Waist High Square Foot Gardening Boxes and Stands Help

[John3]

I bought the first book on square foot gardening and it does not cover how to make the waist high boxes per say. He does say you can use sawhorses and bricks and wood as legs. I think he refers to another part of the book which says use 5/8 plywood (untreated) for a bottom. Some question as to use plastic lining in it or not as he says the lining will let water condesate under it and cause the wood to rot quicker - he does say drill holes in the center of very square foot and one drill hole in a corner of the square - making t two holes drilled in the square foot. I went to the hardware/lumber place to see about redwood and cedar an they said they can not get redwood and that cedar would have to be specil ordered and would take a few weeks or more to get it in (and the price has almost double sense last year. I then told him about the book ans square foot gardening and he said that it is saying to use 1 in (whatever height and whatever length) but he felt that it would rot pretty quick and if I went that way I should use 2 inch thick lumber as it would take a lot longer to rot. The lumber man did say that the 5/8 thick plywood should work (I only mention this as out of all the places I went to he was the only one who had 5/8 think plywood - the others had 1/2 inch thick plywood and said 5/8 was getting hard to get). So after taking about the building the box for awhile we got to adding the legs to it so as to stand it up to about 3 feet high from the ground. During this talk came up the sizes i want for the boxes - which are two feet wide and eight feet long. So the side boards would be 8 feet long and the ends could be made from 8 foot lengeths of lumber. We came up with using deck screws (he said to use the 5 (maybe that was 8 star) star heads and get a bit for them as they do not strip as easiley as the four point and drill them in from the back of the plywood into the width thickness of the side boards. Well I did not like the ideal of sawhorses mentioned in the book and asked if I should use 4x4's he said that would work but he thought that 2x4's would also hold the weight - so we talked about that some then he said he would he peronaly would use cinder blocks and set the box on top of them. Ok I asked about strong winds would they blow the box off the cinder blocks and he said he didn't think so. So I feel like I am going in circles trying to find how to get it the 3 feet above the ground.

Ok I can see using the 2 inch thick boards
OK I can see using the 5/8 inch thick plywood
Ok I understand drilling the holes in the 5/8 inch thick plywood
OK I understand using the deck screws
Any help of pros and cons with 4x4 or 2x4 or cinder blocks or something else. (building six of these- 2ft x 8 ft long)

Also - The lumber man did not know how to help me on building a canopy for it at first. I explained I had a brick wall extention from the house that was built when the house was built and I want to put something there that I could roll down and cover the waist high beds only with heavy/storm rains. After some taking came up with using 2x4s 10ft and put two ft of it into the ground and attach a 2x4 on them on top then in front of the beds put 2 more about six ft high and a 2x4 on top of them and then run a 2x4 from the high 2x4 to the low 2x4. We couldn't seem to figure out what to use to allow the topping cover to roll out and then after the rain roll it back up again. Any ideals or help here appreciated.

[Gardenrube]

Originally Posted by John3

I bought the first book on square foot gardening and it does not cover how to make the waist high boxes per say. He does say you can use sawhorses and bricks and wood as legs. I think he refers to another part of the book which says use 5/8 plywood (untreated) for a bottom. Some question as to use plastic lining in it or not as he says the lining will let water condesate under it and cause the wood to rot quicker - he does say drill holes in the center of very square foot and one drill hole in a corner of the square - making t two holes drilled in the square foot. I went to the hardware/lumber place to see about redwood and cedar an they said they can not get redwood and that cedar would have to be specil ordered and would take a few weeks or more to get it in (and the price has almost double sense last year. I then told him about the book ans square foot gardening and he said that it is saying to use 1 in (whatever height and whatever length) but he felt that it would rot pretty quick and if I went that way I should use 2 inch thick lumber as it would take a lot longer to rot. The lumber man did say that the 5/8 thick plywood should work (I only mention this as out of all the places I went to he was the only one who had 5/8 think plywood - the others had 1/2 inch thick plywood and said 5/8 was getting hard to get). So after taking about the building the box for awhile we got to adding the legs to it so as to stand it up to about 3 feet high from the ground. During this talk came up the sizes i want for the boxes - which are two feet wide and eight feet long. So the side boards would be 8 feet long and the ends could be made from 8 foot lengeths of lumber. We came up with using deck screws (he said to use the 5 (maybe that was 8 star) star heads and get a bit for them as they do not strip as easiley as the four point and drill them in from the back of the plywood into the width thickness of the side boards. Well I did not like the ideal of sawhorses mentioned in the book and asked if I should use 4x4's he said that would work but he thought that 2x4's would also hold the weight - so we talked about that some then he said he would he peronaly would use cinder blocks and set the box on top of them. Ok I asked about strong winds would they blow the box off the cinder blocks and he said he didn't think so. So I feel like I am going in circles trying to find how to get it the 3 feet above the ground.

Ok I can see using the 2 inch thick boards
OK I can see using the 5/8 inch thick plywood
Ok I understand drilling the holes in the 5/8 inch thick plywood
OK I understand using the deck screws
Any help of pros and cons with 4x4 or 2x4 or cinder blocks or something else. (building six of these- 2ft x 8 ft long)

Also - The lumber man did not know how to help me on building a canopy for it at first. I explained I had a brick wall extention from the house that was built when the house was built and I want to put something there that I could roll down and cover the waist high beds only with heavy/storm rains. After some taking came up with using 2x4s 10ft and put two ft of it into the ground and attach a 2x4 on them on top then in front of the beds put 2 more about six ft high and a 2x4 on top of them and then run a 2x4 from the high 2x4 to the low 2x4. We couldn't seem to figure out what to use to allow the topping cover to roll out and then after the rain roll it back up again. Any ideals or help here appreciated.

I would have replied long ago if I had seen this thread. I do have the "new" SFG book and it does detail how to build the stand-up model you are referring to.

I would personally use 2x6 lumber-untreated as it would work fine if you are trying to save $$. For the bottom use 5/8 inch treated marine board plywood. That should resist the rot and water damage better than plain. Drill one hole in the center of every square foot along with a hole at each corner of the planter for drainage. No Plastic liner!

The best support would probably be something you may already have. I have friends that just put it on their picnic table. You already have nice built in bench to it on while your working. You could also use a plain or table or just something you can find at a garage sale. 4x4's bolted to the outside frame of the bed would also work great. I would not use cinder blocks, I just dont think they would work well unless they were cemented together. If they got bumped...bye bye garden.

As far as a canopy you can buy 10 foot lengths of 1/2 inch white pvc pipe and bend them corner to corner. This works well if you have a 4 foot by 4 foot bed. If you have a larger bed you can bend the length of pipe over the sides similar to a covered wagon and secure to the sides with those cheap 1/2 inch "U" shaped clamps sold at hardware stores. The slick thing with this setup is that you can use a clear drop cloth for rain or to make a mini greenhouse, you can cover it with bug fabric to keep pests out, or cover it with shade fabric for a sun shade.

Here's some other things I would do:

-use 4" deck screws that can resist the elements.
-pre drill the holes or use no-split screws before attaching the side and bottom boards.
-find a nice flat place for the structure to sit on.

If you can think of anything else let me know!

GR