What soil and plants to use in Arizona heat in raised beds.

Equal parts peatmoss, compost, top soil and either pearlte or vermiculite raised beds act as containers, they will dry out quicker. Consider an irrigation set up. It waters just the plants and thier roots, not the whole yard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bdkpZef6RA

In most of AZ you can plant year round. I would get your spring crops in now as it is already getting hot. Any nursery will have a good bulk or bagged fruit and vegetable mix soil that is perfect for raised beds. Here are some Arizona specific garden sites.

http://tucson.com/lifestyles/tucson-gardening-a-blow-by-blow-look-at-raised-beds/article_c58a8ab6-da97-556a-9207-e44bcc7b76f4.html

https://southwestgardener.com/category/raised-beds/

https://delange.org/Arizona_Raised_Bed_Vegetable_Gardens/Arizona_Raised_Bed_Vegetable_Gardens.htm

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/242068548696545519/

Happy gardening! 🌱

Hello Dcardelli4, I have two raised beds and I used good dirt and miracle grow and mixed it together good and I also use plant food from miracle grow. I live in the Northern part of Texas and it's all red, red clay. Good luck.

We live in the Phoenix area and have raised planters for our garden... we have found that the galvanized stock tanks work well and we built 2 large planters 3 ft wide by 8 ft long.. built of 2 x 6 lumber... no bottom just landscape fabric.... we have found that most things peter out as soon as the temperatures get over about 105... some tomatoes hang in there but don't bloom or make tomatoes until fall when the temps drop again AND all of our raised beds have a shade structure built over them, using the shade cloth available at Lowe's , etc. in the garden department....

We originally put the Kelloggs potting soil in all of them... it was TERRIBLE.. this year we replaced all but the bottom foot or so with Miracle Grow Garden soil or the fertilizer mulch mixed and sold by Jackrabbit Nursery (Jackrabbit Rd. south of the I 10... go past Yuma rd. )

We have blackberries, boysenberries, and asparagus growing in the shade of a large mesquite tree in halves of 55 gallon plastic barrels (available on Craig's list and at most feed stores) and the cucumbers did well all summer... the whole key in AZ is water and a shaded area.