What Is Terrace Gardening?

If your backyard is a grassy, rolling hill or a rocky, steep incline, terrace gardening can turn it into a palette of colorful swaying flowers or trailing vines of fruits and vegetables. Terrace gardening uses a series of retaining walls to create level steps that are filled with soil. In these steps, you can grow most garden plants, including trees and shrubs.

Any sturdy material that can retain the weight of wet soil can be used to build terrace steps into the side of a slope. Classic materials include field stone, bricks, lumber and cement blocks. The material you use depends on the look you want to create in your yard, the steepness of the slope and the type of plants you plan to grow. For example, if you plan to grow vegetables in your terrace garden, don’t use a material that could leach toxic substances into the soil. Understand that plants with deeper root systems require deeper beds and sturdier material than shallow beds. If the slopes are steep or your area experiences earthquakes, the structure may need to be more elaborate.

If you’ve tried growing flowers on a steep slope and had them wash away, along with the mulch that took you hours to haul uphill, you’ll find terracing ends most erosion when done correctly. Though terracing stops erosion, water within the garden still needs to be managed, especially in large beds, to prevent the weight of the soil and water causing walls to collapes. Water from a rainstorm, freezing and thawing, or overwatering the garden soaks soil and increases pressure on walls and can lead to buckling. Avoid this by following local codes, using the right materials and integrating a drainage system into the terraces. Hire a professional for terrace walls that will be more than 1 to 2 feet high.

Part of the joy of a garden is caring for it and enjoying its natural beauty. Large terrace gardens with wide paths should be designed with this in mind, including access paths to every area of the garden for weeding, deadheading and picking fruits and vegetables. You might also want to create a level place in the garden for a bench so you can sit and gaze at the hydrangeas (Hydrangea spp.), which grow in U.S. Department of Agriculture zones 3 through 9, or breathe in the fragrant honeysuckle (Lonicera spp.), which grows in USDA zones 5 through 8, while you watch butterflies flit about.

Almost any plant of any size can be grown in a terrace garden as long as the beds are large enough to house the plant. One thing to keep is mind is that water runs downhill. When top beds are watered, some water leaches downward through the soil, watering beds below. To prevent under- and overwatering, plant drought-tolerant plants in the top bed and plants that can withstand wetter conditions in bottom beds. Choose plants based on the amount of sun and heat the slope receives, keeping in mind that south-facing slopes receive more sun and are hotter as are western-facing slopes. North-facing slopes are cooler and spend more hours in the shade.