Here's how to build a raised bed for your garden

Here's how to build a raised bed for your garden. Get step-by-step how-to pictures, materials list, and a building guide.
Raised beds make perfect vegetable gardens because the soil inside them drains better and heats up faster in spring than adjacent soil. The only drawback to raised beds is that building them with new cedar 2 by 4s is expensive. In our backyard garden, we decided to save money and resources by recycling the boards from a cedar fence we took down into raised beds. Our fencing boards measured 1 by 6 by 5-the perfect height for making low raised beds. Plus, when we needed a few extra boards to complete our project, we discovered they only cost about $2 each, making them a much more economical choice than 2 by 4s. We attached the boards in our raised beds with metal brackets, so it will be easy to replace them when the time comes. Here's how to build raised beds with fencing boards.