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The vertical garden bed can be called an unusual and successful invention. The design saves a lot of space in the summer cottage. If you approach this issue creatively, then the vertical garden bed will be an excellent decoration of the yard. And on this building you can grow not only flowers or ornamental plants. Vertical beds for strawberries have gained great popularity among gardeners, allowing you to harvest a huge crop in a small suburban area.
Vertical beds from sewer pipes
This invention should rightfully be given first place. If we are talking about growing strawberries or strawberries on vertical beds, then sewer PVC pipes are the No. 1 material for the manufacture of structures.
Let’s look at what is the advantage of using pipe beds:
- The sewer pipe is on sale with accessories. Using elbows, tees or half-elbows allows you to quickly and easily assemble a vertical bed of an unusual shape. The simplest bed for strawberries can be a vertically dug PVC pipe with a diameter of 110 mm.
- The plastic pipe is resistant to weather disasters. The material is not subject to corrosion, rot, the formation of fungus. Plastic will not gnaw even garden pests. During heavy rainstorms, you should not be afraid that strawberries will be washed out of the pipe along with the soil.
- Installation of strawberry beds made of PVC pipes can be performed even on asphalt near the house. The building will become a real decoration of the yard. Red strawberries or strawberries will always be clean, easy to collect, and if necessary, the entire garden can be moved to another place.
- Each PVC pipe serves as a separate section of the vertical bed. In the event of a strawberry disease, the pipe with the affected plants is removed from the common garden bed in order to prevent the spread of the disease throughout all the bushes.
And, finally, the low cost of PVC pipes allows you to get an inexpensive and beautiful garden bed that will last for decades.
It is not difficult to build a bed for strawberries from one vertically dug pipe. However, we need an unusual idea. Now we will look at how to make a vertical bed for strawberries of a three-dimensional design, as shown in the photo.
For work, you will need PVC pipes with a diameter of 110 mm, as well as tees of a similar section. The amount of material depends on the size of the beds, and to calculate it, you need to make a simple drawing.
The frame of the created beds consists of two parallel pipes lying on the ground. They form the foundation. All down pipes are connected with tees, where vertical posts are inserted at an angle into the central hole. From above, they converge into one line, where, using the same tees, they are fastened with one jumper from the pipe. The result is an upside-down V-shaped design.
So, let’s get started:
- First, racks are made from a pipe. They are cut to the desired length and holes with a diameter of 200 mm are drilled on the sides with a step of 100 mm. Strawberries will grow in these windows.
- With the help of tees and pieces of pipes, two blanks of the base of the frame are assembled. Gravel is poured inside for the stability of the structure. The central holes of the tees are not filled to the top. It is necessary to leave space for inserting racks. The gravel filler at the base will play the role of a reservoir of excess water that appears during irrigation.
- Two finished blanks of the frame base are laid on the ground parallel to each other. Racks prepared with drilled windows are inserted into the central holes of the tees. Now they all need to be tilted inside the frame. Tees on connections with a pipe will easily scroll.
- Now it’s time to put the tees on the top of the racks and connect them together with pieces of pipes in one line. This will be the top trim of the frame.
In conclusion, we need to solve a small nuance. Racks of a vertical bed should be covered with soil, and growing strawberries should be watered. This can only be done from the top of the frame. To do this, on the tees of the upper trim, you will have to cut windows opposite the inserted rack. Alternatively, crosses can be used instead of tees for the upper base of the frame. Then, in front of each rack, a ready-made hole is obtained for backfilling the soil and watering the strawberries.
The frame of the vertical bed is ready, it’s time to make an irrigation system and fill the soil inside each rack:
- A simple device is made for watering strawberries. A plastic pipe with a diameter of 15-20 mm is cut 100 mm longer than the vertical stand of the bed. Holes with a diameter of 3 mm are drilled as thickly as possible throughout the pipe. One end of the pipe is closed with a plastic or rubber plug. Such blanks must be made according to the number of vertical racks of the frame.
- The resulting perforated tubes are wrapped with burlap and fixed with wire or cord. Now the tube is inserted inside the rack through the window on the upper trim of the tee or cross. It is important to perform centering so that the watering pipe is exactly in the middle of the rack. For fixing and drainage, 300 mm of gravel is poured into the rack.
- Holding the protruding end of the watering pipe with your hand, fertile soil is poured into the rack. Having reached the first hole, they plant a bush of strawberries or strawberries, and then continue backfilling to the next hole. The procedure continues until the entire rack is covered with soil and planted with plants.
When all the racks are filled in this way with soil and planted with strawberries, the vertical bed is considered ready. It remains to pour water into the watering pipes for irrigation and wait for the harvest of delicious berries.
