Square foot gardening without a raised bed??

Ok, I've been going back and forth on this for a while now, and what I really need is some knowledgable input. I love the idea of the square foot gardening as far as layout goes. The reason I like it is because I don't have a very large planting area, but I want to grow a lot of different things. It makes more sense to divide what I'm growing into squares rather than rows (I'm also into companion planting). What I don't like about raised beds is that they dry out too quickly. We get a lot of rain here in Florida, but we also get some dry spells and in the middle of the summer, a few days without rain might as well be a month. So, for that reason I'm leaning toward gardening on the ground.

So, here's what I want to do...could you tell me if this will work?...Organize my space as if I were building a raised bed, dig in compost/organic soil amendments as needed keeping the planting area semi-mounded, border my planting area with stones, make sure to never walk on the planting area. If I do these things could I get the same yield as a raised bed square foot garden?

Passiflora,

Some may disagree with me, but there is nothing magic about having sides, or having your beds elevated. If you use the same amendments/compost, then not having elevated edges won't matter a bit. The one benefit of raised beds is drainage, but you've noticed the converse problem...drying out. There's no reason that you couldn't do square foot garden layouts as long as you provide the necessary nutrients.

David

I agree with David, use lots of compost and it should be fine.

I agree with Cathy and dreaves. I'd also use some mulch once your garden is established just to slow down the evaporation from the soil.

Until I moved here to NC and couldn't get a spade into the hard red clay, I had NEVER used raised beds.

I gardened in Palm Beach County, Florida for 30+ years and know what you mean about soil (I hate to even call it soil, 'cause it was more like dirty sand) that dried out too fast.

We had a load of horse manure delivered every August and managed to get a decent return of vegetables each Winter from a small plot.

So I suggest that you go ahead, passiflora07, and garden without raised beds or mounds.

I believe that the original SFG book by Mel Bartholomew didn't use raised beds anyway.

Raised bed soil warms up earlier. Of coarse you don't HAVE to have sides, you can just mound up the soil area.

The original "French Intensive" beds didn't have sides, they were just double dug with lots of compost and manure. I think they ended up raised because of all the "ammendments" that were added.

I'm so happy to hear all of this! I will do the double digging and skip the sides. I'm feeling optimistic :) Thanks everyone!