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Gardens
How to Make a Wood Pallet Garden
Making your own wood pallet garden is a quick and easy way to create a healthy and organized garden for flowers and vegetables alike!
Grow plants in wood pallet garden frames.
Photo Credit : Anne Gibson from The Micro GardenerWood pallet garden frames are a recent trend in gardening that has remained popular. If wood pallet frames are something you want to experiment with, they make a super easy raised garden bed and offer an eco-friendly, time-saving approach to growing flowers or vegetables at home. The instant rows created by the pallet slats give weeds nowhere to grow and are the perfect place to write plant names, making identification a breeze. Finally, wood pallet garden frames require no assembly, are readily available, and are often free!
Check your local recycling center for information on where to find wood pallets to use as garden frames. When you find them, choose ones that are in good, sturdy condition and have not been treated with pesticides.
NOTE: If you’re unsure whether your pallet has been treated with pesticides, it’s best to only put non-edible plants in them.
How to Make a Wood Pallet Garden
Materials Needed for a Wood Pallet Garden
- Wood Pallets
- Garden Soil
- Seeds or Plants
- Permanent Marker
Instructions for Making a Wood Pallet Garden
- Choose a sunny location to set up your wood pallet garden frames.
- Prepare a garden bed by rototilling, aerating, and working compost into the soil as you would any garden, but in dimensions to accommodate the wood pallet.
- Dig a rough outline of approximately half the depth size of the outside frame of the pallet (approximately 4 inches) and place the wood pallet in the area. This will help to stabilize the pallet. Hammer the edges with a rubber mallet for more stability.
- Add enough soil to fill the open rows approximately ¾ way.
- Plant seeds, seedlings, or starter plants in the rows that are created by the openings in the wood pallets.
- Label the rows by marking on the pallet with a permanent marker or a handmade wooden stake.
- Water and care for your wood pallet garden just as you would any other garden — minus much of the weeding — and enjoy a compact, efficient little vegetable patch with much less work.
- When it’s time to rotate your garden at the end of the growing season, just lift the pallet from the ground and store away or move to next year’s location.
Have you ever used wood pallet garden frames?
This post was first published in 2012 and has been updated.
SEE MORE:
How to Grow Greens in a Bag of Potting Soil
How to Make Hanging Moss Ball Planters
How to Make a Cinder Block Garden Bed
Shelley Wigglesworth
Shelley (Fleming) Wigglesworth is an award-winning freelance journalist from Maine and a certified Maine Master Gardener who writes gardening articles on a regular basis for NewEngland.com. Her work can be found in the following publications: The Village Magazine, York County Coast Star, Yankee Magazine (online), National Fisherman Magazine, Commercial Fisheries News, Points East Magazine, Coastal Angler Magazine and The Maine Lobstermen's Association's "Landings."
More by Shelley Wigglesworth
The work is very fantastic indeed
This is a great article on wood pallets. I have used them for years and have found them to be very versatile. I have made everything from shelves to tables out of them. I even made a chicken coop out of them once.
I think that everyone should use wood pallets more often. They are so versatile and can be used for so many different things. If more people used them, we would all save a lot of money.
I encourage everyone to give wood pallets a try. You might be surprised at how much you can do with them. Thanks for writing this article!
Ooh.. interesting. One of my neighbors just cleared up his backyard a couple of days ago so he can establish a small vegetable garden. I didn’t even realize that wooden pallets can be so useful in holding up our topsoils as long as we weatherproof them. I’ll share this information with him so he can get the right equipment later.
I loved it when you said that check your local recycling center for information on where to find wood pallets to use as garden frames. I need pallets for my new soft drinks distribution business. Good to hear from this article on where to find pallet makers in town.
My brother Dave composed a compost bin using 4 pallets held together with zip ties, less messy than the wire corrals I was using. Love it
I thought this was a good idea until read all the comments!
Has anyone done this?? Such a great idea but I am thinking slugs would have a field day hiding under those cross bars. ???? Of course I live in Oregon maybe this isn’t an issue in other areas.
Great to see that… I made it too. Using woodprix handbooks 🙂
Pallets are heavy, and clumsy. Wouldn’t it be simpler and get the same result just to lay down 4-inch wide boards between your rows?
At the onset, maybe. The plus side has to be the stability for many years. Four inch boards are apt to be moved around by torrential rains, lawn mowers or merely stepping on them.
You really need to be careful of using used pallets. Some can have some dangerous chemicals that can be found on them.
Melanie is partially right, look on the side if the pallets, there will be a stamp if you see HT its heat treated wood and OK, if you see MB its treated with a pesticide, do not use. Also stay away from pallets marked CH as they are made in China. US or CA are OK. Avoid painted pallets, since you don’t know the toxicity of the paint used. Paint them yourself with latex paint if you want.
Good advice. I didn’t know they’d be stamped with chemical warnings. Thanks.
Some pallets are made of pressure treated wood. Please be sure to warn people that pressure treated wood contains chromated copper arsenate (known as CCA) which is highly toxic. It is possible that these chemicals can seep into soil and taken up by food plants (vegetables) during watering and rain. It is also highly toxic to fish and should be kept away from water with fish (fish ponds) etc. Caring for people and the environment. Melanie 🙂
Wooden pallets are used for many purposes in industries . We use it for home decorations also. Use of the wooden pallets to make garden frames are so nice and a good idea!