Garden on a slope

As an alternative to raising the garden by adding fill (see How to dry out the garden), I'm considering moving it to higher ground. Unfortunately, the only reasonable place is on a slope. How much of a slope will work without too much runoff? This area drops about 1' in 10'.

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How much of a slope will work without too much runoff?

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Just depends on how much rain you get at a time, doesn't it? I know some folks who "hill" all their rows across the slope and you can use a pretty steep slope if you do that.

I think it depends in part on how well drained the soil in that area is. Our main garden area is on a slope about as you describe. (It is about the only area on our property that is even close to "flat"). We are installing slotted farm tile horizontally uphill of the garden to help drain off any major deluge style rain, but even without the drain tile, most of the garden is fine, except for the lower part which tends to stay soggy longer.

One foot in ten is not all that steep to me..my garden has a similar slope, maybe a little less. I plant the early crops on the high side and the later crops on the low side to allow time for drying out at the bottom.

This year I also used some "raised rows" when I mounded up the dirt every 3 or 4 rows and planted in them. Helps quite a bit if/when there are very heavy rains, diverts the water out to the sides quite nicely.

Good luck. [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

If in doubt think of terraces. This is a method used in many parts of the world to make almost vertical slopes producive.

Egon