Table of contents
- Wooden palisade - flexible and uncomplicated
- Build your own bed edging from squared timber
- Wicker fence - rustic and authentic
- Bamboo sticks - close to nature and affordable
- Benjeshecke in miniature
In the near-natural kitchen garden, the bed edging is a rarity. Expansive vegetable plants grow happily into the neighboring bed, where the long tendrils of pumpkin, beans and cucumbers have long settled. Not a trace of a well-groomed appearance, let alone structured plant care. A border made of wood solves the problem in harmony with your ecological garden culture. These 5 ideas want to fire your imagination.
Wooden palisade - flexible and uncomplicated
The wooden palisade is an elegant solution for edging the vegetable patch. The rolling element consists of halved wooden pegs stapled together. Due to its flexibility, the palisade is suitable as a border for any bed shape. The gapless arrangement of the wood ensures that an adjacent lawn no longer grows into the bed and is difficult to stake out. When purchasing, it is preferable to use roller boaders as a plug-in fence, because extended posts for attachment to the ground are already integrated. To set up a rolled wood palisade without built-in stakes, dig a furrow with a small gravel bed along the vegetable patch. Use a rubber mallet to pound the wooden palisade into the gravel and seal the furrow with soil.
Build your own bed edging from squared timber
– clever use of excess timber –
House gardeners with manual skills leave ready-made elements on the side and simply construct a bed edging out of wood themselves. The goal is a cost-effective and stable frame for the vegetable patch, whose individual shape catches the eye. This idea is based on square timber, which can be obtained as offcuts in timber shops and hardware stores at bargain prices. Angular coniferous wood beams, which you smooth with sandpaper beforehand and impregnate with a transparent glaze to protect them from the weather, are ideal. How to proceed correctly step by step:
- Cut wood to the same or different lengths with a jigsaw or circular saw
- Dig a spade-deep ditch along the vegetable patch to match the width of the logs
- The bottom of the pit is covered with a 10 centimeter thick layer of gravel
- Use a rubber mallet to hammer the pieces of wood next to each other into the gravel bed
- Fill the border of the bed with soil from both sides and press down
You can give an edging that is more than 20 centimeters high additional stability with quick-set concrete. Instead of soil, fill the furrow with a ready-mix from the hardware store that only needs to be mixed with water.
Tip:
The wood from native trees is well prepared for the Central European climate and is cheaper than tropical wood. Larch wood, one of the hardest softwoods par excellence, is recommended. Douglas fir and pine wood are also suitable for bordering beds. It is cheaper to use pressure-treated spruce wood.
Wicker fence - rustic and authentic
Wicker elements made of wood inspire as bed borders with rustic charm. Wicker fences made of willow or hazelnut, which decoratively frame the vegetable patch, are very popular. The specialist trade has ready-made elements as a plug-in fence with a length of 120 centimeters and a height of 20 centimeters for less than 5 euros. Ecologically oriented home gardeners appreciate that it is a domestic and renewable raw material. Special advantage: A willow or hazelnut wicker fence as a bed border does not require any impregnation measures.
Bamboo sticks - close to nature and affordable
As a building material for natural trellis, bamboo sticks are well known to many home gardeners. A new finding is likely to be the use as a bed edging. Above all, thick bamboo canes with a diameter of 15 millimeters or more decoratively frame a vegetable bed. With a length of 100 centimetres, the sticks are available from a unit price of 25 to 35 cents. Cut the bamboo sticks to the right size to plant side by side in the soil along the vegetable patch. The specialist trade offers bamboo as a bed border ready-made as a roll-up or plug-in fence from a price of 15 euros for an element with a length of 120 centimeters and a height of 30 centimeters.
Benjeshecke in miniature
– Bed edging and ecosystem at the same time –
The following idea is aimed at home gardeners who prefer to set up new ecosystems in their green realm. If you opt for a small Benjes hedge as a border for the vegetable patch, stay true to your garden philosophy. At the end of the 1980s, when a landscape gardener was thinking about the sensible use of clippings, the idea of the deadwood hedge was born, named after its inventor, Hermann Benjes. Since the principle can be implemented on any conceivable scale, a mini Benje hedge is perfect for edging beds in the vegetable garden. It's so easy:
- Mark the line of the border of the bed with the spade
- Use an ax to sharpen thicker branches from the last tree cut into small support posts
- Drive supporting branches into the ground at a distance of 20 to 50 centimeters at the edge of the bed
- Fold in a second row of branches to match the desired edging width
Stack the prunings between the two rows of support stakes. Ideally, start with thick branches and fill up the pile with thin twigs and foliage.
Positive side effect:
Over time, numerous beneficial insects settle in the small Benje hedge, which actively participate in plant protection in the vegetable patch.
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