The video tells about the manufacture of vertical beds:
Wooden vertical beds for strawberries from boxes
Environmentally friendly and beautiful, you can make your own hands a vertical bed for strawberries from wooden boxes. For their manufacture you will need boards. It is better to take blanks from oak, larch or cedar. The wood of this tree species is less susceptible to decay. If this is not possible, ordinary pine boards will do.
Vertical beds made of wooden boxes are installed in tiers. This scheme allows you to optimally obtain lighting for each plant. There are many ways to arrange tiers. A few examples can be seen in the photo. It can be an ordinary pyramid, and not only rectangular, but also triangular, polygonal or square.
The box is made from planks. It is important that each upstream box of a vertical bed with strawberries be smaller. The easiest way for strawberries is to make rectangular vertical beds in the form of a ladder. All boxes are knocked down the same length. It can be taken arbitrarily, although it is optimal to stop at 2,5 or 3 m. To make a ladder out of the boxes, they are made of different widths. Let’s say the design consists of three boxes. Then the first one, the one that stands on the ground, is made 1 m wide, the next one – 70 cm, and the top one – 40 cm. That is, the width of each box of the vertical bed differs by 30 cm.
The prepared area for a vertical bed is covered with a black non-woven fabric. It will prevent the penetration of weeds, which will eventually clog the strawberries. From above, a box ladder is installed on the canvas. The boxes are covered with fertile soil, and strawberries are planted on the steps formed.
Vertical beds for strawberries from old tires
Good vertical beds for strawberries or strawberries can be made from old car tires. Again, you will have to pick up tires of different diameters. You may have to visit a nearby landfill or contact a service station.
If there are tires of only the same size – it does not matter. They make an excellent vertical bed. It is only necessary to cut a window on the tread of each tire for planting strawberries. Having laid a piece of black agrofibre on the ground, put one tire. Fertile soil is poured inside, and a plastic perforated pipe is placed in the center. Get exactly the same drainage as they did for a vertical bed of sewer pipes. Strawberries are planted in each side window, after which the next tire is laid on top. The procedure continues until the pyramid is completed. The drain pipe must protrude from the ground of the top tire to allow water to be poured into it.
If you managed to collect tires of different diameters, then you can build a stepped pyramid. However, at first, a side shelf is cut out from one side of each tire to the tread itself. Put the widest tire on the bottom. Soil is poured inside and a smaller diameter tire is placed on top. Everything is repeated until the completion of the construction of the pyramid. Now it remains to plant strawberries or strawberries in each step of the vertical bed.
It is important to know that car tires are not an environmentally friendly material. They are more suitable for flowers and ornamental plants. It is undesirable to grow strawberries in tires, although many summer residents continue to do this.
Vertical bed of bags
Growing strawberries in bags began a long time ago. Usually the sleeve was sewn from reinforced polyethylene or tarpaulin. The bottom was sewn up, and a homemade bag was obtained. It was installed near any support, fixed, and fertile soil was poured inside. Irrigation drainage was made of perforated plastic pipe. On the sides of the bag, cuts were made with a knife, where strawberries were planted. Now ready-made bags are sold in many stores.
If you get creative with the process of growing strawberries, then a vertical bed can be made from many sewn bags in several rows. A similar example is shown in the photo. Pockets are sewn on a large canvas. All of them are small in size and designed for planting one strawberry bush. Such a vertical bed of bags is hung on the fence or wall of any building.
The video talks about growing strawberries all year round in bags:
Growing strawberries in vertical beds from PET bottles
Plastic bottles with a capacity of 2 liters will help create a vertical bed for growing strawberries without a penny of investment. We’ll have to visit the landfill again, where you can collect a lot of colorful bottles.
On all containers, the bottom is cut off with a sharp knife. A mesh fence will work well as a support for a vertical bed. The first bottle is attached to the grid from the bottom with the cut bottom up. The plug is screwed loose or a drainage hole is drilled in it. 50 mm recede from the top edge of the bottle, and a cut is made for the plant. Soil is poured inside the bottle, then a strawberry bush is planted so that its leaves look out of the cut hole.
In a similar way, prepare the next bottle, put it with a cork in the lower container with already growing strawberries, and then fix it to the grid. The procedure continues as long as there is free space on the fence grid.
In the next photo, do-it-yourself vertical beds for strawberries are made from 2-liter bottles hanging up with a cork. It can be seen here that two windows opposite each other are cut out in the side walls. Soil is poured inside each bottle and a bush of strawberries or strawberries is planted.
You can make a vertical bed from any improvised materials. The main thing is that there is a desire, and then the strawberries will thank you with a generous harvest of delicious berries.