Your Edging Solution

Since the weather has turned nice out and gardeners are hard at work freshening up their gardens, I though I would discuss the use of a natural or Victorian edge. I recently wrote a response to a question on edging for Fine Gardening Magazine, so I thought I could briefly touch on the subject here:

A trip to any home improvement store or garden center will provide you with many different options for edging your garden beds. With so many products available its hard to know which product will work the best, and edging materials can add up to be pretty expensive – money most of us would rather invest in plants. The most common options for edging seem to be: wood (in the form of railroad ties or landscape timbers), metal (aluminum or steel), plastic (that dreadful black roll top), concrete, stone pavers and bricks. Some of these can but good edgers (metal for example is a great edger for hardscapes), but most of these I would not recommend. Most people are after low maintenance for everything in their garden – even edging. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as a maintenance free edging. Turf grass and weeds can easily grow between pavers or concrete edgers, plastic edging gets eaten up by passing mowers, wood rots, and in our part of the country most edgers can get heaved out of the ground during freeze-thaw cycle.

The best bet for an economical solution for a bed edge is a natural trenched edge (AKA Victorian edge. This is the most cost effective solution – all it takes is a little elbow grease. For this type of edge, use a sharp spade to cut vertically into the turf at the edge of the bed. Then remove soil to a depth of 3 to 4 inches at a 45 degree angle to the freshly cut edge. With a rake smooth out the remaining soil (see picture below). To maintain the edge, it should be retrenched in spring or as needed. Not only is this edge easy and cost effective, it also blends into the landscape, letting the plants be the focal point.