Hi everyone,

I just bought 2" x 8" cedar boards, enough to make a 4' x 12' raised bed. I am roughly following the Sunset plans, except instead of 4" x 4" corner posts, I am going to try it with 2" x 4"s. This is going over an area where the former landowner had a swingset. It's very sandy (that must have been the base for the swingset area) and the total area is probably something like 6' by 15' where this swingset used to be. In the ground, right at lawn level, there are small boards which look like they were sunk in to contain the sand.

Here is my question. I am constructing the raised bed to sit on top of this area. I bought 2" x 8" to save on money... I know that 12-18" is really an ideal depth. So what if I just set my raised bed on top of this sandy area? Would deep rooted plants be able to get anything from that sandy area? I also am wondering whether it is advisable to put cardboard down at the bottom before filling with soil. I feel like I shouldn't do that unless I have at least 12" of soil depth.

I will be filling the bed with a compost-heavy version of Mel's mix. I have already bought 8 cubic feet of perlite, and I plan to go price out and buy a similar amount of peat, and fill the rest with compost.

Thanks for advice on whether I should:

A) Dig down and remove about 4" of that sand, line the bottom with cardboard, set the raised bed over the excavated area, and fill the whole thing with Mel's mix

B) Set the 2" x 8" raised bed on top of the sand and figure the deep rooted plants will be fine having 8" depth of Mel's mix and sandy stuff below. Forget about the cardboard.

Note: in the 3 years we have lived here, not many weeds grow in that sandy area. And they are VERY easy to pull out, obviously.