More than Gardening

I put Orange Rocket Barberry, 3 Bushel and Berry Blueberry shrubs, yarrow, lavender, candy tuft, and Coral Bells in the Gro-Rite Garden.

This raised bed makes the experience more than just gardening.

Since I started promoting the Gro-Rite Garden thanks to Justin and his team at S & K Greenhouse in Shelby, North Carolina; I have debated what to put into it.

When I write or say the experience is more than just gardening, you have to decide:

the specific size you want because you can put this bed into different forms,
if you want a specific center piece, or if you are more focused on rows within the beds,
if you want vegetable/ fruit and rotate crops, flowers, or a mix of shrubs and plants

Bushel and Berry Blueberry shrubs surround an Orange Rocket Barberry. Their leaves are reminiscent of a eucalyptus. I chose the wider version of the Gro-Rite Garden to fit in the shrubs.

Some people begin with raised garden beds, while others do not. The Gro-Rite Garden expanded my world of cultivation. For one, you can build it in 10 minutes or less without tools and screws. It has metal rods you slide in to hold everything in place.

You spend less time putting a raised gardening bed together, and more time goes into the action of planting.

I made this TikTok showing what we put in the Gro-Rite Garden.

This is a closer look at the lavender, yarrow, and blueberry shrub covered with leaf mulch in the Gro-Rite Garden.

A view of our work in the Gro-Rite Garden from the back corner.

I have learned a lot in the three active years in which I have gardened.

I will reach my one year anniversary of no dig gardening in January 2025. From that time forward, I have learned how you need three or more pieces of cardboard to suppress the weeds. It gives the gardener, like a painter, a fresh page on which to let your art flow.

My exploration into no dig gardening led me to expert Charles Dowding, in the United Kingdom, who has done this style with vegetable cultivation, since the 1980s.

There is a lot of room in the wider version of the Gro-Rite Garden. I have started wtih cardboard, just as I do with no dig gardening. This suppresses the weeds. Then I add sand, leaves, dirt, soil amendment, compost, and leaf mulch. A lot of these materials come from the farm and my dad brings mulched leaves and grass. This I add to the top.

The front of the garden reveals the Coral Bells, or heuchera, and candy tuft in front of the blueberry shrubs. The leaf mulch on the very top.

There is so much to learn when it comes to gardening; it’s an entrance to our imaginations. Whatever has lurked in the darkness, can feel exposure to light. That hope found in the light leads you to the different levels of cultivation.

This is what I mean by more than gardening. It leads us somewhere we might venture ourselves without a push or inspiration.