We have had problems with cinder blocks around raised beds - fire ants really like to make nests in the holes. Even if they are not filled with dirt - they just fill the holes up all by themselves!
Now some of you may live in areas that are free of fire ants and if you do, count your blessings!
Our beds are about 4' wide and about 60' long and maybe a foot high, depending on what we find to build them up. We are landscapers so we have alot of scavenged materials from job sites - old concrete edging, leftover retaining wall blocks, bricks, landscape timbers, whatever will hold up dirt. The beds don't get walked on and we haven't tilled since we put them in - maybe three seasons ago? They are full of worms!
In the few areas where I still have cinder blocks, some green onions snuck into some of the holes and now are really growing well in there . . .
re hard times - my garden makes me feel very secure. I don't see the end of civilization any time soon, but winter before last our area got hit by an ice storm that knocked out power for several hundred square miles. Ours was out for 13 days. No gasoline to be had for 60 miles one direction and 45 miles in another. I have never been so thankful for my well and woodstove - and nursing my 6 month old baby. People with central heat, electric cookstoves and city water were freezing and starving and living like animals. And not as good as my animals either! No baby formula or diapers for 20 miles. By the end of that ordeal, I didn't care if the power ever came back on! We were snug, plenty to eat, drew water from the well.
It is the ability to adapt that we get from our lifestyle. Power on, great. No grocery store, still great. Many think our choices make our life harder. To us, they create a feeling of luxury.