What did you get from the greenhouse or garden today?

I got two handfuls of peas and 3 cherokee wax beans. 💛

We are in-between at the moment - I was getting carrots and cabbage, just waiting on onions, potatoes, tomatoes, beans, peas, squash, zucchini, peppers...

Our growing season is quite short, (mid May through to mid Oct as we are at altitude, and the first frosts kill most things). I did cabbage, carrots, onions in the greenhouse for the first time this winter (just gone) and did reasonably well.

Our dirt is clay and rocks, and compacts down at the slightest thing, so I have to aireate around the plants 2 or 3 times or they get stunted.

Last year, only the potatoes/onions did well, everything else was poor... very depressing. Hoping for a better show this year, we had early rain, and I have watered more this year so fingers crossed. ☺️

I am still learning container gardening and yes, the soil gets compacted quickly. Sometimes I move the plants around and try to loosen the soil as I can without harming the plants, but it isn't easy. I started a new back garden this year, container, with metal and I loved the design of the all inclusive unit, but now I am seeing the flaws of it. rain with the cover just breaks the plastic bar top. And so far in this huge raised bed, the only things I get growing are a couple of tomatoes and strawberry plants, but I can't seem to keep it moist and it drys out way too fast. And i filled it with cut logs/branches, shredded junk mail and paper, and a lot of flower/vegetable dirt for the raised bed. Sigh, I am still working at this one container raised bed.

I have raised beds in the green house and one on the patio. they are 2ft wide and 2 ft tall, so I do not have to bend as much.

I filled them with the cheap garden soil from Home Depot, its supposed to be mixed in with your ground soil, but as I detest my actual soil, I was disinclined to use it.

The first year I was a bit disappointed in production, nothing seemed to thrive.

As I put winter veg in the greenhouse beds I was watering regularly. Now, the decomposition has turned it into what looks like soil, as opposed to mulch (which is what it kinda looked like out of the bag.)

Try putting a closhe over the bed to help retain moisture, or, it may be you will need to water morning and evening until the decomposition reduces the material and retains water.

Raised beds will get a bit warmer as the sides are exposed, you may need to put a shade cloth up. I have shade cloth over the S end of my greenhouse beds, for the peppers and tom's, as the afternoon sun is brutal here.

Yes, I have a green shade cloth over it now and removed the coverings that came with it. I am not into watering it morning and night, but once per day. Perhaps that is where I am going wrong, but then again we have all these storms lately and lots of rain. But still it does not hold in the water and drys out. I believe you are correct and mulch from the box stores. Currently I use Lowes dirt.

You could also try soaker hoses - let them go until it is wet all the way down, the water tends to go under faster. I had them for a while, but the minerals in the water clogged them up, so I water in the am every day when it's 85 and over - we have not had any rain since May, and it's our hottest part if the year now, we have very low humidity too.

When I had shorter beds (1ft tall), I had to water after the Sun set too, it's just so hot here. (N AZ -1° to 113° are the temps I have seen in 10 years living here). It was a pain, but I did get some brilliant tomato harvests 😁