Most people fill their raised beds the wrong way—and it can cost you a lot more than it should.
In this video, I break down exactly how I’m planning to fill my new 17” raised beds using a simple layered approach that saves hundreds of dollars without sacrificing soil quality. I’ll show you what works, what doesn’t, and why just filling your beds with one material (like raised bed mix or compost) can lead to wasted money and poor results.
I’ll also talk about common advice like hugelkultur—and why it doesn’t always work the way people think.
If you’re planning to build or fill raised beds this season, watch this first.
👉 If you would like tons more info just like this, check out our NEW Raised Bed Course: https://join.nextlevelgardening.tv/raised-beds
If you want to follow the full buildout of this new vegetable garden step-by-step, I’m documenting everything over on my other channel:
👉 The Gardens at SkyRidge: https://www.youtube.com/@thegardensatskyridge
The raised beds I’m using in this video:
👉 https://shop.nextlevelgardening.tv/search?q=vego&options%5Bprefix%5D=last
39 Comments
what is the salt content of pumice?
we are so lucky to have access to free compost from our landfill. We got almost 5 tons for our front native garden. Get some every year to top off raised veggie garden beds.
Did you add the delivery fee in for the bulk?
Too late. I filled four 17" Vego beds 2 years ago with crap raised bed mix (80 bags @ $8/bag) from WM. They are mostly wood chips. Nothing grows in wood chips. I also tried Hügelkultur. What a joke! All it does is enable you to put off the inevitable filling of the beds, as it drops the raised bed mix 4-6 inches PER GROWING SEASON!! You still wind up buying the same amount of raised bed mix as without Hügelkultur, but you get to pay tomorrow's price for that mix. NOTE: PRICES DO NOT DECREASE. THEY ONLY INCREASE!!! Unfortunately, if you live in a small town, or any town without a source of great organic compost and great organic mushroom compost, and you aren't either made of $$$$ OR A YOUTUBE INFLUENCER, you're pretty much screwed. Good Luck with that.
I bought bags of Eko compost and what a mistake. It's 90% wood chips. Also, the mushroom compost I bought at the same time is full of mushroom spores and they are coming up all over the place. I don't have the solution; I live in a rural area and compost from a yard is available but delivery is exorbitant and way out of my range. So, I'm taking my plants that are done and burying them in the beds to compost right there. My area is dry and I can't keep a compost pile wet enough but I can keep my beds watered.
I was excited to find mushroom compost in my area until I read the ingredients which had cow manure, peat and “other” organic matter!
Thank you Brian 🤗🌷💚🙃
I am SOOOO jealous!!!
I can get compost for $45 per scoop.
But it will cost me $200 just to have it delivered 😢
I did 3 raised beds, the hugelkultur style. All of my veggies grew great and were delicious. I have costs to be concerned about and couldn't possibly afford those seven inches of spending on the extra mushroom compost. I have wooded property and all of that free stuff for the taking. Sorry Brian, I have to disagree with you this time. I still love your teachings, though
Last year I switched from 1 large wood framed 8' x 4' x 12" garden bed (which was falling apart) to 2 corrugated metal 8' x 2' x 32" tall raised beds. I also put in a drip irrigation system. I will tell you, what a god send to have a 32" tall bed and not have to bend over. Plus breaking it up into two 2' wide beds vs one 4' wide bed has really opened the garden to breath better and less reaching or stepping into the bed to reach the center. I just work it from both sides. The 32" deep bed really opens you up to using logs and sticks in the bottom. I also used the soil from the old bed and did a clean out of our chicken pen and coop to fill in the bottom layers, filling in the gaps. I used a bulk delivery of raised garden soil to fill the top half. I've literally never had such a productive, healthy garden as last year. Over winter there has been some settling. I can use some chicken coop clean up material and maybe a couple bags of soil to fill in and leave some room for mulch at the top level. I also employed vertical gardening in one of the beds for tomatoes with a conduit frame, string and tomato clips. So, much more healthy and productive. Really, no weeds and way less pests. I've learned a lot and have been inspired by this you tube channel. I would have never known about some of these things without this channel.
you hit another one out of the park. I have wooden raised beds at the moment with trellises I just added. When the wood gives up im going to go metal. I am hoping to carry over my established soil into the new beds and then top off with raised bed mix. is that a good idea or should I start completely over on the soil?
