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Guy at the lumber yard told me to skip the pressure treated for my raised beds, and now I'm second guessing everything
I was picking up cedar for two 4x8 raised beds at the yard off Route 9 and the guy loading me said pressure treated is fine now since they stopped using arsenic back in 2003. I almost switched my whole plan right there because it would've saved me about $60 a bed. Then I got home and read that the modern stuff still uses copper compounds that can leach into soil, and some folks say don't grow root veggies in it for the first year or two. I ended up sticking with cedar but now I keep wondering if I overpaid for nothing. Anyone here actually grow tomatoes in PT beds and notice anything weird with the plants?
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sean1198d ago
My buddy built four PT beds back in 2019 and planted tomatoes, peppers, carrots, the whole deal right away. First season the tomatoes did fine, but his carrots came out stunted and kind of bitter, and he swore the soil smelled like pennies when he turned it. He ran a soil test after year two and copper was way higher than his other beds, so he ripped them all out and went cedar. Said the $200 he saved up front cost him way more in lost veggies and hassle. Not saying that happens to everyone, but it scared me off PT for anything I'm eating out of.
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