would be!

The lumber I'll be using is all at least 10 years old or more, so I don't think it will have any nasty stuff in it that might leach out into the beds.

Diane, the height note is a good reminder to think it through and decide what is going to work best. I imagine I'll try for about 16-18", since we're working mostly with 2x6s and 2x8s.. I think the peeler poles are all 3" and 4" but will have to check. I don't want to have the beds too tall, since filling them is already going to be an issue. My mother's raised beds in CA are only about 6" high, so I already know that I want something a lot taller than that. When it comes to longevity, hers lasted for about 20 years before they needed to have any boards replaced. They take intense heat in the summer and a heavy snow load each winter, but they've managed to survive.

It's going to be interesting to try to figure out the proper widths, since things like the squash want to end up being huge and sprawly. I don't want to go with more than 36" width, since I'm only about 5' tall and don't bend as easily as I used to. Most of the plants can be trained up on the vertical panels but the squash are a problem unto themselves. I'll probably just set aside a patch down at ground level and devote it to some hills of squash. It would be silly to waste a huge amount of space in raised beds, when it can be put to much better use for something else. I could put in a lot of beans, tomatoes, cukes or melons in the space taken up by one exuberant zucchini or crookneck.

At least with the conditions being what they are now, and not being able to spend much time out in the heat, it's nice to be able to make plans for next year. This was the first year that we used that space to do anything at all, and it wasn't properly prepared or really planned out. I thought for sure I had allowed plenty of room between the rows, but what a joke that turned out to be. I've taken photos to send to my friends in CA, just to show them what an OK garden can do. They've been completely dumbfounded at the sizes of the plants. Vigorous is a major understatement.

I've always found that, when something didn't work out one year, it's ever so nice to be able to tune out the disaster and get excited about plans for the next year. Thinking positive. I think that gardeners are eternal optimists, aren't we?

Pat

p-mac, is that concrete manufacturer a local one in Norman? I've been trying to find the cheapest way to do edging around the in-ground beds I'm putting in this fall, and free concrete would be awesome! It would certainly look better and last way longer than those plastic rolls of edging that seem to be my cheapest option at the moment. It's either that or stalk craigslist for the next six months for people giving away piles of bricks and old lumber.

I like my beds to be 12 inches tall, but I don't really have 12 inches of soil in there. I also like 4 feet wide since I can easily reach 24 inches to the center by working both sides.

I also like them close enough together that I could put a board across from one bed to another to sit and work in the bed if I need to. I don't do much of that because I have no abilty to twist, but I can lean forward and reach into the bed so I do most things on my knees with a knee stool. Also it is handy to have in case I need help from DH because he has bad knees. A couple of months ago, we bought knee pads for him and that helps somewhat, but he would be much more comfortable sitting on a 2x12 that could just slid along the tops of two adjoining beds. He has long arms too. He isn't a big gardener, but if I ask for help, he helps me.

Having told you what I like, now I will tell you what I have. LOL The first bed was built just like I described above. The next one was created out of 2x4 and stacked 2 high making it only 8 inches high. It is a divided "L" shape with one part holding two blueberry plants which I hope will be there permanently. The other part is set aside for strawberries and still has a few survivors from the cat attack. It is not 4 feet wide where the strawberries are planted. I don't know the measurement, but it was what would fit into the available space easily. Why 2x4s? Because I had an abundance of them left from our storm shelter where they had built a temporary roof, loaded it with rebar, then filled it with concrete. Once the concrete was dry they were all removed and since they were a few inches short of 8 feet, they weren't useful as studs. Otherwise they were like new lumber. We just gave them a home by using them in other projects around the house.

The third bed is 2x12 lumber that had been used as concrete forms, so it had its own pre-treatment.

In my raised beds, I have blueberries, strawberries, and asparagus. I had planned for the other one to be a salad bed for the first plantings, but I think it is going to become the onion bed and I will make a small one for early salad greens.

