Building a Raised Garden: the Mator Patch

In this Instructable I will show you how I built a raised garden with minimal cost and created a nice landscape at he same time.

You are more than welcome to post suggestions for improvements or other ways that I could have gone with this project, actually i encourage it.

Thanks for looking

I had this corner of the yard that was mess since I had bought the house. I got really tired of seeing it but didn't know what to do with it. I had planted a tree in it but the dog kept digging in the dirt and finally it had started to make it then we had a frost that killed it.

So here was my dilemma. I needed to do something with that back corner but it also had a pile of dirt and rock in the area. the previous owners had laid concrete and piled the excess dirt in the corner and throughout the yard.

As you will see in the pictures I have some crazy pumpkin plants all over the yard. The kids planted the pumpkin seeds from the previous Halloween’s pumpkin carving. What do you know they grew and grew, but alas no pumpkins. We didn't have any bees to pollinate the flowers and manual pollination wasn't working either. So the lawn mower came out and finished them off.

Once again inspiration struck me, that and www.gardenerschoice.com had some huge tomato plants they were selling at great prices. So here it was a place to raise some "Mators". It has to look nice though.

The previous owners had already put a small raised area lining the back wall of the yard and my wife decided that we should go with the same castle stones they used, naturally I agreed.

Time to plan and gather materials.

Materails list
27 Castle stones (Lowes)
1 bag of Omni brand compost (Made localy)
2 bags of Steer manure (Made localy also)
7 Monster Tomato plants (gardenerschoice.com)
2 Tomato Trees (gardenerschoice.com)
4 Black garbage bags

Tools list
1 Spade shovel
1 Flat shovel
1 Pair of gloves
1 Bucket
1 Group of kids

Dirt Displacement fancy terms for shoveling dirt.
First thing I needed to do was move some dirt and filter out the river rock.

Basically all I did was shovel dirt to the opposite side. Then I paid the kids to come out and pick ut the river rocks, man was there a lot of rocks. There was enough here that I didn't have to buy any more rock for the project.

After the dirt was moved and filtered I put the castle stones down.

At this point I begain filling the raised aread with the filtered dirt I also began mixing in my steer manuare. After the manuare was mixed in next I threw in some "Omni" compost.

The manuare needs a couple weeks in the dirt to settle in, straight manuare would just burn the plants up. It doesn't take long in the heat in Arizona to cook the ground for me.

I used black plastic yard backs as my liner to keep the weeds from growing through the rocks. Some people use it in their garden bu I didn't use any becaseu the ground is quite warm enough.

Then I laid the river rocks that were filtered from the dirt and started laying my walking area.

Here is the final step before we put plants in the ground.

I had to have a drain flow area should we get heavy rains during the Monsoons, we didn't, but I needed to be ready and have a path for the water to flow anyway. So I created a small follow through area with the river rock right through the garden wall. The water actually flows under the castle stones and out to the drain. Some of the castle stones are positioned directly on top of the river rock. This way water still flows around the river rock under the castle stones and out the drain. See the other picture for the completed look.

Time for some plants.

I ordered muy plants trhough the internet from Gardeners Choice They have what seems to be some outraguos claims that I thought I would put to the test.

Well they certainly grow, and would have grown better if not for the intense heat this year. I have been able kept them alive since May 2007, but they hvae grown like crazy. Now they are more like giant bushes gone wild. But not to many Mators have come off these plants, its the heat again. The tomatos we have gotten off of them taste pretty darn good.

Now that it is cooling off we will see how the mators do, I already have new babies.

Here is some plant growth.

Pic 1 the plants are growing.

Pic 2 getting bigger

Pic 3 bigger still

Pic 4 BIGGER

Pic 5 getting some shade

Pic 6 some more shade

I will add some new pictures because I need some help to design a simple fence to hld the plants up. you will see what I mean when I post those pics.

Here are the most current pics as of 20 Sept 2007'

I am embarassed about them, but I didn't know the plant would grow this big. Plus I have also kind of neglected them, it was just to hot to get out there. All I could do was water, water, water and get back in the house.

So if you have suggestions about how to build a cheap support system or wahtever you can think of please let me know.

I do have plans on cooling the plants off next summer, I have another Instructable in mind for that.

Thanks for taking the time to read and provide any suggestions.

It is the 11th of October 2007.

The plants are now 9 months old and still growing strong.

I built a tall trellis out of an old patio umbrella and it came out looking pretty good and is working great. I built it about 2 weeks ago and now that the weather has cooled off I am getting more blooms and the plants have covered the trellis. Lets see if I get some tomatoes in the next couple of weeks.

Take a look at the newest pics below.

The dogs got in to the garden again! Dig dig dig and then lay down in it.
The toamto plants have already out grown the trellis the i put up a week ago now I have to build it bigger. The plants are over 6 ft tall now they are growing like crazy!

Good news FINALLY I have some Red bell peppers growing! FINALLY!

I'll add pics soon.