 Marcia Helen Suss, NDSU Extension Agent in McKinsey County. Today I'm at the McKinsey County Fairgrounds where we plant Junior Master Garden Program in our raised beds. We have had this program for about eight years and our raised beds weren't great for planting the gardens with the kids. Our beds are eight by four and they're filled with topsoil and each year we fill them with soil amendments to keep them nice and rich and they work great. Today we're going to show you how we plant in our raised beds. First off, when we work with our kids, we decide what we're going to plant where. We start with our vining plants that we will plant vertically. That would be things like peas, like cucumbers, and tomatoes which will plant in cages. Then we look at the plants that we will plant singly like peppers, like potatoes, things like that. Lastly, we look at the plants that will plant in rows so that would be things like radishes, onions, beans, lettuce, things like that. We decide with the kids what we want to plant where. Usually we plant the things that we want to plant vertically on the outer rows. Today we have three year master gardener and 4-H here with us, Darby, who's going to show us how she plants a few things in her garden. Today I'm going to show you how to plant peas. You need to dig a one-inch hole to basically the size of your fingertip and then you have to put the peas in. They're going to have to be about half an inch apart and then cover them up. Next I'm going to show you how to plant onions. So you need to dig a hole that's like the perfect size for the onions so they can just go right in. And the only thing that you want to see on the onions is the very top, like that. Thank you Darby. Warfwood gardening in raised beds is sometimes called condensed gardening because you can plant a lot of vegetables in a small space. Once the kids have all their beds planted, we make maps of where everything is planted so that they have a history of what they planted where. We do not want to plant the same vegetables in the same spot every year. Also when the vegetables emerge then we know what is coming up, as well as we label all the rows too so that everything is labeled, of course. Okay so we planted three rows after the vegetables emerge. I'll line all the rows with soaker hoses which would be about 25 feet of hose. And after the vegetables emerge, guess what else emerges? The weeds. So we have to keep the weeds pulled just as much as you can and in time the vegetables take over and weeding is not a problem in the raised beds. So in summary, raised beds are great ways to plant for beginning gardeners to plant with kids. You get a lot of vegetables in a small amount of space. You have to decide what you're going to plant where, rotate your crops, and then make sure you keep after weeding so that it does not become a problem. Every year the raised beds are always a great fun and a highlight of my summer. So enjoy planting raised beds. Give it a try. I know you'll enjoy it. Thank you.