Soil Preparation No-Nos

Remember how adding too much oil in your brownies caused everyone to pretend to like them while turning puce? You can add the wrong materials during raised bed planting when you're painstakingly attending to soil preparation and amending.

Just as some preservatives and spices are no-nos for would-be brownie gobblers, some soil preparation materials should be left alone:

• Too much lime, for vegetables and flowers (the ideal soil pH is between 6.0 and 7.5) * Bone, grease and meat drippings
• Tomato, eggplant and pepper foliage and stems (may contain diseases)
• Cucumber, melon, and squash leaves and vines (may contain diseases)

When learning how to plant a garden with two or more levels, you may fear that some amenders will be dangerous. The only danger is in not adding even amounts of soil amenders when you're gardening raised beds.

Raised beds with more sunlight will especially need fertile, nutrient-rich soil. Now that you've fed your plants with the right soil preparation, it's time to tackle that brownie recipe again.