Be sure your paths have ample room to turn and dump a wheelbarrow. Also, for gophers, line your raised beds with hardware cloth (NOT chicken wire! It will rot and the little buggers can fit through anything the size of their head!)

Some people pooh pooh it, but I've been using sound emitters for gophers for years with great success. It takes a couple of weeks for the little guys to realize that the sound isn't going to go away, but then, the only time I had trouble was when the batteries died, or now, with solar they broke down.

Since we moved in to our home in town, we installed these and several neighbors who were over run by gophers have installed them and all of those properties are gopher free!

They're about $10 each at Harbor Freight.

@nancyjane_gardener thanks! Well, if the sound emitters worked, I wouldn't need the raised beds. But there a lots of people who say they don't. I guess it can't hurt to try!

@tozmo1 Thank you for that insight! I will photograph the area every 30 min today and see how sunlight changes in that area. The hill and fence don't shade the area; an few trees do however.

@nancyjane_gardener the area i'm planting in is up a flight of stairs and is only about 25' wide so iI don't think I really need a wheelbarrow there -- but what's your preferred minimum width of a path?

anilix I like a 3' wide path if possible, but 2' in a pinch. How are you getting soil/compost to your raised beds?

Also, I still got gophers around the raised beds when I had them until I got the sound emitters. Then they went away.

thanks @nancyjane_gardener do you remember what brand your sound emitter is? I will try to order online. Also, did it bother your neighbors?