Just discovered newbie mistake- can I fix it?

14 years ago

Three years ago I built my first raised bed with help from all the advice I got here. I dutifully bought and screwed together cedar boards, rounded up the ingredients for Mel's mix, and began to plant and enjoy my garden bed.

The bed has always been extremely quick draining and I was surprised at how quickly it would get dry even after long, soaking rains. I chalked it up to the fact that I plopped the bed on top of a pre-existing sand patch that the former homeowners had put down for a swingset.

Well today I figured it out. It is not the sand below the bed. It is my stupidity. I just finished building my second bed. While at the landscaping place, the guy told me "one thing with peat- make sure you wet it REALLY well before you mix it up with the other stuff." I thought about it and did not remember getting this advice or doing this step with the first beds. I asked the guy what can happen if you don't wet the peat before mixing. He told me, "oh, well if you mix it in dry, the particles of peat in there basically repel water, FOREVER."

Hmmmmm. My "quick draining" bed is starting to make a lot more sense now.

Here's my question: is this fixable? My bed has settled some, so there's room to amend. It's a 14' x 4' bed and I'd say there's like an inch or two of space to the top of the boards I could play with. Trouble is, that bed is for all my early crops. So it's full of lettuce, peas, radishes, swiss chard, kale, and spinach.

I had some leftover wetted peat from the project I just did with the new bed. I used some of that to top dress between the rows of little seedling plants. Do you think that will help? Essentially I feel like it's like I just put a little sponge down between all the rows, to hopefully help the mix retain more water. But I'm worried it will just be at the surface and not do any good.

Help or advice on how I might fix the situation would be appreciated! Feeling like a big dummy!

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Comments (5)

keski
14 years ago
In my experience, it takes a winter to get the peat moss wet. I've had to use it dry in the mix, and it eventually does get wet. It is best if you can wet it first but then it is so heavy, it's difficult to handle. I do remember that my first year, the beds were drier. It does not stay dry forever.
Keski
agmss15
14 years ago
Well your guy gave you sort of good advice. Peat is water repellent when dry - it has a high surface tension. It is a really good idea to moisten peat before mixing it with other amendments. And when it dries down it can be a huge PIA to get it moist again - it makes a water repellent crust. BUT there is NO way that your peat mix from three years ago is repelling water because you mixed it wrong - unless it hasn't rained in 3 years.

It sounds like you have a very light mix in your raised beds. I wouldn't really put a new layer of peat on top - that too will be water repellent when it dries. If you have compost/composted manure I would mix some into your bed every year before planting. Maybe some top soil too. Since you already have some crops in your garden - top dress wherever you can and scratch it in well. You can mulch with chopped up leaves and/or grass clipping too.

There are also products like 'soil moist' that help your soil hold moisture. Use very lightly - when I first used it I had some amusing volcanos of gelatin globs. I would only use SM where the soil is always very dry.
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bananastand
Original Author
14 years ago
OK, this is good to hear- I suspected as much, that over the winters and many rains it would have to EVENTUALLY absorb water. I did top dress the whole thing in wetted peat, and I can add more compost at the end of the season. Any other ideas or perspectives still welcome.
mandolls
14 years ago
The wetted peat that you added on top will dry out (its in the sun) and form a crust. Buy some compost now if you arent making any and just lay that on top of the peat. It will keep the peat from drying out.

I tried using peat as a top mulch one year and it made it very difficult to get any water to the plants in the beds. On the other hand it sure kept the weeds from coming through - it was like a layer of concrete.
bananastand
Original Author
14 years ago
AHHHH, you are right! It's all hard now. SHOOT I am still a newbie, it seems!! Hopefully I can wet it again, then cover in compost. I work all weekend though so I hope it doesn't dry out completely. Sigh.