I have very good soil and really prefer to plant in the ground, but when we have an abundance of spring rain the ground stays too wet to plant, but the beds are OK. Although I froze 99 half-cup packages of onions and have been using fresh ones continuously since the onion were dug, they should have done much better. They stayed soggy wet for about 3 weeks, so I think they get the raised bed next year.

My husband has a friend that raises llama and she offered us the barn cleanings, so I will likely be adding that to my garden. I have never used it before but she says it is like rabbit and you can add it anytime. I will probably add it in the fall and plant in the spring.

So....

I like raised beds because the weeding is easier and there is much less of it.

I like raised beds because they drain faster in Spring and I can plant earlier.

I like raised because they are easier to cover when bad weather is coming in the Spring.

I like raised beds because the soil stays in one place and doesn't wash away.

But in my garden they compact fast with the heavy rains, and they are a bear to keep watered during hot dry conditions, LIKE NOW.

My garden has beds, it has ground plantings, it has tree roots, It has shade from buildings, but also has full sun areas. The plants that seem to like my garden best are peppers. I grow lots of tomatoes, but the vines don't look pretty like some of yours. They either get disease from too much rain in Spring, or like this year, they burn in the sun. I am rethinking the way I plant and will probably make big changes next year.

I will probably be planting fewer kinds of tomatoes also. I have gardened here enough years that I am seeing the ones that do well and the ones that probably should not have a place next year. Bush Goliath will not be back, but Cluster Goliath will have a place, and maybe Early Goliath. Other than those two and Sungold, I will probably be back to mostly open polinated varieties.

As for peppers, I love them and love to grow them so I will probably continue to plant a lot.

I don't normally have a problem with squash bugs, but they have moved in on me now. I have been out there today squishing eggs on the leaves.

So, here is my take on things. I like raised bed in the Spring but not so much in the summer. However, if I expect to get some of the summer squash that I like I think it will be necessary to keep it covered for a couple of months. I may even try the one that needs no pollination for insects so I can keep it covered full time. The same thing is true of cucumbers. If I had to initial buy soil, then I would want to put it in beds, not on flat ground.

Gardening is a crap-shoot, a risky and uncertain venture, and what works best one or two years may be difficult in the third one. No garden is ever the same.

Someone was concerned about crop rotation. I'm not sure how important that is in a home garden as far as nutrition goes, because we always keep adding mulch and compost. However, if you have pest issues, that live in the ground then it probably has merit.

I love, love, love Paula's concrete beds, but I think wood works best for me because I have a lot of slugs which most of you don't have. I have never seen or scorpion here, and have never seen a snake in my garden although I know they are seen down by the water a block away. What is best for one gardener is not the right thing for another but when we talk about it, it helps to decide what we need.

I have tow kinds of raised beds.

1. 2010: We build 5 of 3x15 raised beds by eliminating 16x26 Bermuda patch. Installed 10" treated lumber around the 16x26 patch to contain Bermuda. Then build 5 of 3x15 beds by cutting the path between them, no timber used for small beds. Then installed used carpet on the walking paths in between each beds. Overall looks good and little cheaper. I just used some Norman compost and lot of lawn clippings to amended clay soil. These beds are most productive as compared to this year's beds which have an additional garden ready mix soil.

2. 2011: This year I have build 14 beds with dimensions of 1x4x16 feet. I used non-treated timber but stained with linseed oil. Constructing these beds was very easy. Used sod cutter to remove 3-4" of Bermuda turf and then tilled 8-10" deep with heavy rototiller rented from Home Depot. Then ammended native red clay soil with Norman compost then added another 4-6 inces of the garden ready soil mix haled from three different locations. So far all beds are doing great. I have great success and excellent growth is observed with only native soil and Norman compost.

I learned that Okies Red Clay soil has lot of nutrients except N, it just need more compost! Double dig the red clay soil, add equal amount of compost and some lawn clippings if you have and till very well with roto tiller. I love Mantis tiller for this work. Plants will love this soil and mulch heavily with lawn slipping when plants reach 4-6". lay Insert soaker house across beds and may add little more clippings whenever you move lawn. water twice a week and keep harvesting even this heat.