1st time using beds this year. Very helpful info. Thanks
I’m filling mine today!
Looking good 👍
How did you insure you didn’t get salty mushroom compost this time?
Hukel whatever worked great for me but I must done it right lol 😂
I got 12 cubic yards of mushroom compost and 12 cubic yards of garden mix. Including delivery, the whole thing was $1,100. Well worth it v trying to afford bagged soil.
I look forward to seeing those beds planted out.
I love your shirt! I have had their car sticker on my cars for close to two decades and have had people ask me what it means! For those of you wondering, it means: “HE is greater than I” (God is greater than I) !!
Wonderful and timely video. I have a garden and because of community construction (fire station being built) I had to move mine. It's 20×25 and the new location is on very deep and impenetrable hardpan. Luckily I was able to get my soil moved. But you're right – it's a LOT of work and money, even bringing my own soil – I couldn't use my lumber, and I have to redo irrigation. Oh, and here we have restrictions on the amount of metal we can use, and 12" is the maximum height.
Thanks for telling it like it is, Brian. OK, time to get back to irrigation.
Oh! That's great shirt! God bless my friend!
I had hoped to get a good blend delivered but I've discovered that I'm physically unable to use a shovel to accomplish this. Learned that from the mulch that was delivered so I've had to use bagged products. Yes it cost more but I'm physically able to handle it.
Your family should do cameos like the cat does just walking through. 😀
Love the video! Question, would sawdust to fill the bottom half work?
Running your hugelkultur material through a wood chipper before use will fix most of your large voids problems.
10* Time to hump those wheel barrows and earn those biceps, shoulder, neck, and back muscles ! Too bad you couldn't have a concrete mixer arrangement with an auger, and then be able to maneuver the duct chute and be able to fill up the raised beds at a distance 1!!
I have tree roots (very small ones) coming into my raised beds 😢…. So frustrating! The soil is now a compacted mess!
I live in the woods and have tons of dry leaves. Would leaves packed down in the bottom of the raised bed work?
Learning a lot from your videos. My indoor planting is going amazing. I should be a exactly at the May 5th frost date for tomatoes and peppers.
Where did you buy the soil from? I'm in Long Beach so I wanted to look into this myself
You can't expect immediate results out of a raised bed. I started in spring used some logs and branches then pretty much used it as a compost heap for the season.
So true John about chair gardening. The 330 gallon IBC totes are 30 inches tall when cut in half. The outside painted to help the roots grow everywhere. I only use rotten logs of trees that work best in hugokultur cut to fit tight and then filled with local aged ground wood chips to 18 inches.. Watered well with a small amount of high nitrogen only fertilizer. This allows filling the top 10 plus inches with raised bed mix. The 4'x4' bed is workable from four sides. Small enough to say I could weed that. Great Ideas in your videos. Using the two cup tomato starting method you teach on next level gardening. WOW.
Sounds good if you can get mushroom soil.
I had the same issue with the settling with my hugelkiltur bed Brian but it was only 1 raised bed and I tend to grow watermelon and other heavy feeders in that bed so I just used raised bed mix bags and homemade compost to fill in the gaps. My gaps were terrible last year but now this season, it is leveled out. I have onions and strawberries in that bed at the moment.
I love your raised beds!!! I've never used mushroom compost, but I will certainly give it a try!
What zone are your in? I'm in zone10 and we started our beds using overburden dirt/soil. We also mix compost in with the soil. This is our 4th growth season, in doing good.
OBEY
I'm thinking your hügelkultur beds would have done better had you not used full, uncut cedar logs as shown at 3:36.
Those will stay solid for a very long time, which is not the point of using them in a bed.
Maybe something like oak (split open) would have been a better choice.