Redneck Raised Bed Garden

I had to post here - I had planned on building something very similar. Problem I had was I could not scrounge enough cheap/free buckets that were uniform size enough to work, and buying buckets just didn't seem cost effective.
But my thoughts:
I was looking at square buckets, like cat litter comes in. It would sit better on the frame and have less wasted space. Even bigger problem with scrounging or buying them, tho.
Very workmanlike job on your table. All you need, nothing you don't. I would have used treated, even if it was more expensive. However, I just bought some 2x4 this past weekend, and treated at our local home box was cheaper than whitewood - $1.88 for PT 2x4x8 vs 2.74 for untreated. My pantry shelves are now made out of treated....
I saw somewhere, I think it was Mother Earth News, plans to make self watering containers out of a pair of 5 gallon buckets. There was one bucket as you have, with holes in the bottom sitting inside an un-holed bucket that served as a reservoir. I am sure you could look it up and find it online, free of course. That would work great in this case.
To take the self-watering a step further, I considered a PVC pipe manifold of sorts with a filling funnel on one end. It would run into the bottom of each reservoir bucket so I only have to run the hose or dump the water bucket at one spot.
Seeing yours, I am inspired to re-consider

I see KIT.S has the type of square buckets just like I was talking about. How do you get those for cheap/free, without having to wait for your cat to go through 20-40 of them?

FOr square cat littler type boxes, check out recycle centers. We usually recycle on saturdays. There is always a cat litter bucket to two in there. I can seldom resist snagging any 3 gallon or larger buckets in the recycle bin. The wife is not a big fan of my little hobby, Ill have to show her this . She will have a new appreciation. SHe hates weeding.

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Sold the farm no more critters
I have a postage stamp lot now
I aim to make it the most organic productive 1/3 acre in southwest Missouri
With a 20 acre plot to be added in 3 years or so

I am afraid that "freecycle" things will be getting harder to get. A local place that did offer the 5 gal buckets for a buck, now recycle them so they are not available there anymore. A bottled drink plant gets their "flavoring" in cardboard boxes. No plastic to recycle. Pickles now come in boxes, not buckets at some of the restaurants.

Check places that make sweet rolls. The frosting comes in buckets that some places will sell cheap.

I ask for buckets at sams in the bakery. My sams has round and square!

Some might call it container gardening, but it is still pretty cool. It would only take a little more activity to move the whole operation into the living room for the winter. More buckets might be needed to catch the drips. Then that water could be used to water the plants again.

If you built several sets of these things you might be able to raise a small flock of chickens underneath. You might want to do that part somewhere else (beside the living room).

I agree, this whole time I was trying to figure out what was wrong with being a redneck.

Also, please keep us posted because I'd like to see how these turn out too!

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Well I'm scrounging the wire mesh I'll use for the staking and "train" them into the mesh. Like mentioned above I'll pinch off the plants when they get too big...

I intend to weave tomatoes into the mesh all around the perimeter with the peppers in the middle of one side... Still tweaking and thanks for all the great ideas... Next year I can see a whole new look to my garden ;-)

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Check with your local recycling company. They get tons of 5 gal buckets and they don't get squat for them when they try to sell them for melt down. Some recyclers don't want to be bothered with scavengers, but others make a biz out of selling reusable items like lumber, buckets, crushed concrete, dirt, mulch, etc.

Excellent idea, way to challenge the status quo. So many pre-conceived notions that a garden has to be at ground level, making it an ergonomic struggle.

This is the kind of design I'd look to as a starting point for making gardening do-able when one is in a wheelchair. Maybe lower the height a bit, maybe use 2 gallon buckets instead of five so that they are liftable by someone in a wheelchair or scooter. So much potential.

Love it!

Awesome idea! I bet if you put some wheels/casters on the bottom it would be super easy to push it around so you would not have to lift the buckets out!

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You are confined only by the walls you build yourself.

sure looks good if you don't mind daily watering..which I couldn't possibly do here..so it wouldn't work for me

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Brenda Groth
http://restfultrailsfoodforestgarden.blogspot.com/

Great idea...think of folks that can't bend over or folks in wheel chairs. I'll bet you can get lots of tomatoes, too.

The only difference between daily watering of plants in the ground and plants in buckets is the buckets take less water. Some of those water absorbing crystals help that also. I have to water every day here or things start to droop.

People asked about getting buckets: The ones we bought were 25 cents apiece including the lids. They had had mayonaisse in them, and had not been washed out, so they were cheaper than the usual 50 cent ones with no handles. There is a gentleman locally who gets once-used food-safe items and resells them. The garbage company won't allow us to scrounge and won't resell anything, although they have an entire trailer full of white square buckets. Shame, that. I remember "sea-gulling" with my dad, and we still use a cast iron frypan he picked up that way.
So anyone in Oregon can pick them up in Adair, north of Corvallis on Hwy 99W.
And yes, hopefully our upside down tomatoes will thrive and I'll post before-and-after pictures. My DD says there are small green tomatoes there now....
Kit

Great idea. I have to show that to my son who can not garden where he lives. I would not worry about staking, they will drape down and my guess is, do just fine. I think I would put the lid under each bucket though, to keep the water running out of the bottom too fast.

The bottom half of the buckets is peat moss so I'm hoping that will be a water bank for the plants. Will keep up with progress or lack thereof...

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you could always make self watering buckets so that the water could be better maintained especially during the summer

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