Plastic swimming pool planters/raised beds for edibles?

[big brown horse]

Mmmkay, I have 3 broken plastic swimming pools that won't hold water. Normally I chop them up and recycle them...a real pain in the patoosie. I have to get my strawberry starts in the ground asap so I was going to build another raised bed for them. Light went off in my head, cut the bottoms out of the plastic pools, line the ground with cardboard (to prevent weeds for a while) then fill the pool up with soil and plant the strawberries.

Question, do you think this will be safe for edibles? The roots won't touch the plastic, it is just there to hold in the dirt. Thoughts? (Remember I'm the one who is afraid of plastic. And microwaves for that matter, but that is another story.)

 

[FarmerChick]

not afraid of plastic but my problem is being in the South the sun just dry rots the plastics so fast. Even if I leave out a small plastic bucket of Nicole's thru summer, by the end it is so super brittle I pick it up and it shatters in my hands.

I like to build with things that I know I do not have to replace anytime soon.

but sure, many use all kinds of things to grow. We stacked old tires up into a tier and planted taters one time. Did fine.

 

[i_am2bz]

I've planted things in plastic pools; I have onions in one right now!

But as FC said, they aren't very durable down here. One pool cracked in half when we tried to move it. Plastic water jugs shatter like glass if left out.

 

[big brown horse]

I went ahead and did it, and I'm glad I did. Now I have a small thyme garden, a big raspberry patch and a medium strawberry patch. I think I'm going to eventually replace the plastic with stone pavers as the budget allows. I used a jig saw to take the bottoms off and lined the ground with used (dull) cardboard and thick paper (dull) chicken feed bags that I've been collecting. (Dull meaning nothing shiney printed on the paper or cardboard.)

 

[AL]

I have been considering doing this very thing! I let my garden plot go feral over the summer and now there is nowhere to plant! I have a bunch of landscape timbers for one nice sized bed, and then I will be using Rio's old worn out kiddie pool

 

[big brown horse]

I love permacultured gardens and I'm striving for low maintainance gardens. I have a hugel beet, and many no till lasagna style raised beds already. I think I can use my pools as forms for more lasagna style beds and then remove them when the roots take hold the soil packs down a bit and the raised bed holds itself together. I love keyhole and small round gardens!

 

[FarmerChick]

absolutely smaller is easier to handle

I sure agree

we crop planted. wow the work involved doing acres and acres was insane. I planted about 2 acres of sunflowers and lost control of it. the weeds went nutso. I got decent flowers but the harvest etc. was very hard.

smaller is easier to handle and I sure agree cause when I planted my small garden I kept it small and very open. very wide rows so I could actually work in those rows easily.