Anybody use broken concrete for raised garden bed?

4

hope this is helpful,Its been there 7 yrs now

I busted up a concrete sidewalk andparking slb and used the pieces for a retaining wall in the front yard to break up the hill wich was way to hard to mow.I motared the pices together and then brushed them clean took me all summer but looks great. And costed me abot $20 in mortar. Which was a saveings cause the city wanted to chrge me $100 ro dump there for that ammount or $300 for a dumpster. Will post pic tommorrow

Huggergirl,
Those are great photos. Thanks for posting them. It's amazing how good plain ol' "busted up" concrete looks when it is stacked. Those are some monster pieces too. Somebody did some back-breaking work making that wall. It looks as if those pieces are pretty uniform in depth, whereas mine is of varying thicknesses, in smaller chunks, and more like the haphazard shapes of rocks (see photo way up there above all this). Also, while mine may be stacked in places (to level one side of a flower bed, for instance), I will be using them more like rocks to line the beds. I think Lynnie and Rachel were going to use them for a stacked wall. I am glad to know it looks so good whatever way it's used. We got ourselves some free resources here. LOL

Judy

Judy,have you played around and dry stacked any yet,Iam thinking placing them like I did with the field stone,well I guess like a puzzle more or less.I did not use any morter with my stone,just dry stack,we have real winter here freeze thaw, morter not a good option with out footers here.Ive had to rebuild spots over the years.

Hugger that looks great! Judy have you started yours yet? I'm in the "constructive staring" phase that you talked about...I mentally moved my rocks closer to my screen porch with a fountain.

Judy, if your concrete pieces are dug into the ground with the tops all the same level with the ground, the border might look like cool stepping stones. Just a thought.

Everyone just make sure not to go straight up ,unless you have flat rock and a level starting surface,mother nature will push it forward yr by yr .here is the last stone wall I built,dh helped he hauled my back fill up and down that darn hill !!! Its kind of a mish mosh of plants right now,not sure how I want to plant it, the whole area is not quite done yet,always a work in progress !!

This message was edited Aug 10, 2009 9:08 AM

huggergirl thanks for all the pictures, every one i see gets me more excited about it. very helpful.
artwestallis, i would like to see pix of yours too.
venice, I've decided to use any extra chunks as a path thru my future front garden. just like you said level with the ground so they look like stepping stones.


just ripped out two old useless garden beds from the front yard. I reused the broken stuff as a border for a sitting area. not as nice as the concrete, but It does the trick for free. and i now have my blank slate for creating the front foundation bed!

Hugger & Lynnie --

My friend has done amazing work in her rock garden and she put a small pool with a stream in it. The rock garden has small stones on up to small boulders. I forget but I don't think they are as big as yours Lynnie. She said she is not done with it yet because they had a lot of continuous rain in Texas before the hot spell started and she couldn't work in the garden during that time. I asked her if she would share a couple of her photos and she said she would send them to me tonight. Hope they give you some ideas.

Venice that would be awesome! Thanks!
Philsgal, that's some work you got done!

That's a nice area Hugger!

Lynnie6868,thanks,a deck is going in on the other side of the screened porch,Ill most likley be posting pics of the progress,slow progress !!

Huggergirl and Lynnie:
No, I haven't started yet but when I do, I think I'll have a good idea of exactly what I want, thanks to all that "constructive" staring and contemplating I've been doing. I have taken my "before" pictures so I can also look at them on the computer and mentally make notes of what might work. I hesitate to share them just yet because everything really looks cruddy right now. There will be no more than two "rocks" stacked because what I want to do isn't that high. Just enough to "level" or "almost level" the bed. My back yard slopes downward from north to south ... not a whole lot, but enough that there will be a nasty wash if I don't block it in places. I've never really worked on a lawn in the back but just let the grass come up where it will. There's a lot of centipede, some bermuda, and a lot of just junk grass ... but it's green and stops the runoff. It has been just too hot here to even think about working outside. Temps in the 90s and humidity right alongside. I almost wilt just walking to the mailbox. :-)

Venice: I am way ahead of you on the stepping stones. I had even entertained the thought of making a small "patio" under a tree using the large chunks of concrete laid flat into the ground like flagstone with moss between the stones (moss is already under the tree). But for lining the beds, I definitely want "rocks" ... big, chunky stones. There is a guy in North Carolina who posts on the other forum. His gardens consist of grass paths winding through rock lined beds and it is absolutely charming. That is what sold me on doing mine that way. I looked at my rock pile and said, "Dad gum! There's my flower bed liners!"

Am just dying to see what you guys are gonna do with yours!

Judy

Judy, on what forum is the NC guy you were talking about? The one with winding grass paths through a rock garden. Would really like to see his photos.

Judy there's no way your area looks cruddier than my back yard did until a couple of weeks ago! lol I had such an eyesore, and it wasn't out of sight of the whole street, either. Finally got the scrub & debris pulled up.
Hugger I need a transition from my screen porch too...I have a porch off the screen porch, now i want a patio off that lol THAT will be a while coming.
I'd love to see the NC guy's pics also!

Hugger and Lynnie, send a D-mail with your email address and I will email all the photos my friend finally sent me. I don't have a file I can attach here. You won't believe what she has done!

Does anyone know how to change a photo that is on an email with the text (not as an attachment) and change it to a file that I can attach here?

Venice,
Sometimes this will work: open the email with the photo and drag the photo to your desktop. See if the name changes to "something-blah-blah.jpg." It may be a string of numbers or a name or whatever. If that is the case, you can treat it just like a jpeg and attach it to a message, email, whatever. I have a Mac and that usually works for me, but I think it will work with a PC too.