I have decided not to buy any garden ready soil mix anymore, I am thinking to build few more beds this fall from left over timber hauled in the spring. I will just double dig clay soil and till it with lot of compost. I am sure, this will do magic for me.

Reg. my soil test experiments indicates, I not see any difference between three types of the soil hauled from three different suppliers at different rates. All are are doing same but inferior to "native red clay+compost experiments".

-Chandra

Wow! Loads of more great information. I never even thought of trying used carpet for the walkways between the beds. What a neat idea.

Carol, I've run into scorpions (and collided with them) several times here, and it's becoming a dangerous situation for me. I don't think I can afford another sting. We also clearly have snakes, although I've only found one copperhead so far. Now that I know they're around, I keep a closer eye you for them.

I noticed that a lot of you have talked of edging material to use as a stopper for the Bermuda grass. It just dawned on me that we still have a whole lot of corrugated metal around from the old chicken pens that have either been destroyed or that need to be taken out. It's really awful stuff to cut, because it's heavy, but anyone who can use it for a garden project is welcome to come and get it. You'd have to do it yourselves, because I'm too feeble to be of any help when it comes to that sort of thing, but it's definitely free. It's just a thought. Roofing for a garden shed? Anchor it as a lean-to shelter for partial shade or windbreak? Lots of different applications, and we have LOTS of it. Bunches and bunches of it. It will just take some muscle to get it out of here.

I think my major stumbling block with the whole garden plan is going to be in how to set up some sort of shade without it turning into a big construction project. I really don't want to go there, any more than I want something that a storm can take down or send flying off into Arkansas. Not easily, anyway.
My garden plot is not only in full sun. It also gets bounced heat on one end from the back of one of the metal shop buildings to compound the problem. In a normal year it probably would not be such an issue. In temperatures like we've been seeing, it becomes a serious problem. It's hard to keep even the peppers from sagging and wilting.
I've even thought about taking cattle panels and running two of them anchored together to make a 32' length and then arching it in a big bow that runs N-S in the garden. Subtracting the distance it would need to go down, it would still leave me with over 20' of span that I could use to suspend shade cloth. The plants would still get some direct sun, but the worst of the midday sun would be cut way down. This needs a whole lot more thought. I don't want to run into a situation of massive overkill, and I think I'm headed in that direction. At least it certainly seems that way. There has to be an easy and effective way to do it, and still leave room for the plants to grow and for me to be able to reach them fairly easily. Hmmmmm. Think, think, think. Or, we could set up the vertical cattle panels and then set posts on all 4 corners and in the middle of the span to support another panel that would balance flat across the top, in a giant T. As far as I'm concerned, anything that climbs up over 6' in height is going to be too much for me to reach anyway, so the overhead crosspiece should not get in the way of anything. I could run my shadecloth across it much easier and a lot more economically (that stuff is expensive!) and it should do the job . . . at least in theory. Right? It would not be as sturdy as the arch, but the shade cloth doesn't have much wind resistance. It we have it well anchored, it just might work.

Chandra, I had no idea that HD will rent tillers. We don't have one in Shawnee and the place we rented from last spring had awful equipment. It was old and battered and half broken-down. We had thought of going to Pioneer Rental next year, but I'm not sure what they have available. Has anyone used the HD store in Norman? That's the closest one to us. Do they have Mantis tillers for rent?? That would be awesome.

Pat

Save your pennies and buy a Mantis. They are a workhorse. In addition, they are small enough to use in raised beds to work in your compost and light enough to pick up and move them in and out. I love my Mantis but hard a very hard time using a large tiller even when I was younger and stronger.

I am assuming that you have a small home garden and not a tractor size plot.

Pat,

Norman HD won't have rental facility, I rented from HD at Moore (650 SW 19th Street Moore, OK 73160). They charged $48 for 4hrs (~$70 for a day). I heard there are other local rental facility (RSC and Crossroads) will rent cheaper than HD.

HD tiller was heavy but it tuned rock hard pan into smooth powder. By the way need to soak soil at least 24 hrs before tilling, help lot.

