Oh no! You have horsetail, Equisetum arvense, in your raised beds. There are a few questions about getting rid of it on here, you could do a search. I suspect you might have to empty the beds and add a stout membrane at the bottom to stop them coming up; they are quite resistant to chemical treatment.

Kurtail (was Kibosh) could be the answer to your problem. I know it is quite expensive but it is possible that horse tail will get through most barriers; I have seen it come up through asphalt. Have a look at their web site. Horse tail (often confused with mare's tail (hippuris vulgaris), mares tail is an aquatic weed.

Picking them out religiously or mushing them between stones and then applying a strong herbicide will kill Horse/marestail over time. This is a 2 year job. Get the flowering stalks first to stop them spreading more!

It's b*^^"% horrible stuff. I had loads of it in my garden when we moved here. Don't try and dig it up. Any small of root left in will grow a new plant. I have managed to almost get on top of it after 9 years! One of the things I do now when I see young growth, is to wear a rubber glove, spray some Roundup onto the glove and crush the horsetail whilst applying the roundup from my glove. But, you have to keep at it I'm afraid. The roots are said to go down as far as 2 meters (and more)!

It could be, that to try and eradicate it from your raised beds, is to empty them of any flowers/veg and tread down the horse tail in order to crush it. Soak it with round up (crushing it beforehand will help to break it's thick silicone type coating) and cover with thick black plastic sheeting. Bare in mind that I was advised to leave the black sheeting in place for about a year!

I agree with Botanic, that you should try and catch it at it's very early stage of growth (around early march). It spreads by sending out spores before it gets to the stage it is in your photo.

Good Luck!

When i took over my work garden 15 years ago, i had the damn stuff in one of my beds. Cleared the bed out and sprayed with strong glyphosate continuously for 10 years. Thought i'd got it all.

Planted bed up 5 years ago and now it's everywhere again.

grow your veg in large pots stood on top of barrier until you have sorted problem, at least you will be able to start cropping, and then follow all advice above. I have thick horticultural membrane covered in shingle and it still gets through, but have found the new Resolva 24 a reasonable deterrent, but needs repeating. (mix of glyphosate and diquat). Mind you my shrub bed that had the bindweed problem responds well to thick carpet as a barrier (i put bark on top) and as long as you zap escapees they will give up in the end. (for a while!!)

Oh Lord, I thought I had horsetail years ago and got rid of it with vinegar, but it wasn't the same as this. No wonder when I recommended vinegar to people to kill horsetail it didn't work. Apologies then to several,people.

Was the original horsetail in the same place as your raised beds, Hank. If so, tough, you have a problem. But, if the site of the raised beds did not have horsetail then it must be coming from the compost in the beds. In this case I would suggest dismantling the beds and clearing all the roots out of the compost before you build the beds back again.

OMG, B, as you said - I have a problem. Yes, the original "horsetail" was in the same place but it wasn't quite like this stuff, and as I said, vinegar killed it quite easily.
Anyway, this new stuff is interspersed among my lettuce and onions etc so I'll keep pulling it up as best I can for now and do the big job later in the year. Thanks.
What I don't understand though is the fact that I've treated all 3 beds in exactly the same way but one is completely unaffected. But I'm grateful for small mercies.

All I want now is for my apple tree to get codling moth and ruin most of the apples as it did last year and my cup will runneth over.