White Flower Farm sent me an email with a photo of an Asiatic lily mix they were promoting. It was so beautiful it took my breath away. The name of it was "Strawberries and Cream." You can imagine. All the colors from maroon to white and all shades of pink in between. I tried dragging it to my desktop to send to my sister and it worked. Needless to say, I ordered many bulbs (I ain't tellin' how many because you'd laugh at me). I hesitate to post the photo here because I don't know if WFF may have a copyright on it. If someone can clarify that, I will be happy to post it. (Any list administrators listening?)

Judy

Judy, I have tried everything and nothing will work. I can highlight it and copy it. However, when I pasted it on my desktop yesterday, my computer called it an active desktop. It has a link to the Internet. Anyway, it really messed up my computer and I had to update it to a previous day. Also, I tried to look on the Internet, but I couln't find anything.

Friend's rock garden in TX.

Lynnie,
By back yard isn't as bad as yours? I bet it's worse. We are talking severely neglected back yard here. However, if you insist ... here's the crud.

I really need to start a thread on the Cottage Garden Forum with something like, "A Newbie Begins: First You Need a Cottage," because I've really turned a tract house into a country cottage and I dearly love it. It took me 10 years before I really got interested in doing anything with it and 10 more years before I really started getting serious about my gardening. (I raised, trained and showed dogs for 25 years). I have been here since 1988 and just bought it to get out from under a bad landlord situation and give myself a tax break. It was bare bones and ugly but had an acre of land and lots of room inside (nearly 2000 sq. ft. with the half-basement). It had possibilities I didn't see then. I just wanted a place of my own.

The deck extension you see was added in 2003, the steps were moved from going down the left side to coming out the center, and things have progressed from there.

I want to use the "rocks" to line the flower beds planned for both sides of the steps. The far left side will probably take two or three stacked to even out the bed with the right side. Haven't decided whether to make the right bed longer than the left or cut it off equal with the left and make another bed coming farther out into the yard on the far right side of the deck, with a small tree (Japanese Maple or Crape Myrtle ... something on that order). I intend to put lattice on the bottom of the deck.

The bricks you see stacked at the base of the steps will be used for a walkway from the right deck steps around through the gate to the garage. I had originally planned to use them to line the flower bed but changed my mind when I saw the NC guy's garden. The pile of sand was left over from a front yard project and will be used in making the walkway also.

The plants temporarily set in the bed areas are variegated pittosporum which I may use back here or in the front. I just love the plants. The light colored plants on the steps are variegated privet which will go in front of the Leyland Cypress trees (not in photo) to make a screen on one side of the yard. I like my neighbor on that side but there are lots of kids and I like to sit in some semblance of privacy on my back deck. May do it on the other side too. Neighbors on that side are BAD news. Had to call the cops because they were stealing my "rocks." Also caught them cutting down my small trees in the "woods" out back. Whatever happened to respect for what belongs to another?

Anyway, here's my cruddy back. Hopefully it will look better as soon as things start to cool off. You guys have given me inspiration and some gumption to get going.

Rock garden.

Rock garden

Shoot. I might as well give you the whole picture. Here's the Leyland Cypress side and more of how the house is situated. (I love to look at y'all's houses and how the gardens fit around them.) The plans are for a row of variegated privet in front of the LC and a row of roses in front of that. May line that with the rocks too, if I have enough.

Judy, you really have a very nice backyard! That area has great possibilities. That was a good move having your steps coming from the center of your deck. I don't think the gardens on each side of your deck need to be the same length but the stones would look good if they were the same height but not equal, if that makes sense.

Huggergirl, I hope my friend's rock garden can stimulate some ideas for yours. See 3 photos.

Here's the back "before" ... back in 1993 when we had one of our rare snowstorms. LOL. Most of the trees have been cut down now except one huge oak that came up from seed and covers most of the back yard.

Thank you, Venice. I agree it has possibilities. The longer I stayed here, the more "constructive" contemplating I did. Wait until you see what I did with the front. I am really quite proud of the change. I designed all the changes and gave sketches to the contractors. They really did all the work.

Here's the front in 1988:

And here's the front today:

Ooooooooooooh. So cute! Good job!

Judy your house & yard are so nice! Sorry girl, my eyesore has yours beat lol
We had a weed filled kennel out back and invasive sumacs (if I can find a pic I'll post it) and a neighbor's falling down fence. Then some debris mixed in the weeds, as icing on the cake. ugh!
Venice, THAT is GORGEOUS! is that all the pics or do you have more you need to mail? How long did she work on it?
You're right, Judy, I'm getting excited to start! I'll get before pictures & post those first!
Venice I agree, my front foundation plantings are longer on one side than the other, 1 side is 22 feet, the other 12 or 15, I forget. They have the same bed depth (each bed is about 10 feet deep) and the same height. One wall is higher because the ground slopes down, though.

wow nice job!

More

She sent me 17 photos! How many do you want to see?

More front today:

They first just had a pond but it was too much maintenance. So now nearly her whole backyard is a rock garden. Recently she made a small brick patio by a Hawkins shed, that may not be any more than 2' deep, where she keeps all of her garden stuff. Out front she has more formal gardens with roses and I can't remember all what else she has. I think she has been working on her rock garden for about 5 years. I could be mistaken though. I will try to find out.

Judy you certainly have a beautiful house and a very spacious yard.

By the way, do you know how to copy over that hyperlink of Farmerdill's garden? Over in Slugs, Jim was asking for it.

Just let me know if you want to see more.

Thank you, you guys, for the compliments on the "cottage." I still have a long way to go.

Venice, that rock garden is awesome! It must have taken years to get that look. So, so beautiful.

Lynnie: would love to see your yard ... warts and all. LOL Got to run. Will be back tonight.

Judy

Judy, thanks but I figured out how to do that hyperlink.