Please note, Mantis will not work for tilling new soil, you need to have bigger tiller for breaking the ground for first time. Once hard pan is broken, Mantis do wonder rest of the years. Please feel free to burrow my Mantis if you need it.

-Chandra

Chandra, you are simply amazing! Thank you so much for the information and for your extremely kind offer. I think for the next year we will need something pretty heavy. We tilled part of it this year, but I want to widen out the plot next year, so I'd be afraid of using a Mantis on it for fear of hurting the machine.

Carol, the plot is about 20 x 30 or so. Not big, and not tiny either.

I have another tool I want to tell you guys about. The name is gone off of mine, so I had to get it from my mother before I could pass it on.

How many of you have ever heard of or used a "Glide-n-Groom" hoe? I've had one for over 20 years and it's probably my favorite tool. It's completely unlike any other hoe you've ever used, and I'm counting in all the different styles, including things like the hula-hoe.
This one is made to lie flat on the ground and is slightly slanted. It's small and sort of oval-shaped, with sharp sides both front and back, and because of the size of the blade, it's pretty light in weight. Nothing at all like swinging a regular hoe. Besides, you don't swing it. It only requires a very short motion, and the size also makes it great for getting into tight spots and close areas. I can't even describe how it slides under and makes short work of things like clover and goathead thorns. I've even turned mine on end and used it to cut a trench more than once. If anything happened to it, I'd be sick about it and would need to order another one immediately. I've had other horticulture people see me using it and immediately ask "what is that and where did you get it!?".

So, having said all that, I now have the link to pass along so you can see what I'm talking about. They are made by a company named Goserud Products in MN. I can't think of any gardener who would not love it. I think I'm going to order a spare, just in case anything ever happens to mine.

Pat

Here is a link that might be useful: My 'Wonder Hoe

Pat, I have shade on my tomatoes but not the squash, southern peas, long beans or Armenian cucumber. I have another side garden with afternoon shade for pwppers, eggplants and a few odds and ends.
I made my shade with t-posts, extended the height with PVC. The shade material was costly so I actually just used some old, white bedsheets. Since it's only for the hottest months of summer and we're only going to be here one more summer after this one, I decided not to buy shade cloth.
If you buy shade cloth, I'd get either 40 or 60%. pretty much everybody in AZ uses shade on their tomatoes and peppers. I put mine on when it gets to be 100 degrees consistenly and take it off when it starts cooling down.

Isn't it also called a diamond shuffle hoe?

Carol, I really don't know. I've never seen anyone else who has one of them, or anything like it. I've never seen a shuffle hoe, so I can't answer that.

Tracy, you're being really optimistic, aren't you? Hoping we may only have one year of this overheated mess? I'm just pulling your chain, you know. We all hope we don't get a replay of it next year. Where are you headed, by the way? Will you be coming back to OK, or a completely new location?
Actually, I'm also using a bed-sheet and a big white curtain for my garden shades. I found some that's the real thing, already taped and sewn with grommets installed, and I think it has a good warranty, so I thought it might be worth it if I can save a bunch of $$$ in buying a pre-made size. I was looking at it for use over the top of one of the chicken pens that I want to turn into a raised bench growing area. The top is already completely covered in chickenwire, so all I need to do is anchor the shade-cloth in place. The garden looks just a trifle eccentric with multi-colored shades over it now.

Pat

Pat,
Don't all start trying to sway Dr Tracy down your way now. I have already been looking for a horse ranch, a college where her husband can teach, and a medical practice for her in northeast Oklahoma, so you play nice now. I hear she even expects to have a house on it. geez. This may be the only way she can have hay for her horses is to move up here where we normally have it. LOL

Okay, Carol. But at least is sounds like Tracy is coming back to OK, right? All that and she wants a house, too? Boy, some folks can really be picky. :-)

Maybe by the time she gets back, we'll have pasture and hay for horses again.

Tracy, did you say you're in Tucson? Not a bad place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there. And they sure don't have pastures like we do.

Pat

I think Tracy wants a horse pasture with an attached house. LOL